Requirements on Consumer Information about Product ... - ANEC

Consumer Information about PCF
Administration’s environmentally effective food choices” 17 . The Swedish guidelines aim to
support food choices that lead to a “reduced climate impact, non-toxic environment, varied
agricultural Iandscape and rich diversity of plant and animal life.” Therefore, greenhouse gas
emissions are one important aspect, but by far not the only one: land use, water demand,
eutrophication, acidification, toxic substances, biodiversity, soil erosion.
The focus on CO2e probably does not bear the risk to adversely affect other environmental
aspects. But this is still unclear due to the lack of data. Until now, no eye-catching adversely
effect could be identified.
It can be concluded that guidelines like the Swedish ones on environmentally effective food
choices – eat less meat in general and less beef in particular etc. – are more appropriate
than CO2 figures on products. Besides that, such guidelines can focus on the important
issues and the relevant products. Such information could also complement existing bio
labelling. Perhaps graphical illustrations of typical food CO2 patterns as shown in Table 5
and Table 6 (maybe placed in supermarkets) will be also useful.
6.6 Category 3 (products with relevance to climate at production phase)
Example 2: Textiles
Due to the lack of data (statistical data on textile consumption and PCF data on different
textiles), a concluding statement concerning the overall relevance of textiles and home
textiles in the context of climate relevant emissions cannot be given.
According to the available data, the PCF of textiles is relatively low compared to other
product groups like cars, food etc. (see e.g. Quack and Rüdenauer 2007). Additionally, a
high share of the PCF of textiles (except for some home textiles) occurs during the use
phase (see e.g. ISR 2009) which is already covered elsewhere (household appliances:
washing machines, tumble dryers, vacuum cleaners).
There already exist the following approaches (e.g. rankings, rating system):
• With the EU flower, textiles can be labelled that are manufactured in an environmentally
friendly way and that cause less water pollution then conventionally manufactured
ones. There is a variety of different products currently labelled.
• In Australia too, a type I Australian Ecolabel e.g. Woven Image (2009) exists, that takes
into account the whole life cycles of textiles.
17 The National Food Administration's environmentally effective food choices. LIVSMEDELS VERKET
NATIONAL FOOD ADMINISTRATION. Proposal notified to the EU 15.05.09. Download available under:
http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/tris/pisa/cfcontent.cfm?vFile=120090292EN.DOC
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