LCA Food 2012 in Saint Malo, France! - Manifestations et colloques ...

PARALLEL SESSION 5A: FOOD LABELLING 8 th Int. Conference on LCA in the
Agri-Food Sector, 1-4 Oct 2012
3.2 Benchmarking
Although not presented here, the characterised global warming potential impact results (i.e. climate
change) are benchmarked with available international and national research in each PCLCA. The global
warming potential impacts were consistently comparable with the other studies. This is not surprising since
the underlying LCI data to a significant degree was adapted from the benchmark studies, as described in the
paper. Only with indigenous data from industry can we develop a more confident product profile appropriate
for Chile.
4. Discussion
The objective of identifying and reducing environmental impacts, and not merely transferring impacts
across media or stages of the product life cycle, is best served by considering the whole product life cycle
when setting product environmental criteria. That said, we cannot let lack of data or methods hold back progress.
The spirit in which the work was progressed was to take a pragmatic and practical approach to overcome
gaps, and to provide a starting point for improvement, rather than hold back in the absence of confirmed
models and data. In this spirit the team developed provisional normalisation and weighting factors in
order to help interpret the results. The assessments rely on unconfirmed characterisation models for regional
impacts in Chile and the background data was adapted from almost exclusively non-South American process
information.
An anticipated concern for the Chilean industry and stakeholders is that life cycle data and product characteristics
are used correctly and appropriately in communication and use. This especially includes any tools,
methods, ecoprofiles and ecolabels that draw from the participating companies’ data. For this reason, a regional
hub of TSC is being established to provide appropriate regional adaptations and stakeholder engagement.
The retailer and Chilean government are also funding targeted producer initiatives to catalyse the use
of LCA-based tools and methods by retail suppliers.
It is the authors’ view that the goal should include a wide consensus on a consistent level playing field
methodology. Consistency specifically in terms of LCI and allocation but also LCIA, is crucial to enable a
meaningful comparison between products. Solving methodological problems to encompass the breadth of
issues for products sold in retail stores must provide an approach that is similarly consistent and applicable
across a large range of sectors. This is also important in order to avoid the possible misinterpretation or even
misuse of the results themselves.
5. Conclusion
The LCA reported here has shed light on what the main environmental hotspots in the life cycle are. A
consistent and level playing field methodology and active engagement from Chilean stakeholders must be
established for the food sector in order for LCA to provide meaningful and reliable input into decisionmaking.
6. References
Ahlmén, K., Andersson, K., Strömberg, K., & Widheden, A., 2001, LCA Kyckling, by CIT Ekologik and MiljöledarnaCiconia for
SvenskFågel.
Australian Life-Cycle Inventory Database Initiative (AusLCI), 2009, Guidelines for Data Development for an Australian Life-Cycle
Inventory Database, Draft Standard, 29 June 2009.
Barilla, GERF, & Life Cycle Engineering, 2009, Environmental Product Declaration of Durum Wheat Semolina Pasta Produced in
Italy.
Bevilacqua et al., 2007, Life cycle assessment of pasta production in Italy, Journal of Food Quality, 30, 932-952.
Boggia, A., Paolotti, L., & Castellini, C., March 2010, Environmental impact evaluation of conventional, organic and organic-plus
poultry production systems using life cycle assessment, World's Poultry Science Journal, 66.
Bosco, A., Di Bene, C., Galli, M., Remorini, D., Massai, R., & Bonari, E., 2011, Greenhouse gas emissions in the agricultural phase
of wine production in the Maremma rural district in Tuscany, Italy, Italian Journal of Agronomy 2011, 6:e15.
Building Products Innovation Council (BPIC), 2010, Methodology Guidelines for the Materials and Building Products Life Cycle
Inventory, http://www.bpic.asn.au/LCIMethodology.htm [last viewed 3 March 2011].
Cordella, M., Tugnoli, A., Spadoni, G., Santarelli, F., & Zangrado, T., 2008, LCA of an Italian lager beer, LCA Journal, Springer
Verlag.
Franklin Associates, 2006, Life Cycle Inventory of Container Systems for Wine, prepared for Tetra Pak Inc.
Fundación Chile, 2007, Ficha Técnica Ecónomica Para el Cultivo de Alfalfa tipo, Dormancia Media.
Gazulla, C., Raugei, M., & Fullana-i-Palmer, P., 2009, Taking a life-cycle look at Crianza wine production in Spain: Where are the
bottlenecks?, Int J LCA, 15 (4), 330-337
441