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

GROUP 5, SESSION B: FOOD PRODUCTS 8 th Int. Conference on LCA in the
Group 5, Session B: Food Products
Agri-Food Sector, 1-4 Oct 2012
123. Ecodesign opportunities for a farmer’s bread. Two case studies
from north-western France
Michal Kulak , Thomas Nemecek 1 , Emmanuel Frossard 2 , Gerard Gaillard 1
1 Agroscope Reckenholz-Tänikon Research Station ART, Zurich, Switzerland, 2 Institute of Agricultural
Sciences, ETH Zurich, Switzerland, Corresponding author. E-mail: michal.kulak@art.admin.ch
Bread is a staple food item for Europeans. Its history can be traced back to the beginning of our civilisation.
However, due to industrialisation and urbanisation, its production processes have notably changed over time.
Some consumers believe that organoleptic and nutritional qualities of the product were affected as a result of
these changes. There are farmers in Brittany and Pays de la Loire regions, who reintroduce many of the forgotten
bread production methods from pre-industrial era. They collect ancient varieties of cereals and cultivate
them in an organic way. Some use horses for traction. The grain is milled on-farm and the bread is
baked and sold locally. This way, a unique product is created. Sometimes though, this is done at the expense
of the environment as traditional methods are not necessarily more ecoefficient. Van Holderbeke et al.
(2004) compared environmental impacts from bread production in Belgium in the year 1800, 1900 and 2000.
The life cycle carbon footprint results were 1.2 kg CO2eq kg -1 , 1.1 kg CO2eq kg -1 and 0.6 kg CO2eq kg -1 respectively.
The goal of this study was to measure environmental impacts of French farmer’s bread and explore
opportunities for changes in the design of production and distribution processes that would allow
minimising environmental impacts while maintaining the positive attributes of this distinctive product to the
consumer.
Data on farming practices, processing and distribution of bread were collected from two producers in northwestern
France. Recent version of Swiss Agricultural Life Cycle Assessment (Nemecek et al., 2008) tools
and ecoinvent database were used to assess environmental impacts from the field to the consumer’s table.
The functional unit was 1 kg of bread delivered at home and ready for consumption. End-of life processes-
human excretion and wastewater treatment were excluded from the analysis. Impact categories were selected
to reflect a broad range of environmental effects, including global warming contribution, the use of natural
resources and potential toxicity. Results of the studies were disseminated to the farmers. Semi-structured
face-to-face interviews were conducted to choose promising ecodesign strategies- ones that would be effective
in reducing environmental impacts and also accepted by the producer and his consumers.
Table 1 shows a comparison of LCA results expressed per 1 kg of bread. Factor 8 differences in total result
exist between the two farms for some impact categories. This suggests significant differences in ecoefficiency
may be achieved with different production methods. Fig. 1 shows the contribution of the particular
production stages into the overall environmental impact in Case 1. Most environmental impacts come from
the wheat cultivation, followed by distribution and baking. There are strategies that can improve the ecoefficiency
and would be accepted by the producer. The first solution would be to expand the relative area with
the cereals and use mechanical traction, instead of using the land to produce feedstuff for horses. At the same
time, wheat variety currently cultivated by the farmer provides relatively low yields in the given soil conditions.
It is expected, that choosing a variety better adapted to local conditions would improve the product
environmental performance. It may also be possible to change the proportion of flour in the bread recipe. A
higher proportion of crops that grow better than wheat, such as rye could be used. It may also be feasible to
optimise baking and distribution processes. Fig. 2 shows results for the second producer. Changing the crop
or variety can also be considered here. A large share of the impact comes from the baking process. This is
mainly done in the oven at consumer’s home. Baking the bread on-farm in a more efficient oven or forming
a partnership with the baker could potentially add value to the sold product and at the same time reduce environmental
impacts.
References
Nemecek, T., von Richthofen, J., S., Dubois, G., Casta, P., Charles, R, Pahl, H. 2008. Environmental impacts
of introducing grain legumes into European crop rotations. Eur. J. Agron. 28, 380-393.
Van Holderbeke, M., Sanjuán, N., Geerken, T., De Vooght, D. 2004. The history of bread production. Using
LCA in the past, in: Halberg, N. (Ed.), Life Cycle Assessment in the agri-food sector. Danish Institute of
Agricultural Sciences, pp. 255-260
Table 1. Selected environmental impacts from 1 kg farmer’s bread at the consumer’s table of two case study
farms in North-Western France.
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