IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v16y2024i23p10658-d1537152.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Bridging Nutritional and Environmental Sustainability Within Planetary Boundaries in Food Life Cycle Assessments: SWOT Review and Development of the Planet Health Conformity Index

Author

Listed:
  • Toni Meier

    (Institute for Sustainable Agriculture and Food Economics (INL) e.V., 06114 Halle, Germany)

  • Susann Schade

    (Institute for Sustainable Agriculture and Food Economics (INL) e.V., 06114 Halle, Germany)

  • Frank Forner

    (Institute for Sustainable Agriculture and Food Economics (INL) e.V., 06114 Halle, Germany)

  • Ulrike Eberle

    (Corsus—Corporate Sustainability GmbH, 20459 Hamburg, Germany
    Corsus Research gUG, 20459 Hamburg, Germany)

Abstract

To promote sustainable food choices, it is essential to provide easily understandable information that integrates health, environmental impacts and planetary boundaries. For this purpose, the Planet Health Conformity Index (PHC) was developed and tested. Current labels, such as the Nutri-Score for health and the Eco-Score for environmental impacts, provide separate information, which may result in consumers receiving conflicting messages. The PHC combines these dimensions into a single label, aligning with consumer demand for clearer guidance and fostering sustainable food consumption and development. Methods: The PHC assesses 18 nutrients and five environmental impacts—Global Warming Potential (GWP), cropland use, freshwater use, nitrogen application (N-min) and phosphorus application (P-min)—within the framework of planetary boundaries. Six different algorithm designs, varying in capping and weighting, were tested on 125 food products from the German market. The analysis compared mass-, energy- and multi-nutrient-based functional units. Results: Under mass- and energy-based units, many products meet planetary boundaries. However, incorporating nutrient profiles often leads to exceeding these boundaries (exceedance rate PHC: GWP: 38% of products transgressed the boundary, cropland use: 41%, freshwater use: 27%, N-min: 34%, P-min: 71%). Accordingly, the PHC contextualizes nutritional strengths and weaknesses environmentally. Moreover, it disaggregates the Planetary Health Diet (PHD) at the nutrient level, facilitating adaptation to individual nutritional needs. Conclusions: Traditional food Life Cycle Assessments should include nutrients in the functional unit and consider planetary boundaries to enable more accurate food comparisons. The PHC presented here takes these aspects into account. In addition, its dual-factor approach, integrating health and environmental metrics, ensures broad applicability. Thus, the PHC Index can be applied not only to single food items but also to recipes, dishes, menus and entire diets.

Suggested Citation

  • Toni Meier & Susann Schade & Frank Forner & Ulrike Eberle, 2024. "Bridging Nutritional and Environmental Sustainability Within Planetary Boundaries in Food Life Cycle Assessments: SWOT Review and Development of the Planet Health Conformity Index," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(23), pages 1-20, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:16:y:2024:i:23:p:10658-:d:1537152
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/23/10658/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/23/10658/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Catherine C. Ivanovich & Tianyi Sun & Doria R. Gordon & Ilissa B. Ocko, 2023. "Future warming from global food consumption," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 13(3), pages 297-302, March.
    2. Andreas Oehler & Stefan Wendt, 2017. "Good Consumer Information: the Information Paradigm at its (Dead) End?," Journal of Consumer Policy, Springer, vol. 40(2), pages 179-191, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Cruciani, Caterina & Santagiustina, Carlo R.M.A., 2023. "The present and future of sustainability disclosure in equity investment funds’ pre-contractual documents: Mapping ESG discourse through STM," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 58(PA).
    2. Sebastian Bachler & Felix Holzmeister & Michael Razen & Matthias Stefan, 2021. "The Impact of Presentation Format and Choice Architecture on Portfolio Allocations: Experimental Evidence," Working Papers 2021-15, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck.
    3. Uddin, Main & Wang, Liang Choon & Smyth, Russell, 2021. "Do government-initiated energy comparison sites encourage consumer search and lower prices? Evidence from an online randomized controlled experiment in Australia," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 188(C), pages 167-182.
    4. O. Seizov & A. J. Wulf & J. Luzak, 2019. "The Transparent Trap: A Multidisciplinary Perspective on the Design of Transparent Online Disclosures in the EU," Journal of Consumer Policy, Springer, vol. 42(1), pages 149-173, March.
    5. Terence J. McElvaney & Peter D. Lunn & Féidhlim P. McGowan, 2018. "Do Consumers Understand PCP Car Finance? An Experimental Investigation," Journal of Consumer Policy, Springer, vol. 41(3), pages 229-255, September.
    6. Bonnet, Céline & Coinon, Marine, 2024. "Environmental co-benefits of health policies to reduce meat consumption: A narrative review," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    7. D. Scheld & O. Stolper & A. Walter, 2021. "Double Dutch Finally Fixed? A Large-Scale Investigation into the Readability of Mandatory Financial Product Information," Journal of Consumer Policy, Springer, vol. 44(2), pages 151-178, June.
    8. Klaus G. Grunert & Yanfeng Zhou & Marija Banovic & Natascha Loebnitz, 2021. "Supermarket competence in emergent markets: Conceptualization, measurement, effects, and policy implications," Journal of Consumer Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(4), pages 1633-1659, December.
    9. Umberto Filotto & Caterina Lucarelli & Nicoletta Marinelli, 2018. "Nudge of shared information responsibilities: a meso-economic perspective of the Italian consumer credit reform," Mind & Society: Cognitive Studies in Economics and Social Sciences, Springer;Fondazione Rosselli, vol. 17(1), pages 1-14, November.
    10. Nelė Jurkėnaitė, 2023. "Analysis of the Nexus between Structural and Climate Changes in EU Pig Farming," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 13(9), pages 1-19, September.
    11. Andreas Oehler & Matthias Horn & Stefan Wendt & Lucia A. Reisch & Thomas J. Walker, 2018. "Young Adults and Their Finances: An International Comparative Study on Applied Financial Literacy," Economic Notes, Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena SpA, vol. 47(2-3), pages 305-330, July.
    12. M. Lundholm, 2021. "Compensation and Socio-Economic Status of Borrowers in Foreclosure: Evidence from Swedish Micro-data," Journal of Consumer Policy, Springer, vol. 44(1), pages 95-116, March.
    13. Andreas Oehler & Matthias Horn, 2021. "Behavioural portfolio theory revisited: lessons learned from the field," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 61(S1), pages 1743-1774, April.
    14. Oehler, Andreas & Horn, Matthias & Wendt, Stefan, 2020. "Information Illusion: Placebic Information and Stock Price Estimates," VfS Annual Conference 2020 (Virtual Conference): Gender Economics 224575, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    15. Bouyssou, Clara G. & Jensen, Jørgen Dejgård & Yu, Wusheng, 2024. "Food for thought: A meta-analysis of animal food demand elasticities across world regions," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:16:y:2024:i:23:p:10658-:d:1537152. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.