Ecolabels are marks placed on product packaging or in e-catalogues that can help consumers and institutional purchasers quickly and easily identify those products that meet specific environmental performance criteria and are therefore deemed “environmentally preferable”. Ecolabels can be owned or managed by government agencies, non-profit environmental advocacy organizations, or private sector entities.
Eco labels can be single-attribute, meaning they focus on a single lifecycle stage (i.e. the use phase) of a product/service or a single environmental issue (i.e. VOC emissions). They can also be multi-attribute, meaning they focus on the entire lifecycle (manufacture, use, maintenance, disposal) of a product/service and address many different environmental issues (i.e. energy use, chemical use, recycling, and more).
Foundation Earth
Foundation Earth is an independent, non-profit organisation issuing front-of-pack environmental scores on food products, helping businesses build a more resilient and environmentally sustainable food system while giving consumers the tools they need to make sustainable buying choices. They bring together scientists and leading figures from food production and retailing who all share a vision of a food industry that doesn’t destroy the planet.
Our food systems are complex. If we want to truly change the way we produce and consume food, we need to take a systemic approach and involve all actors from business to academia, policy makers and citizens. Foundation Earth is innovating to develop an optimum methodology that measures the environmental impact of food products and provides an easy-to-understand front-of-pack score for consumers.
They score products by carrying out Life Cycle Assessments (LCA) focusing on high-quality data (as opposed to more general averages), that not only allow their eco impact scores to be as accurate as possible, but also helps brands identify where improvements can be made in their supply chain. Foundation Earth is currently trialling two pilots comparing different methodologies, with the aim to harmonise learnings and develop a single system aligning with European Union PEF guidelines.
The Foundation Earth front-of-pack label is designed to give consumers the information they need to choose more sustainable food products. Their scores range from A+ to G and are re-certified yearly, making it possible for product owners to improve their production and grade over time. They know that to provide the best scoring system means growing with the science and consistently integrating new learnings. That’s why they are engaged in Research & Development activities that draw the best elements of different methodologies to produce a scientifically robust and widely accepted method that accounts for the true environmental impact of food production.
A consumer generally takes a few seconds to make a purchasing decision – especially consumables that are part of our everyday shop. At the same time, 49% of consumers now consider sustainability when buying food. Foundation Earth knows that communicating environmental impact data can be complex, making it hard to choose products sustainably: that’s why they aim to make their ecolabel as accessible as possible all the while providing transparent data. They undertake constant research on consumer behaviour to test reactions to their label, collect feedback and make it easier for everyone to understand their scoring system clearly and accurately.
Life Cycle Analysis
Life cycle analysis (LCA) is an essential tool in establishing baseline environmental impacts from a specific process, product, or infrastructure, and can also connect economic and social impacts depending on the end goal. Ideally, the main outcome of an LCA is a detailed quantitative documentation of environmental impacts for a process or product from cradle to grave, meaning cultivation and manufacturing of each feedstock to the end use or disposal. The analysis may include one or multiple impacts with the most common being: greenhouse gas (GHG) and other air emissions, water use and pollutants, energy usage, and waste production.
When conducting an LCA it is important to consider the implications of system boundaries, feedstocks, energy use, co-product emission allocation methods, product end use, and differences in framework guidance. LCA experts have experience with many applications of life cycle analysis and can help clients navigate the complex nature of LCA implementation, as it can be a large undertaking. An LCA expert can evaluate products and processes to benchmark against industry norms or identify opportunities to reduce those impacts. Taking the LCA application one step further, an LCA expert can tie LCA and business models together to optimize that balance of impacts and operations for a more sustainable solution.
Eco-labelling Era
A survey from the Carbon Trust asked 10,000 consumers across France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, the UK and the US for their take on carbon labelling on groceries. 51% admitted that they did not think about the carbon impact of products when making choices at the supermarket, but more than two-thirds said they would support carbon labelling. Most of this cohort said such labels would encourage them to change their purchasing choices.
Some brands sold in supermarkets have added carbon labels to their packaging, including Flora’s parent company Upfield, energy drink challenger Tenzing, Quorn Foods and plant-based milk brand Oatly.
The practice of carbon labelling is also becoming increasingly popular for catering firms with contracts with some of the UK’s most popular sports and music events and tourist attractions, like Benugo and Compass Group.
Eco-labelling was also one of the key recommendations from Chris Skidmore’s Net-Zero Review. The Review, published last month, sets out more than 120 recommendations for policy recommendations to deliver a more ‘pro-growth, pro-business’ pathway to net-zero by 2050. While many recommendations relate to energy and industrial infrastructure, Skidmore also accounts for the need to better engage and inform the general public, flagged by the Public Accounts Committee.
One engagement-related recommendation is the implementation of standardized environmental labelling on as many product categories as possible by 2025. This includes ecolabels on things like lightbulbs, which the Government is keen on, and on consumer goods including food and drink.
Abel & Cole
Abel & Cole is claiming a UK first by becoming the first retailer to introduce eco labelling across its entire fruit and veg range. The box scheme specialist has begun using Foundation Earth eco-impact labelling, with products scored on impacts such as CO2 emissions and water pollution.
Foundation Earth aims to unite the food industry behind a single eco-labelling system by working with Life Cycle Assessment experts to gather data and map supply chains. Foundation Earth has already successfully piloted its traffic light-style system of labels.
Abel & Cole’s sustainable sourcing manager Ed Ayton said: “We know it can be difficult to tell how sustainable something actually is. Often, that kind of information just isn’t shown on the packaging, so customers are left making decisions without all the facts. ”If biodiversity impact was on ingredient lists, every pound would be a vote. Eco-labels like Foundation Earth’s present those facts at a glance, giving customers the knowledge they need to enjoy a more sustainable shop.”
Abel and Cole have already submitted the data for 87 of its fruit and veggie lines to the Foundation Earth eco-label team. There are currently 456 eco labels in use around the world, but Foundation Earth – an independent non-profit organisation – is aiming to unite the food industry behind a single labelling system that uses lifecycle assessments.
There are many different types of impact that a product can have, such as toxicity to humans, or ozone depletion. For Abel & Cole’s work with Mondra, grades are calculated as follows:
- Map supply chains
The first step is to map out every process that goes into making a product, across the following five stages: Farming – Transport – Processing – Packaging – Retail.
- Gather data
Information gathered directly from its suppliers is called ‘primary data’. Primary data is crucial to building an accurate picture of their impact.
- Fill the gaps
When primary data can’t be sourced directly from suppliers, Mondra draws on information from other areas. ‘Secondary data’ can be obtained from other pre-existing research, or a proxy model can be built to estimate the results.
By rating the performance of farmers against the data of Oxford University’s HESTIA database, and factoring in the impact of transportation, processing and packaging, a final score from A+ to G can be produced for the four different impacts. This is then reworked into a single grade, which can be easily displayed on the packaging or website as an eco label.
In order to reliably condense the impact grades into a single score and encourage action where it’s needed most, each stage of the supply chain and type of impact is weighted differently in the final score. For example, farming contributes more to the final score than any other stage, given that is where most of a product’s impact happens.
Abel & Cole says it wants to know how effective eco labelling is for encouraging shoppers to eat more sustainably, and so it has teamed up with Oxford University to look at the impact on its shoppers’ choices. It will be working with the same team that introduced the nutritional traffic light system to food products. ”As well as influencing customer behaviour, eco labelling is also an important tool for helping brands make their products more sustainable,” the company added. ”By mapping supply chains and detailing the impact of each process involved, a business can see where the most effective improvements can be made. For example, our work with Mondra highlighted the impact of the packaging used to transport items. We’ll be working closely with our suppliers to increase the number of reusable containers used in our supply chain, to combat this impact.”