Purpose Changes in the consumption of protein-rich foods are needed due to their high environmental impacts. However, proteins are indispensable for human nutrition, and there is notable variation in the protein quality of protein-rich foods. The methods to consider protein quality in Nutritional Life Cycle Assessment (nLCA) are still developing. In this study, we assessed the impact of including protein quality in single- and...

Purpose Nutritional aspects have recently been integrated into the life cycle assessment (LCA) of foods through the use of nutrient indices as functional units (nFU). In this study, we develop the nFU indices for each product group presented in the Spanish plate model, by adapting the approach introduced in our previous studies into a Spanish context. Methods The product grouping followed the Spanish plate model covering prote...

Purpose The contribution of milk on the environmental and nutritional impacts of diets is substantial especially in countries with high consumption rates of dairy products, such as in the Nordic countries. Due to environmental and health reasons, plant-based drinks (PBDs) are gaining popularity among consumers, but the nutritional composition of PBDs varies depending on their base ingredients and possible fortification. This s...

Purpose Recent methodological developments have integrated nutritional aspects into life cycle assessment (LCA) by using nutrient indices as functional units (nFUs). Previous developments have focused on protein-rich foods, but environmental impacts and nutritional composition vary across products in other product groups, highlighting the need to develop nFUs also for other product groups. Here, we present product-group-specif...

Purpose Substitution of animal-source foods with plant-based alternatives requires product-specific information from both the environmental and nutritional perspectives. The use of nutrient indices as nutritional functional units (nFUs) in Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of food products has been developed to integrate nutritional aspects into the method (nLCA). However, the methodological approaches vary because the execution of...

Purpose Agricultural land use and land-use change, especially from forests to agricultural land, to satisfy growing demand for food and feed, is a major cause of global biodiversity loss. International trade connects food consumption to land use across the world, leading consumption in one area to affect ecosystems elsewhere. However, methods for evaluating the effects of food consumption on biodiversity are still under develo...

Purpose Beef and dairy production systems produce several by-products, such as fertilizers, bioenergy, hides, and pet foods, among which the environmental impacts arising from production should be allocated. The choice of allocation method therefore inevitably affects the results of life cycle assessment (LCA) for milk and beef. The aims of this study were to map out the different allocation methods used in dairy and beef LCA...

Purpose Currently, there is no consensus on how the impacts of land use on the soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks would be best quantified within life cycle assessments (LCA) of agricultural products. The impacts of different decisions were tested within a model-based assessment of soil carbon changes on the life cycle global warming impact for spring wheat produced in two example regions in Finland (Southwest Finland and Northe...