CARBON FOOTPRINT OF READY-MADE CHILLED MEALS

摘要

Food production chains exert significant stresses on the environment, including impacts on climate change. Developing effective carbon reduction strategies first requires estimation of the carbon footprint of the complete food supply chain, taking a whole life cycle approach. This is not a trivial task as currently scant information exists - while food companies have detailed knowledge about their own business, information about the environmental performance along the whole supply chain is often missing. There is in particular a lack of studies of the life cycle environmental impacts of whole meals. In an attempt to contribute towards a better understanding of environmental impacts of the food supply chains, this paper presents the results of a carbon footprint study of whole, ready-made chilled meals, estimated following the PAS 2050 methodology. Two types of meals are considered: lamb and chicken curry. It has been found that the main contributors to the carbon footprint are meat production and manufacture of the meals. The contribution of transport and refrigeration is relatively small. These results demonstrate that, while it is important to minimise the impacts from these activities globally, much greater improvements in the ready-made meal supply chains can be achieved by reducing the impacts in the agricultural and manufacturing stages.