Search

In the latter half of the twentieth century, particularly in developed countries, a growing awareness of the environmental impact of personal choices—encompassing climate, pollution, land degradation, and biodiversity loss—resulted in an upsurge of environmental labels on goods. Environmental labels play a crucial role in assisting consumers in selecting environmentally superior products, fostering market development towards eco-friendly production systems, and serving as a foundation for product differentiation and increased product value. Despite a growing public interest in environmental quality and climate change, surveys reveal a gap between consumers’ environmental attitudes and actual purchasing behaviour. In addition, concerns about the complexity and cost of certification systems have arisen, with fears of creating market barriers for small producers. This review aims to provide an overview of environmental labelling in the context of animal food products, emphasising social and regulatory aspects, exploring technical considerations of life cycle thinking approaches in certification schemes, and discussing the pros and cons of standardising procedures for the development of multi-dimensional environmental labelling in the animal food sector.

The dairy industry’s contribution to global warming has been thoroughly examined. However, it is important to raise public awareness of emission hotspots and the possibility of mitigation in dairy supply chains. This study assessed the Carbon Footprint (CF) of five dairy products through a cradle-to-grave Life Cycle Assessment approach and evaluated the carbon sink potential of some practices. The functional units were 1 kg of fresh raw milk, yogurt, fresh cheese, mozzarella cheese, and aged cheese. The data collected were related to an extensive dairy farm, a cheese-factory, two markets, a delivery service, and a court of consumers. The CFs were 4.39, 5.10, 9.82, 8.40, and 15.34 kg CO2 eq. for fresh raw milk, yogurt, mozzarella cheese, fresh cheese, and aged cheese, respectively. The hotspots of the dairy supply chain considered herein refer to farm activities and energy consumption, whereas conservative agriculture practices and rotational grazing sequestered 1.60 ± 0.80 kg CO2 eq. per kg of dairy product consumed. The CF was reduced by 0.14 kg CO2 eq. for 1 kg of dairy product delivered at home compared to direct purchasing at a market. The carbon sink capacity of dairy farms appeared as a primary mean for mitigating climate change in the dairy supply chain.

This study presents a comprehensive assessment of the Water Footprint (WF) for buffalo mozzarella production and consumption relative to an area in central Italy with a high concentration of buffalo farms. Using the Water Footprint Network (WFN) methodology, the consumption of green, blue, and grey water fractions (Wfc) throughout the supply chain has been examined.The study encompassed nine buffalo dairy farms, two cheese factories, four retail outlets, and a cohort of 243 consumers, providing a comprehensive overview of the entire process from raw milk production and mozzarella cheese making to the final stage of home consumption. The results of the study were expressed as litres of water per kg of consumed buffalo mozzarella cheese. The total WF was 6820 ± 1490 L per kg of mozzarella, with green, blue, and grey Wfc contributing for 59%, 12%, and 29%, respectively. The green Wfc was predominantly influenced (88%) by off-farm feed. The blue Wfc was also primarily affected by off-farm feed (61%), followed by on-farm crop irrigation, buffalos’ drinking water and cheese factory operations. Home consumption had a negligible impact on the overall WF. The grey Wfc brought to light environmental concerns, primarily due to nitrate leaching. Although off-farm crops had a remarkable effect on the grey Wfc, the cultivation of on-farm crops was responsible for 69% of this fraction. In particular, a significant part of the grey Wfc originated from on-farm areas left fallow for parts of the year, leading to no uptake of residual nitrogen by crops.Adhering to WFN guidelines, this research not only expands knowledge on the WF of buffalo mozzarella, but also highlights critical water hotspots. It underscores the necessity for dairy farmers to refine irrigation and soil management, incorporating precise irrigation and crop rotation strategies, to mitigate the impacts on Wfc efficiently.

Public opinion about environmental aspects is generating a widespread concern, which contributes to lead consumers to choose sustainable products. Livestock systems are responsible for the emissions of different pollutants and, as a consequence, this is reflected in the environmental sustainability of animal-based products.This study was aimed at evaluating the environmental impacts of buffalo mozzarella cheese with a cradle-to-grave life cycle assessment approach from the primary production of milk to the end-of-life of buffalo mozzarella cheese. The functional units were 1 kg of buffalo Fat and Protein Corrected Milk (FPCM) evaluated at farm gate and 1 kg of consumed buffalo mozzarella cheese evaluated at consumers’ home.The study enrolled 9 buffalo dairy farms, 2 dairy plants and 4 markets where 243 customers were surveyed. Processes of raw milk production, mozzarella cheese making, transports, retail and home consumption were considered. The accounted environmental impacts were: climate change (CC), terrestrial acidification (TA), freshwater eutrophication (FE), marine eutrophication (ME), ozone depletion (OD), ecotoxicity (EC), human toxicity (HT), land use (LU) and fossil depletion (FD). Buffalo farming was the primary hotspot accounting for more than 50% throughout all impact categories and having a major role in CC, TA, FE, ME, OD and LU. The energy consumption of cheese making had a contribution of 29% in HT, whereas the use of high-emitting vehicles by consumers accounted for 23% and 17% in EC and FD, respectively. To reduce several sources of pollution and mitigate the environmental impacts of buffalo mozzarella cheese, the LCA hotspots identification can lead to the development of specific mitigating strategies to improve sustainability along the supply chain. The development of farm-based models may better assess environmental impacts, the mitigation achieved by the implemented best practices and the “pollution swapping” effect to evaluate the effectiveness of the mitigation strategy.

Natural parks (NPs) have a primary role in supporting people’s welfare by maintaining natural and cultural resources. Various activities, such as those related to conservation of flora and fauna, forestry, agriculture and livestock, residential, and tourism, coexist within the boundaries of NPs. All these activities may contribute as a source or sink of carbon dioxide and, despite some NPs having started to promote their environmental services, there is currently a lack of information on their carbon footprint (CF). Although various international standards have provided guidelines to assess the CF of organizations, a lack of explicit formulation and procedure in these standards makes them difficult to apply, especially when the organizations to be evaluated embed a wide range of biological and anthropogenic activities. The framework proposed in this paper provides for the first time a holistic methodological approach to quantitatively and qualitatively estimate the annual greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and removals occurring in NPs. The main data needed for the NP’s GHG inventory were directly collected on-site. The activity data and emissions factors as well as the methodologies involved were all referenced to their data sources, including the use of a biogeochemical model, IPCC equations, Ecoinvent database, and a literature review. This method highlighted that, by emitting 0.55 Mg CO2e ha−1 year−1, the NP generates an annual CF of about 3,300 Mg of CO2e. The agricultural activities with 43.4% of share showed the largest incidence, followed by wild fauna (17.8%), tourism (15.1%), and, to a lesser extent, all the other sectors considered in the assessment. On the other hand, when the annual soil and forest C sequestration rates were included in the balance, the NP contributes to sequester about 3.7 Mg CO2e ha−1 year−1, thus resulting in it being an important C-sink site (i.e., about 22,000 Mg CO2e year−1). By providing granular information on GHG emissions and carbon removals trend, the methodological approach involved in this study could help NPs in both planning effective mitigation strategies and supporting environmental certification processes. CF of NPs could increase tourists’ awareness of the important role that these protected natural areas have in climate change mitigation and adaptation.

A better understanding of soil organic carbon (SOC) dynamics is needed when assessing the carbon footprint (CFP) of livestock products and the effectiveness of possible agriculture mitigation strategies. This study aimed (i) to perform a cradle-to-gate CFP of pasture-based beef cattle in a Mediterranean agropastoral system (ii) and to assess the effects on the CFP of alternative tillage, fertilizing, and grazing practices under current (NCC) and future climate change (CC) scenarios. Minimum (Mt) and no-tillage (Nt) practices were compared to current tillage (Ct); a 50% increase (Hf) and decrease (Lf) in fertilization was evaluated against the current (Cf) rate; and rotational grazing (Rg) was evaluated versus the current continuous grazing (Cg) system. The denitrification−decomposition (DNDC) model was run using NCC as well as representative concentration pathways to investigate the effects of farm management practices coupled with future CC scenarios on SOC dynamics, N2O fluxes, and crop yield. Within NCC and CtCf, an emission intensity of 26.9 ± 0.7 kg CO2eq per kg live body weight was estimated. Compared to Ct, the adoption of Mt and Nt reduced the CFP by 20% and 35%, respectively, while NtHf reduced it by 40%. Conservation tillage practices were thus shown to be effective in mitigating greenhouse gas emissions.