A large share of the food produced never gets eaten. This phenomenon, known as Food Loss and Waste (FLW), represents one of the most pressing sustainability challenges of our time. Every tomato that spoils in the field, every pepper discarded at the supermarket, and every plate of salad left uneaten at home embodies an environmental impact that often remains hidden.
In recent years, environmental Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has emerged as a powerful tool. By quantifying the environmental footprint of food along its entire cycle — from field to fork — LCA helps us understand where losses occur, what resources are wasted, and how we can act more effectively to reduce their impacts. In the context of fruits and vegetables, especially in the Mediterranean region encompassing Europe and MENA countries (Middle East and North Africa), this approach is particularly relevant. These products are perishable, resource-intensive, and central to regional diets and economies.
Understanding Food Loss and Waste: More Than Just Leftovers
FLW are often used as a single expression, but they represent different stages of the problem. Food loss occurs along the early stages of the supply chain — during production, postharvest handling, storage, and processing — while food waste typically happens at the retail and consumption stages. Both forms lead to similar consequences: resources are used without yielding the intended benefit of feeding people.
Globally, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates that around one-third of all food produced for human consumption is lost or wasted each year. In the case of fruits and vegetables, the rates are even higher due to their perishability. Heat, inadequate storage, inefficient logistics, and market standards for appearance all contribute to this inefficiency. According to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), around 931 million tonnes of food were wasted globally in 2019, accounting for approximately 8–10% of global greenhouse gas emissions, once the resources used for food production are taken into account.
But what truly makes FLW critical from an environmental standpoint is that wasted food carries the entire burden of its production — the water used to irrigate it, the fertilizers applied to grow it, the energy spent to refrigerate it, and the emissions released during its transport. When food is discarded, all those impacts have occurred for nothing. The environmental dimension of FLW extends far beyond the visible waste. When fruits or vegetables rot, greenhouse gases such as methane are released, contributing to climate change.
Why Measuring Environmental Impact Is Essential?
Quantifying these impacts allows us to identify which parts of the chain have the greatest potential for improvement. That is where LCA becomes indispensable. This is a standardized method (ISO 14040–14044) used to evaluate the environmental performance of products or systems throughout their entire life cycle — from the extraction of raw materials to production, distribution, use, and disposal. In the food sector, it provides a comprehensive view of how agricultural inputs, processing technologies, packaging, and transport contribute to impacts such as: climate change, water scarcity, eutrophication, acidification, and resource depletion.
For instance, applying LCA enables researchers and policymakers to answer these key questions:
- Which stages of the supply chain contribute most to the environmental footprint?
- How many emissions are released for every kilogram of crop produced?
- Which interventions would bring the greatest reductions in environmental impact?
Supporting Circular and Sustainable Solutions
Accounting for environmental impacts through LCA does more than provide numbers — it helps guide decisions and policies. For example, LCA can support the design of circular strategies that transform unavoidable losses into new resources. However, not all valorisation pathways are equally sustainable, and LCA helps determine which ones truly reduce the overall footprint.
Moreover, environmental accounting can help align local actions with global goals, such as the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 12.3, which calls for halving per capita global food waste and reducing losses along production and supply chains by 2030, as well as with the European Union’s Farm to Fork Strategy, which aims to reduce the environmental impact of food systems and promote more sustainable production and consumption patterns.
A Call for Integrated Action
LCA plays a key role in bridging the gap between producers and consumers by making visible how decisions taken at every stage of the food chain — from agricultural practices and postharvest management to retail strategies and household behaviour — shape the overall environmental footprint of food systems. By revealing these interconnections, LCA helps all actors better understand their influence and supports more informed, sustainable choices.
In this context, the environmental LCA will be carried out by the Universidad Politécnica de Cartagena (UPCT) as part of the FUSION (PRIMA project), titled “Comprehensive and sustainable solution to minimize food loss and waste and promoting food security in the Mediterranean region”. This analysis provides a robust scientific basis to identify critical loss and waste hotspots across the food supply chain and to evaluate effective mitigation strategies tailored to the Mediterranean context.
To truly make progress, the insights gained from LCA need to be translated into practical actions at multiple levels:
- At the field level, evaluating climate-resilient tomato and pepper crop species better adapted to future environmental conditions, with the aim of reducing vulnerability to losses and lowering the associated environmental footprint.
- At the postharvest stage, assessing the potential of solar-powered portable cold storage and technologies that support shelf-life determination or extension — such as ethylene absorption systems or IoT tools — to prevent early losses and reduce the environmental impacts linked to energy use and food waste.
- Across handling and storage processes, exploring cold plasma as an advanced disinfection approach to improve product preservation while minimising environmental burdens.
- Evaluating circular approaches for the valorisation of unavoidable by-products, ensuring that these solutions effectively reduce overall environmental impacts and contribute to FLW reduction.
Environmental LCA should not be treated as an isolated tool but rather integrated into a common sustainability framework that also considers economic costs and social dimensions. This integrated approach ensures that strategies to reduce food loss and waste are environmentally effective, economically viable, and socially fair.
Dr. Laura Rasines Elena (Researcher on LCA, PRIMA project, UPCT).
