Assessing the Environmental Sustainability of Food Packaging: An Extended Life Cycle Assessment including Packaging-Related Food Losses and Waste and Circularity Assessment

Erik Pauer, Bernhard Wohner, Victoria Heinrich and Manfred Tacker
Additional contact information
Erik Pauer: Section of Packaging Technology and Resource Management, University of Applied Science, 1030 Vienna, Austria
Bernhard Wohner: Section of Packaging Technology and Resource Management, University of Applied Science, 1030 Vienna, Austria
Victoria Heinrich: Section of Packaging Technology and Resource Management, University of Applied Science, 1030 Vienna, Austria
Manfred Tacker: Section of Packaging Technology and Resource Management, University of Applied Science, 1030 Vienna, Austria

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 11, issue 3, 1-21

Abstract: Food packaging helps to protect food from being lost or wasted, nevertheless it is perceived as an environmental problem. The present study gives an overview of methods to assess the environmental sustainability of food packaging. Furthermore, we propose a methodological framework for environmental assessment of food packaging. There is a broad consensus on the definition of sustainable packaging, which has to be effective, efficient, and safe for human health and the environment. Existing frameworks only provide general guidance on how to quantify the environmental sustainability of packaging. Our proposed framework defines three sustainability aspects of food packaging, namely direct environmental effects of packaging, packaging-related food losses and waste, as well as circularity. It provides a list of key environmental performance indicators and recommends certain calculation procedures for each indicator. The framework is oriented towards the Product Environmental Footprint initiative and the Circular Economy Package of the European Union. Further research should develop a method to determine the amount of packaging-related food losses and waste. Moreover, future studies should examine the potential environmental benefits of different measures to make food packaging more circular.

Keywords: food packaging; environmental sustainability; life cycle assessment; circular economy; food losses and waste; sustainability framework (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (30)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/3/925/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/3/925/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:3:p:925-:d:205009

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().