description
- SENSE will deliver a harmonised system for the environmental impact assessment of food&drink products. The research will evaluate existing relevant environmental impact assessment methodologies, and consider socio-economical, quality and safety aspects, to deliver a new integral system that can be linked to monitoring and traceability data. The system will integrate: (a) (regionalised) data gathering system; (b) matrix of key environmental performance indicators; (c) methodology for environmental impact assessment; and (d) a certification scheme. The methodology will be transferred to food&drink sectors and stakeholders by means of specific communications strategies. SENSE will validate the new harmonised system in the juice, meat&dairy and aquaculture chains. However, the methodology and its associated software will be modular allowing its implementation in any food product. The sustainability information collected along the production cycle of any food stuff and reflected into the EID (Environmental Identification Document) will be accessible by the EID-Communication Platform, contributing to make the environmental sustainability part of the usual purchasing behaviour of consumers and provide a competitive advantage to those products which choose to use the EID. Main results of SENSE will be: (i)Standard key environmental performance indicators (KEPI); (ii)Harmonised methodology for environmental impact assessment; (iii)SENSE-tool for environmental data collection; (iv)EID and EID-Communication Platform; (v)Certification Scheme Concept (CSC) for sustainability; (vi)Roadmap for policy and governance implementation. SENSE consortium is formed by a multidisciplinary team involving 23 partners from 13 countries made up by a combination of complementary profiles: research organisations, food and drink SMEs, environmental and LCA experts, SMEs for dissemination and communication and European food Associations.