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How to Obtain Forty Percent Less Environmental Impact by Healthy, Protein-Optimized Snacks for Older Adults

It is well known that meals containing less meat are more sustainable, but little is known about snack-meals, which typically do not contain meat. This study investigates the diversity in environmental impacts associated with snack production based on 20 common recipes optimized for protein content,...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Saxe, Henrik, Loftager Okkels, Signe, Jensen, Jørgen Dejgård
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2017
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5750932/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29211041
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph14121514
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author Saxe, Henrik
Loftager Okkels, Signe
Jensen, Jørgen Dejgård
author_facet Saxe, Henrik
Loftager Okkels, Signe
Jensen, Jørgen Dejgård
author_sort Saxe, Henrik
collection PubMed
description It is well known that meals containing less meat are more sustainable, but little is known about snack-meals, which typically do not contain meat. This study investigates the diversity in environmental impacts associated with snack production based on 20 common recipes optimized for protein content, energy content and sensory aspects for older adults. The purpose is to improve sustainability of public procurement by serving more sustainable snack-meals. Public procurement serves Danish older adults over millions of snack-meals every year, and millions more are served in countries with a similar social service. The environmental impact of snack production was estimated by consequential life cycle assessment. The average impact of producing the 10 least environmentally harmful snacks was 40% less than the average impact of producing the 10 most harmful snacks. This is true whether the functional unit was mass, energy, or protein content, and whether the environmental impact was measured as global warming potential or the monetized value of 16 impact categories. We conclude that large-scale public procurement of snack-meals by private and municipal kitchens can be reduced by up to 40% if the kitchens evaluate the environmental impact of all their snacks and serve the better half more frequently.
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spelling pubmed-57509322018-01-10 How to Obtain Forty Percent Less Environmental Impact by Healthy, Protein-Optimized Snacks for Older Adults Saxe, Henrik Loftager Okkels, Signe Jensen, Jørgen Dejgård Int J Environ Res Public Health Article It is well known that meals containing less meat are more sustainable, but little is known about snack-meals, which typically do not contain meat. This study investigates the diversity in environmental impacts associated with snack production based on 20 common recipes optimized for protein content, energy content and sensory aspects for older adults. The purpose is to improve sustainability of public procurement by serving more sustainable snack-meals. Public procurement serves Danish older adults over millions of snack-meals every year, and millions more are served in countries with a similar social service. The environmental impact of snack production was estimated by consequential life cycle assessment. The average impact of producing the 10 least environmentally harmful snacks was 40% less than the average impact of producing the 10 most harmful snacks. This is true whether the functional unit was mass, energy, or protein content, and whether the environmental impact was measured as global warming potential or the monetized value of 16 impact categories. We conclude that large-scale public procurement of snack-meals by private and municipal kitchens can be reduced by up to 40% if the kitchens evaluate the environmental impact of all their snacks and serve the better half more frequently. MDPI 2017-12-06 2017-12 /pmc/articles/PMC5750932/ /pubmed/29211041 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph14121514 Text en © 2017 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Saxe, Henrik
Loftager Okkels, Signe
Jensen, Jørgen Dejgård
How to Obtain Forty Percent Less Environmental Impact by Healthy, Protein-Optimized Snacks for Older Adults
title How to Obtain Forty Percent Less Environmental Impact by Healthy, Protein-Optimized Snacks for Older Adults
title_full How to Obtain Forty Percent Less Environmental Impact by Healthy, Protein-Optimized Snacks for Older Adults
title_fullStr How to Obtain Forty Percent Less Environmental Impact by Healthy, Protein-Optimized Snacks for Older Adults
title_full_unstemmed How to Obtain Forty Percent Less Environmental Impact by Healthy, Protein-Optimized Snacks for Older Adults
title_short How to Obtain Forty Percent Less Environmental Impact by Healthy, Protein-Optimized Snacks for Older Adults
title_sort how to obtain forty percent less environmental impact by healthy, protein-optimized snacks for older adults
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5750932/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29211041
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph14121514
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