REVIEW PAPER
Carbon Footprint: an Ecological Indicator
in Food Production
Adam Więk, Katarzyna Tkacz
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Department of Industrial Commodity Science, Bases of Technique and Energy Management,
University of Warmia and Mazury, 10-726 Olsztyn, Poland
Pol. J. Environ. Stud. 2013;22(1):53-61
KEYWORDS
ABSTRACT
Decreasing energy resources, world population growth, and the development of societies based on the
principle of sustainable development are the main factors increasing the importance of ecological aspects of
production and consumption. One of the proposals taking into account the ecological aspect is the introduction
of an ecological indicator – carbon footprint – characterized by all kinds of products and services. The
proposed methodology for determining the value of carbon footprint does not include some important elements.
Identified problems in this work are an unreliable estimation of greenhouse gas emissions and differences
in the value of the carbon footprint (depending on the farming techniques used and the manner of its
expression).
The aim of our study was to analyze the available literature data on the size of its carbon footprint during
the production of animal materials. The tool used to determine the CFP value was life cycle analysis
(LCA). A study of the literature showed that the CFP value in the production of pork in various agricultural
systems ranges from the 2.06 kg CO2eq/kg (good agricultural practice) to 3.97 kg CO2eq/kg (organic agricultural
production).