Nutrition-Oriented Reformulation of Extruded Cereals and Associated Environmental Footprint: A Case Study.

The global food system faces a dual challenge for the decades ahead: to (re)formulate foods capable to feed a growing population while reducing their environmental footprint. In this analysis, nutritional composition, recipe, and sourcing data were analyzed alongside five environmental indicators: climate change (CC), freshwater consumption scarcity (FWCS), abiotic resource depletion (ARD), land use impacts on biodiversity (LUIB), and impacts on ecosphere/ecosystems quality (IEEQ) to assess improvement after three reformulation cycles (2003, 2010, 2018) in three extruded breakfast cereals. A life cycle assessment (LCA) was performed using life cycle inventory (LCI) composed by both primary data from the manufacturer and secondary data from usual third-party LCI datasets. Reformulation led to improved nutritional quality for all three products. In terms of environmental impact, improvements were observed for the CC, ARD, and IEEQ indicators, with average reductions of 12%, 14%, and 2% between 2003 and 2018, respectively. Conversely, the FWCS and LUIB indicators were increased by 57% and 70%, respectively. For all indicators but ARD, ingredients contributed most to the environmental impact. This study highlights the need for further focus on the selection of less demanding ingredients and improvements in agricultural practices in order to achieve environmental and nutritional improvements.

Comparing the Performance of Bread and Breakfast Cereals, Dairy, and Meat in Nutritionally Balanced and Sustainable Diets.

Objective: To quantify the performance of food products in a sustainable diet based on the balance of their contribution to nutrient intake and environmental impact, within the context of the Dutch diet. Design: While fixing the quantity of a specific food group at different levels, optimized diets that met nutrient requirements and stayed as close as possible to the current Dutch diet were calculated, in order to understand its potential environmental impact and its nutritional quality. Bread & breakfast cereals, dairy, and meat were compared between 0 and 250% of current intake. Their performance is expressed in the relationship between the quantity of these food products and (1) the environmental impact of diets and (2) the nutrient balance of the diets. Setting: The Netherlands. Subjects: Women aged 31-50. Results: The amount of bread & breakfast cereals in the optimized diets were inversely correlated with their environmental impact. The nutrient balance of the optimized diets was maintained despite varying cereal content, with the expected improvement over the current diet. Increasing amounts of dairy in the optimized diet were associated with an increase in environmental impact and meat with a steep increase. The nutrient balance of optimized diets with varying dairy and meat contents was also maintained at high levels, even at 0% content. Conclusions: Bread and breakfast cereals are sources of nutrients with a better environmental performance compared to dairy or meat within the context of the Dutch diet. It is possible to optimize diets for environmental impact whilst maintaining a high nutrient balance.

Nutrition in the Bin: A Nutritional and Environmental Assessment of Food Wasted in the UK.

The UK currently has the most detailed, directly measured data for food wasted in the home. This includes information on the exact types of food wasted. These data allow calculation of the nutrients within that waste, as well as its environmental impact. The results progress the conversation beyond how much food is wasted or its energy content; it permits the implications for nutrition and sustainability to be assessed in detail. Data for UK household food waste were expressed as an average waste per capita for each type of food. Each food type was matched with an item (or group of items) from the UK Composition of Foods (7th Ed). The level of nutrients wasted was compared to UK Reference Nutrient Intakes (RNIs) for adult women (19-50 years, used as a proxy for general population requirements). The data were normalized into "nutrient days" wasted per capita per year, then into the number of complete diet days (for 21 nutrients plus energy). Results show that approximately 42 daily diets were discarded per capita per year. By individual nutrient, the highest losses were vitamin B12, vitamin C, and thiamin (160, 140, and 130 nutrient days/capita/year, respectively). For protein, dietary energy and carbohydrates, 88, 59, and 53 nutrient days/capita/year, respectively, were lost. Substantial losses were also found for under-consumed nutrients in the UK: calcium, which was mostly lost via bakery (27%) and dairy/eggs (27%). Food folate was mainly lost through fresh vegetables/salads (40%) and bakery (18%), as was dietary fiber (31 and 29%, respectively). Environmental impacts were distributed over the food groups, with wasted meat and fish the single largest contribution. For all environmental impacts studied, the largest contribution came from agricultural production. This paper shows that there are areas where interventions preventing food waste and promoting healthy eating could work together (e.g., encouraging consumption of vegetables or tackling overbuying, especially of unhealthy foods). Food manufacturers and retailers, alongside governments and NGOs, have a key role to minimize waste of environmentally impactful, nutrient-dense foods, for instance, by helping influence people's behaviors with appropriate formulation of products, packaging, portioning, use of promotions, or public education.

A framework for increasing the availability of life cycle inventory data based on the role of multinational companies.

PURPOSE: The aim of the paper is to assess the role and effectiveness of a proposed novel strategy for Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) data collection in the food sector and associated supply chains. The study represents one of the first of its type and provides answers to some of the key questions regarding the data collection process developed, managed and implemented by a multinational food company across the supply chain. METHODS: An integrated LCI data collection process for confectionery products was developed and implemented by Nestlé, a multinational food company. Some of the key features includes (1) management and implementation by a multinational food company; (2) types of roles to manage, provide and facilitate data exchange; (3) procedures to identify key products, suppliers and customers; (4) LCI questionnaire and cover letter and (5) data quality management based on the pedigree matrix. Overall, the combined features in an integrated framework provide a new way of thinking about the collection of LCI data from the perspective of a multinational food company. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: The integrated LCI collection framework spanned across 5 months and resulted in 87 new LCI datasets for confectionery products from raw material, primary resource use, emission and waste release data collected from suppliers across 19 countries. The data collected was found to be of medium to high quality compared with secondary data. However, for retailers and waste service companies, only partially completed questionnaires were returned. Some of the key challenges encountered during the collection and creation of data included lack of experience, identifying key actors, communication and technical language, commercial compromise, confidentiality protection and complexity of multi-tiered supplier systems. A range of recommendations are proposed to reconcile these challenges which include standardisation of environmental data from suppliers, concise and targeted LCI questionnaires and visualising complexity through drawings. CONCLUSIONS: The integrated LCI data collection process and strategy has demonstrated the potential role of a multinational company to quickly engage and act as a strong enabler to unlock latent data for various aspects of the confectionery supply chain. Overall, it is recommended that the research findings serve as the foundations to transition towards a standardised procedure which can practically guide other multinational companies to considerably increase the availability of LCI data.

Investigacion basica para la industrializacion de aceite de germen de trigo

Este trabajo de grado constituye una respuesta tecnica de investigacion basica ante la inquietud por industrias alimenticias La Estrella y su division molinos, la Empresa Torremolinos, sobre la necesidad de lograr un mejor aprovechamiento del germen de trigo, subproducto de la molienda de trigo. El germen de trigo, subproducto de la industria molinera hasta ahora desaprovechado, puede generar una nueva industria, debido a la presencia de importantes cantidades de substancias suceptibles de ser recuperados y procesadas economicamente. El aceite de germen de trigo a obtenerse tiene un alto costo en el mercado local debido a la ausencia de plantas procesadoras nacionales. El aceite de germen de trigo, debido a su elevado contenido de vitamina E, tiene multiples usos y aplicaciones en la industria farmaceutica, cosmetica y alimenticia. Por otra parte, el germen de trigo desgrasado es utilizado en la industria de panificacion, agroindustria y como fuente de proteina vegetal.

Investigacion basica para la industrializacion de aceite de germen de trigo

Los objetivos de la investigacion son contribuir al cumplimiento de la funcion de investigacion de la universidad, ofreciendo servicios a la industria nacional, mediante el desarrollo de una propuesta alternativa para la industrializacion y aprovechamiento de un subproducto de la molienda de trigo; propiciar un nuevo enfoque y la revalorizacion del germen de trigo, resaltando su alto contenido de vitamina E y otras cualidades; realizar la investigacion basica del mecanismo de extraccion del aceite de germen de trigo por solvente y expresar los resultados mediante el modelo matematico correspondiente; establecer de manera preliminar el proceso adecuado para la industrializacion de aceite de germen de trigo, esto es, su extraccion y posterior refinacion. La investigacion basica para la industrializacion del aceite de germen. adoptando el criterio basico de minimizacion de la perdida de contenido de la vitamina E, comprende las siguientes etapas : Investigación preliminar y recopilación bibliográfica de datos tecnicos, caracteristicas fisico quimicas y formas de procesamiento tanto del germen de trigo como de su aceite. Investigacion del mecanismo de extraccion del aceite mediante solventes. Planteamiento del modelo matematico que describa y represente el proceso de extraccion del aceite de germen de trigo. Eleccion de las variables tales como el solvente de trabajo, relacion optima entre solvente y germen de trigo, tiempo de extraccion, y condiciones de operacion.Investigacion realizada confirma las notables caracteristicas, propiedades y posibilidades del germen de trigo, como materia prima para la fabricacion de aceite, que a su vez tiene importantes atributos que lo convierten en un producto de alto valor comercial por sus múltiples aplicaciones en varias industrias. Las operaciones, ensayos, pruebas y examenes realizados concuerdan plenamente con la literatura existente, habiendose comprado experimentalmente tanto los datos tecnicos como los procesos de extraccion del aceite. El modelo matematico desarrollado responde satisfactoriamente a las condiciones del proceso,representa y describe el mismo en forma clara y eficiente. Los productos obtenidos en el proceso tambien muestran condiciones tecnicas semejantes a las descritas en la literatura y muy favorables como para ser considerados atractivos para su comercialización.