dsm-firmenich and Sustained drive consumer transparency with farm-to-fork ecological footprint tool

07 Nov 2023 --- dsm-firmenich has joined forces with Sustained, a sustainability company providing software services, to enable farmers, processors, food manufacturers and retail brand owners to report the farm-to-fork environmental footprint of food products containing animal proteins, such as eggs, meat, milk and fish. 

By making the footprints accessible to consumers, the partnership aims to support consumer demand for transparent and reliable sustainability data across the entire value chain. 

The partnership will deliver product-level environmental life cycle assessments (LCA) of consumer food products at scale by leveraging dsm-firmenich’s Sustell service — which captures farm-level specific emissions data — together with the Sustained platform that helps food brand owners and manufacturers to more accurately assess their environmental impact from a product and value chain level. 

“Connecting Sustell to the broader data ecosystem through multiple partnerships is key to unlocking the value of sustainability for our customers and the value chain. Our partnership with Sustained underlines our commitment to making this possible,” says David Nickell, VP of sustainability and business solutions at dsm-firmenich, Animal Nutrition & Health. 

Data management needs 
Due to a combination of companies’ commitments, changing regulatory requirements and consumer demand for sustainable products, businesses along the food value chain increasingly need to measure, report and reduce their environmental footprints. Food production and consumption are both significant sources of greenhouse gas emissions. 

The partnership will deliver product-level environmental life cycle assessments of food products with animal proteins.The partnership will support businesses to both manage and communicate the sustainability of food production across supply chains. 

“Until recently, full LCA for farm and food products has been an expensive, manual effort that exceeded the resource capacity of firms with hundreds or thousands of SKUs,” underscores Carl Olivier, co-founder & CEO at Sustained.

“With this partnership, we make data management from farm-to-fork easier to manage and maintain at scale, bringing greater transparency that empowers more sustainable food production and consumption.” 

Driving sustainable food production 
Sustainability factors increasingly influence consumer purchasing behavior, with consumers willing to pay more for greener products and looking for climate-related on-label packaging. According to dsm-firmenich and Sustained, over 70% of consumers consider sustainability a primary driver in purchasing decisions. 

“An accurate, scalable and credible assessment of a product’s environmental impact from farm-to-fork will help inform consumer choice and drive more sustainable food production,” highlights Nickel. 

“The combined platforms empower businesses to set achievable reduction targets, guide new product development, facilitate eco-labeling and ensure compliance with evolving regulations based on real production data.” 

The new partnership is one of several actions by dsm-firmenich to meet the company’s ambitions for accessible, affordable, healthy nutrition and livelihoods within planetary boundaries. 

For example, the company’s first audited results of its progress toward reaching those goals unveiled positive impacts on addressing societal and environmental challenges linked to food consumption and production. 

Earlier this year, dsm-firmenich also partnered with Foundation Earth, a non-profit organization issuing Eco Impact scores on food products, specifically for animal protein products. Under the partnership, dsm-firmenich aimed to undertake LCAs for participating brands under Foundation Earth’s method to empower consumers to make more sustainable food choices. 

By Jolanda van Hal