Food’s impact spectrum: HowGood’s Latis platform leverages Nutri-Score and Eco-Score for better benchmarking

13 Dec 2021 --- HowGood – a SaaS data platform coined as the “world’s largest product sustainability database” – has integrated the EU’s Nutri-Score and French Eco-Score labeling systems into its sustainability intelligence software, Latis, which measures the impact of specific ingredients.

The addition of the European scoring systems allows retailers and brands to easily measure and predict a food product’s nutritional value and environmental credentials, cutting down “hundreds of hours” of research.

With the insights gathered from Latis, F&B businesses can better understand how any changes made in the product development process can impact these scores to ensure their products are universally considered as meeting these standards.

“Perhaps the most important step in the HowGood methodology is the harmonization of all the data we collect, which is done by plotting each practice along a single line for each impact metric – the impact spectrum,” Ethan Soloviev, chief innovation officer at HowGood, tells FoodIngredientsFirst.

“This is done while keeping the entire CPG ecosystem in mind, enabling a clean transition from theoretical to practical application and offering the ability to directly compare one ingredient to another using the same criteria – something that is very difficult, if not impossible, to find elsewhere,” he explains.

“Each ingredient, taking into account where it was grown or produced and under what conditions, is plotted on this impact spectrum from ‘Degenerative’ to ‘Regenerative,’ with ‘Sustainable’ as the midpoint.”

About NutriScore and Eco-Score
Both Nutri-Score and Eco-Score are European scoring systems that award grades to food products on a scale of A to E. 

Nutri-Score measures nutritional value and is calculated by measuring the amount of calories, fat, saturated fatty acids, carbohydrates, sugars, protein, salt and fiber per 100 g of a food product. 

Eco-Score measures a food product’s environmental footprint by summarizing 15 environmental impacts based on life cycle analysis. In recent developments, it was rolled out by the Lidl supermarket chain in the UK at 105 Scottish stores.Both Nutri-Score and Eco-Score are European scoring systems that award grades to food products on a scale of A to E.  

Working with an expansive database
A diverse collection of more than 550 different data sources forms the foundation of HowGood’s database, its key environmental and social impact metrics include greenhouse gas emissions, biodiversity, labor risk and animal welfare, among other benchmarks.

“With Latis, a food formulator could look up any number of ingredients under consideration – we’ll say goji berry, acai, mangosteen and kiwi – and instantly discover, based on the ingredient’s geographic sourcing location or growing certification, how each one performs against all of our impact metrics,” details Soloviev.

“So for example, if that company has a public- or privately-stated goal to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, formulators have the tools to instantaneously optimize their product recipes to reach that goal, cutting out hundreds of hours of frustrating and incomplete research.”

For each source, HowGood performs a data certainty assessment based on the age and comprehensiveness of the findings. 

“This process is completed for every impact metric in the HowGood system and for every ingredient on which there is accurate and verifiable data,” says Soloviev.

“Once the data is collected and analyzed, we conduct a proprietary process of mapping each ingredient to its source crop, animal or material. Using global import/export data and HowGood industry partnerships, we then map each source crop to its corresponding geographic location to account for the specific on-the-ground practices, impacts and risks in each locale.”

Advocates for mandatory labeling schemes
Policymakers across the world are continuing to advocate for mandatory front-of-pack labeling in response to growing concerns about public health, the environment and demand for transparency in the food industry.

According to Innova Market Insights data, consumers now rank planetary health as their number one concern, overtaking personal health, which has been the top priority in recent years. The market researcher recently crowned “Shared Planet” as its Top Trend for 2022 in the F&B space.

Myths and misunderstandings about food sourcing and processing are “crumbling,” Innova Market Insights stresses, and therefore it has never been more important to engage in honest and open communication with consumers.

“Brands are taking big steps to improve their carbon footprint and reduce risk from their supply chains, and we’re excited to aid them in those goals by aligning those insights with marketing considerations, bringing front-of-pack labeling insights directly into the hands of product developers and procurement teams,” underscores Soloviev.

Speaking on behalf of one of HowGood’s clients Danone, Alice Lesaffre, director of open innovation and partnerships, comments: “The in-depth insights we gather through HowGood’s Latis platform are instrumental in helping Danone rapidly and holistically understand the impact of our products as we create them.”

“We anticipate the integration of labeling like Eco-Score and Nutri-Score will help us further improve not only our impact, but also our communications and transparency around consumer health and the environment.”

By Benjamin Ferrer