Food innovation community EIT Food has announced a partnership with non-profit organisation Foundation Earth to develop internationally adopted and accepted standards for the environmental scoring of food and drink.
Foundation Earth already provides front-of-pack environmental scores for food products, but the new International Alliance for Food Impact Data will aim to address the lack of standards and coordination between stakeholders. The Alliance will initially focus on the EU policy landscape, with the belief that any future EU-mandated standards are likely to be of the highest level.
As part of the partnership, Foundation Earth has been integrated into EIT Food, which is supported by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (an EU body). Following the integration, Foundation Earth Chief Executive Cliona Howie will become the Director of Data Impact Systems at EIT Food, with responsibility for the International Alliance for Food Impact Data.
“This new Alliance will help put an end to unnecessary competition and enable us to leverage a new platform to convene a real solution with a clear roadmap, in the public service,” she said. “Our focus will be on driving large-scale impact that works across the whole food system and transforming the environmental credentials of the continent’s food and drink industry.”
“Key lever of change”
Amid growing calls for the adoption of environmental labelling on food products, several brands have chosen to do so voluntarily, such as Quorn, Upfield, and One Planet Pizza. ProVeg International argues that environmental scoring is an important way of communicating the sustainability benefits of a plant-based diet, but also emphasises the importance of standardising the methods used to calculate impact in order to avoid confusion.
“Environmental data is a key lever of change for food systems transformation,” said Richard Zaltzman, Chief Executive Officer at EIT Food. “We are absolutely delighted to integrate the knowledge and capacity of Foundation Earth into EIT Food, which will enable us to take strides towards our shared mission of transforming the food system with credibly collected, measured, and evaluated impact data. This will form the basis for decision-making across the food and drink industry, policy, future-proofing innovation in our sector, and enabling us to reduce the environmental impact of the entire food system.”