SHARP-Indicators Database towards a public database for environmental sustainability

Elly Mertens; Gerdine Kaptijn; Anneleen Kuijsten; Hannah van Zanten; Johanna M Geleijnse; Pieter van 't Veer

doi:10.1016/j.dib.2019.104617

SHARP-Indicators Database towards a public database for environmental sustainability

Data Brief. 2019 Oct 7:27:104617. doi: 10.1016/j.dib.2019.104617. eCollection 2019 Dec.

Authors

Elly Mertens¹, Gerdine Kaptijn¹, Anneleen Kuijsten^{1

2}, Hannah van Zanten³, Johanna M Geleijnse^{1

2}, Pieter van 't Veer^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Division of Human Nutrition and Health, Wageningen University, PO Box 17, 6700 AA Wageningen, the Netherlands.
² TiFN, Wageningen, P.O. Box 557, 6700 AN Wageningen, the Netherlands.
³ Animal Production Systems Group, Wageningen University & Research, PO Box 338, 6700 AH Wageningen, the Netherlands.

Abstract

To initiate the achievement of an European-wide applicable public database for indicators of environmental sustainability of the diet, we developed the SHARP Indicators Database (SHARP-ID). A comprehensive description of the development of the SHARP-ID is provided in this article. In the SHARP-ID, environmental impact assessment was based on attributional life cycle analyses using environmental indicators greenhouse gas emission (GHGE) and land use (LU). Life cycle inventory data of 182 primary products were combined with data on production, trade and transport, and adjusted for consumption amount using conversions factors for production, edible portion, cooking losses and gains, and for food losses and waste in order to derive estimates of GHGE and LU for the foods as eaten. Extrapolations based on similarities in type of food, production system and ingredient composition were made to obtain estimates of GHGE and LU per kg of food as eaten for 944 food items coded with a unique FoodEx2-code of EFSA and consumed in four European countries, i.e. Denmark, Czech Republic, Italy and France. This LCA-food-item database can be linked to food intake data collected at the individual level in order to calculate the environmental impact of individual's diets. The application of this database to European survey data is described in an original research article entitled "Dietary choices and environmental impact in four European countries" (Mertens et al., 2019).

Keywords: Diet; Environment; Europe; Food; Greenhouse gas emission (GHGE); Land use (LU); Life cycle analyses (LCA).