Compare methods

	Food-System Life Cycle Assessment	Agrifood Value Chain Analysis
Field	Food Agriculture Studies	Food Agriculture Studies
Family	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
Year of origin	2018	2001
Originator	ISO 14040/14044 LCA framework; food-system synthesis by Joseph Poore & Thomas Nemecek	Raphael Kaplinsky & Mike Morris
Type	Cradle-to-grave environmental modelling pipeline for foods and diets	Field-based value-chain mapping and analysis pipeline
Seminal source	Poore, J., & Nemecek, T. (2018). Reducing food's environmental impacts through producers and consumers. Science, 360(6392), 987-992.	Kaplinsky, R., & Morris, M. (2001). A Handbook for Value Chain Research. Prepared for the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). Brighton: Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex.
Aliases	Food LCA, Agri-food Life Cycle Assessment, Dietary Life Cycle Assessment, Cradle-to-Grave Food Footprinting	Agricultural Value Chain Analysis, Food Value Chain Mapping, Commodity Chain Analysis (Agrifood), Value Chain Governance Analysis
Related	4	3
Summary	Food-system life cycle assessment (LCA) quantifies the environmental footprint of a food, meal or diet across its entire life cycle — from agricultural inputs on the farm, through processing, packaging, transport, retail and cooking, to waste disposal. Following the ISO 14040/14044 framework, an analyst defines a functional unit (such as one kilogram of food, 100 grams of protein, or 1000 kilocalories), compiles a life-cycle inventory of all inputs and emissions at each stage, characterises those flows into impact indicators (greenhouse-gas emissions, land and water use, eutrophication and acidification), and interprets the result with sensitivity and uncertainty analysis. Poore and Nemecek's 2018 Science synthesis, covering tens of thousands of farms worldwide, showed that impacts vary as much as fifty-fold among producers of the same product and that even the lowest-impact animal foods typically exceed plant substitutes — establishing LCA as the central tool for comparing the sustainability of foods and diets.	Agrifood value chain analysis traces a food product through the full sequence of value-adding activities — from input supply and farming through processing, trade, and retail to the final consumer — and asks how value, costs, and power are distributed along that chain and where smallholders and processors can capture more. The method follows Kaplinsky and Morris's influential Handbook for Value Chain Research, which provides the practical apparatus for mapping a chain, quantifying flows and margins, and analysing governance and upgrading. Gereffi, Humphrey, and Sturgeon's theory of global value chain governance supplies the lens for understanding who coordinates the chain and how that coordination shapes the prospects for upgrading.