Optimizing the environmental performance of food product package systems: A lifecycle assessment of the tradeoff's between packaging design and food waste

 As a highly engineered and designed interface between food and the end user, food packaging offers an acute lever for influencing food wastage, both by inhibiting physical and bio-chemical degradation of food, but also by “scripting” individual behaviors around food handling, preparation, preservation and disposal. Yet, in the sustainable food packaging conversation to date, very little attention has been given to packaging’s ability to contribute to net reductions in the environmental impact of food life cycles by reducing food waste.

A primary goal of this research project was to demonstrate the use of life cycle assessment in elucidating the environmental trade-offs between food waste and food packaging. A thorough review of the literature (Section 3) grounds this work in a solid academic foundation among food waste, food packaging, and food life cycle assessment.

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