Geotraceability and life cycle assessment in environmental life cycle management: towards sustainability

Sustainability is an emerging concept in product chains and integrates environmental, social, and economic aspects during the product's life cycle. Recently, the demand for environmental quality has required information about the products' life cycle. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) includes the inventory analysis, where the inputs, outputs and feedback mechanisms of matter and energy for each phase of the product life cycle are systematized, and the Life Cycle Impact Assessment, when the environmental impacts potentials are calculated. A powerful tool to describe the history, use, and location of a product is called geotraceability. This paper presents an environmental life cycle management for storing and retrieving product life cycle data within a food chain (tracing), as well as following the location of the product in real time (tracking), particularly for recall operations in case of a crisis. Information about inputs and outputs can be structured and integrated through LCA. Geographic information can be obtained from satellite imagery and positioning systems. The development and integration of these tools will add value to products and enhance food safety to consumers, as well as the environmental quality within the production area, fostering environmental sustainability to the product life cycle.