Positive Food: the first sustainability food label arrives

Not just calories and nutrients. Soon on the labels of the food products we buy we will also be able to read information on their environmental but also social sustainability thanks to Positive Food, the first food labeling system that also provides information on the sustainability of the products, born in Italy as a certification to make consumers aware of a more conscious nutrition. The new label was presented today in Rome by the Milan Center for Food Law and Policy, an internationally recognized association set up with the aim of following up on the themes of Expo Milano 2015 “Feeding the planet, energy for life”.

The first sustainability label

The project, developed with the scientific know-how of the University of Milan and in collaboration with the Mission Structure for National Anniversaries and National and International Sporting Events – Presidency of the Council of Ministers, represents a novelty on the world food scene because Positive Food is the first label that bases the evaluation of a food going beyond the nutritional information content. Through this certification, the consumer who purchases a food product will be able to learn about the values ​​associated with the various dimensions of the sustainability of the food and the relative supply chain, from the ethical-social to the nutritional one.

Shopping with sustainability in mind

While the nutritional aspects are an intrinsic characteristic of the products, the environmental, social and economic aspects, as they have been identified, are the result of company or sector choices. “For example – he explains Stefano Corsiscientific coordinator of the Positive Food project and professor at the Department of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences of the University of Milan – a company that decides to use only renewable energy sources to produce a cheese can have a higher environmental index, as well as another company that applies welfare policies will be able to show superior performance in relation to people, and finally a company that invests in innovation, in the territory or in the circular economy will have a higher score in relation to the supply chain”. At the same time, Positive Food aspires to trigger a virtuous system that stimulates companies to implement strategies aimed at improving the various dimensions of sustainability.

The four indices of the label

Several interdisciplinary research teams from the University of Milan have worked for the creation of the Positive Food label which was developed starting from four fundamental indices for a food product: the environment, people, the supply chain and nutrients. “The information systems currently on the market – explains Corsi – provide partial information, usually limited to nutritional data, i.e. the caloric intake, the quantity of fats, proteins, carbohydrates and salt. None of these systems, however, provides information about the sustainability of the supply chain and related agri-food products”. Positive Food represents the first sustainability labeling for food products: “It is a new voluntary certification model that provides the consumer with a concise but complete assessment of the sustainability of the products, indicating, alongside the nutritional characteristics, also the economic, social and environmental aspects“, adds Corsi. Positive Food provides a scoring system for each of the four indexes, from 0 to 5 in which the higher the score, the greater the overall sustainability of the product and the supply chain.

Environment and food

By now, even consumers are well aware that nutrition and the environment are closely linked: to be good, a product must respect the environment and it is important that its impact is transparently known. Only in this way can nutrition become truly healthy and, above all, conscious. The objective of this index is to clarify how much a product impacts on climate change, on land use, on the depletion of mineral and energy resources, how much water resources are affected, how much food contributes to the ecotoxicity of fresh water. In this way, consumers will be able to better understand the real impact that a product has on the planet and consequently make responsible and informed choices.

Food and people

The other index taken into consideration by the label is that relating to people. In what sense? “At the origin of good food there is always the well-being of male and female workers, who can produce the best only thanks to fair conditions. The economic and social sustainability of each product allows for the creation of a virtuous circle which feeds a transparent production cycle and responsible consumption and is based on objective and recognized criteria, including the well-being of workers, inclusion and diversity, social innovation, employment and gender equality”, replies Corsi.

The role of the supply chain

The new sustainable labeling system provides comprehensive information about a food product. This means clearly and transparently reporting a score relating to the supply chain and all the steps and processes involving a food, from its origin to the final sale. “Territoriality and traceability, social promotion, innovation, circular economy and animal welfare are indicators that will be represented to provide the consumer with a picture of the food product along the entire supply chain”, explains Corsi.

Indication of nutrients

To complete the sustainability label there is also information on nutrients which is often the first index of information towards which consumers, increasingly educated in terms of food education, turn. “The Positive Food labeling system – explains Corsi – restores the value of nutrients, in particular by focusing in this first phase on three indices relating to nutrients which represent the elements of greater nutritional importance in dairy products such as the calcium content, the of proteins compared to fats and salt.These indicators are not alternatives to nutritional labels and furthermore, a method of integration with information relating to portions and frequencies of consumption indicated in the Guidelines for a Healthy Italian Diet for the type of product”.

What the new label looks like

Unlike the other interpretative labels, Positive Food has a uniform blue color which leaves the consumer free to choose: “This labeling model – explains Corsi – goes beyond the limits of traffic light coloring (green, yellow and red) which necessarily implies an implicit evaluation of authorization to consume, corresponding to green, and vice versa of a ‘prohibition, when the score falls in the red spectrum. This approach risks triggering unwanted mechanisms of possible excessive consumption in the first case and renunciation in the second, when instead a healthy diet corresponds to a balanced consumption of a wide variety of products”.

How to read the new label?

What will we find on the new label? A number representing the average of four indices (Environment, People, Supply Chain and Nutrients) and a QR Code which leads to a report hosted on the Positive Food website where the consumer can read and analyze the data, methodology and results that led to that score.

The next steps

The new label will come issued to manufacturing companies on a voluntary basis and in this first phase of the work, an analysis was carried out on the dairy products sector by simulating the Positive Food label for semi-skimmed milk which is one of the most consumed products. After the presentation of the project, the reaction of the companies is awaited: “We are enthusiastic about the project and we are positive on the fact that the certification will see validation on the national territory and in various supply chains in the coming months”, declares Pierfilippo Giuggioli, project manager for the Milan Center for Food Law and Policy.

“Our utmost commitment will be to provide consumers with shared and clear data and references, additional tools to make informed choices, making citizens and companies an active part in the ecological transition process for economic development that respects the environment and its sustainability We have already had requests from some companies and it is possible that in a few months we will see the first products with the new label on the shelves, thus anticipating the European regulation“.