Prevenção do desperdício alimentar sob a avaliação de ciclo de vida : ferramenta e aplicação em casos práticos

Abstract

This thesis has as main subject the study of food wastage (food losses and waste) and how Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) can be implemented into this topic regarding prevention of food wastage. The main objective is to build an LCA-based tool which allows assessing environmental avoided impacts due to prevention of food wastage strategies. In order to do that, a literature review of the main approaches used is performed and some guidelines are proposed. Along with these and the main tool, two practical cases are assessed, both located in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. One of them assesses the potential avoidable food wastage and associated carbon footprint in two restaurants, the other assesses a prevention strategy from wholesales to consumption, in a social restaurant, also from a climate change perspective. Auxiliary research yields that little data is currently available in Brazil regarding food wastage amounts, a setback in the study of LCA practical cases. Nevertheless, some proposals are posed for future research when such data becomes available in order to assess several prevention strategies in Brazil, for decision makers in public policy or private stakeholders.