The Effect of Active Packaging on Minimizing Food Losses: Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of Essential Oil Component-enabled Packaging for Fresh Beef

Packaging plays an important role in ensuring food safety and quality, and the development of active packaging, especially antimicrobial packaging, enables actively inhibiting/killing the microorganisms causing food spoilage and thus extending the product's shelf life. A survey of the publications revealed that generally 50% shelf life extension is possible. The goal of this study is to assess the overall environmental performance of the food and packaging system considering the effect of food loss reduction by using active packaging. A comparative life cycle assessment has been carried out, focusing on a case study: essential oil component-enabled packaging for fresh beef. Different scenarios were set up to contrast the situations of food using conventional packaging (current situation) and food using novel active packaging (containing active coating). Additionally, a sensitivity analysis has been integrated, aiming to identify the breakeven point of the balance. In the scenarios using the best-performance active packaging, it was shown that a breakeven point can be achieved across the four impact categories evaluated, including global warming, fossil energy demand, acidification potential and eutrophication potential. It is expected that the obtained results would serve as guidelines for active packaging development striving for a positive eco-profile of the food and packaging system. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.