Environmental life cycle assessment of Finnish broiler chicken production – Focus on climate change and water scarcity impacts

Abstract

The production and consumption of poultry meat increases in Finland, but no updated information on the impact of broiler production on climate change has been available, and the impacts of broiler production on water scarcity have never been studied. The Life Cycle Assessment methodology was applied to quantify the climate change and water scarcity impacts of Finnish broiler chicken meat. For water scarcity, the AWARE method was applied for the first time as a characterisation method in broiler chicken production. To harmonize the LCA calculation, the European Commission's Product Environmental Footprint (PEF) guidelines were followed when applicable. The comprehensive primary data accounted for 89% of Finnish broiler chicken production in 2018. The climate impact of Finnish broiler chicken meat was found to be 2.37 kg CO2 eq./kg of carcass weight (CW), including the effect of land use change (LUC), and 1.82 kg CO2 eq./kg of CW, excluding LUC. The relative share of the feed chain of the climate change impact of Finnish chicken meat was almost four fifths (79%). The water scarcity impact of Finnish chicken meat was 0.55 m3 eq. (AWARE)/kg CW. More than four fifths (82%) of the water scarcity impact of broiler production are formed in the feed chain. In addition to the national-level results, farm-specific results were calculated for 20 farms to indicate the variation and targets for improvements. In this study, we demonstrated that feeds were even more important in the water scarcity impact category.