Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Matters Arising
  • Published:

Making food transport data matter

Nature Food volume 3, pages 1005–1007 (2022)Cite this article

Subjects

Matters Arising to this article was published on 15 December 2022

The Original Article was published on 20 June 2022

arising from: Malik et al. Nature Food https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-022-00531-w (2022).

New estimates of the contribution of food-systems transportation activities to total greenhouse gas emissions (GHG)1 represent an important addition to a growing body of work seeking to estimate the climate impact of the food system. In particular, they add to the food system emissions data published in EDGAR-FOOD2 and FAOSTAT3,4, with which the new results were compared. To be useful, however, it is necessary to clarify which food-systems transportation activities are being measured across these studies, and to point out the strengths and weaknesses associated with different methods of estimating GHGs from food-systems transportation activities.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

References

  1. Li, M., Jia, N. & Lenzen, M. et al. Global food-miles account for nearly 20% of total food-systems emissions. Nat. Food 3, 445–453 (2022).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Crippa, M., Solazzo, E. & Guizzardi, D. et al. Food systems are responsible for a third of global anthropogenic GHG emissions. Nat. Food 2, 198–209,(2021).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Tubiello, F. N., Karl, K., Flammini, A., Gütschow, J., Obli-Laryea, G., Conchedda, G., Pan, X., Qi, S. Y., Halldórudóttir Heiðarsdóttir, H., Wanner, N., Quadrelli, R., Rocha Souza, L., Benoit, P., Hayek, M., Sandalow, D., Mencos Contreras, E., Rosenzweig, C., Rosero Moncayo, J., Conforti, P. & Torero, M. Pre- and post-production processes increasingly dominate greenhouse gas emissions from agri-food systems. Earth Syst. Sci. Data 14, 1795–1809 (2022).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  4. FAO. Greenhouse gas emissions from agrifood systems. Global, regional and country trends, 2000–2020. FAOSTAT Analytical Brief Series No. 50. FAO https://www.fao.org/3/cc2672en/cc2672en.pdf (2022).

  5. 2006 IPCC Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories (eds Eggleston, H. S. et al.) (IGES, 2006).

  6. FAO & UNSD. System of environmental–economic accounting for agriculture, forestry and fisheries: SEEA AFF. FAO https://doi.org/10.4060/ca7735en (2020).

  7. Poore, J. & Nemecek, T. Reducing food’s environmental impacts through producers and consumers. Science 360, 987–992 (2018).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Foong, A., Pradhan, P., Frör, O. & Kropp, J. P. Adjusting agricultural emissions for trade matters for climate change mitigation. Nat. Commun. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-30607-x (2022).

  9. Tubiello, F. N., Conchedda, G., Wanner, N., Federici, S., Rossi, S. & Grassi, G. Carbon emissions and removals from forests: new estimates, 1990–2020. Earth Syst. Sci. Data 13, 1681–1691 (2021).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  10. Crippa, M., Solazzo, E. & Guizzardi, D. et al. Climate goals require food systems emission inventories. Nat. Food 3, 1 (2022).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Lenzen, M. Errors in conventional and input-output-based life-cycle inventories. J. Ind. Ecol. 4, 127–148 (2001).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Statistics Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome, Italy

    Francesco N. Tubiello, Kevin Karl, Silvia Cerilli & Alessandro Flammini

  2. Joint Research Centre, European Commission, Ispra, Italy

    Monica Crippa & Efisio Solazzo

  3. School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University, Center on Global Energy Policy, New York City, NY, USA

    Kevin Karl

  4. Circular Economy and Environmental Protection Division, United Nations Industrial Development Organization, Vienna, Austria

    Alessandro Flammini

  5. Directorate General for Research and Innovation, European Commission, Brussels, Belgium

    Adrian Leip

Authors
  1. Francesco N. Tubiello
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Monica Crippa
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Kevin Karl
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Efisio Solazzo
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Silvia Cerilli
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Alessandro Flammini
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  7. Adrian Leip
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

F.N.T. and K.K. drafted the manuscript and analysed relevant data. M.C., E.S., A.F., S.C. and A.L. provided critical revision of the manuscript, provided final approval of the published version and agreed to be accountable for all aspects of the work.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Francesco N. Tubiello.

Ethics declarations

Competing Interest

The authors declare no competing interests.

Peer review

Peer review information

Nature Food thanks Pekka Kinnunen and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

Additional information

Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Disclaimer. The views expressed in this manuscript are the authors’ only and do not necessarily represent official positions of FAO or the European Commission on the subject matter.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Tubiello, F.N., Crippa, M., Karl, K. et al. Making food transport data matter. Nat Food 3, 1005–1007 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-022-00638-0

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-022-00638-0

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing Anthropocene

Sign up for the Nature Briefing: Anthropocene newsletter — what matters in anthropocene research, free to your inbox weekly.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing: Anthropocene