Carbon Footprint on the Product – How Data Travels From Field to Package
Blog Series: Food Data and Traceability, part 4.
A consumer scans a QR code on the packaging and sees the product's carbon footprint data. This sounds futuristic – but the technology already exists. The question is whether the data exists in the right form.
Carbon footprint data is born in the chain – not in the office
A food product's carbon footprint is not a number that a sustainability team calculates once a year. It consists of dozens of data points that arise along the supply chain: during raw material cultivation, transportation, manufacturing, packaging.
Currently these data points are typically collected through separate information requests, supplier surveys and manual consolidations. The result: the calculation cannot be easily updated, its methodology is hard to open up to a customer, and it is not comparable to competitors or sector benchmarks.
The most valuable carbon footprint data is that which can be calculated transparently, repeatably and from every part of the chain – not just the product's final output.
GS1's data model made Finland a pioneer
The Food Data Finland development project produced a model for transmitting carbon footprint data across the food chain. This model was internationally unique – so unique that it became the basis for a global GS1 standard.
When data is structured according to this shared model, it can be transferred to GS1 Synkka or the upcoming GS1 Data service – from where it is available to retail groups, regulators and consumers without separate information requests.
Four data layers – all necessary
The Food Sustainability Data Model divides sustainability information into four areas: origin data, packaging materials, certifications and carbon footprint. These are not separate silos – they complement each other. Carbon footprint information is more credible when origin data is available. Certifications reinforce origin claims. Packaging data completes the environmental footprint calculation.
Comparable data also means a buyer can assess two suppliers using the same framework – and choose the one whose information is better documented.
The next step: batch-level data and the 2D code
The data model is designed to scale. The next development step is batch-level data: not just a product-level average carbon footprint, but information on which batch and when a product was made, and where that specific batch's raw materials came from. This is enabled by the GS1 2D code, which links the physical product to its digital data.
Trineria provides a data platform that connects traceability information from different sources – for example from raw material suppliers, production systems and packaging registries. This makes it possible for carbon footprint data to be connected to broader supply chain transparency within the GS1 network, rather than remaining an isolated figure.
This blog post concludes our four-part series on food data and traceability. You can find the earlier parts here:
- From the Factory Floor to the Data Chain – How Production Directors Build Traceability Into Daily Operations
- A New Barcode is a Window Into the Product's Entire Lifecycle
- Finnish Food on Export Markets – Data Helps to Get there
Thinking about what your packaging could tell the world? Get in touch — a small pilot is a very good place to start.