Comparison of LCA and EFA for the environmental account of fruit production systems: a case study in Northern Italy

Although various study cases can be found on the application of environmental indicators in agricultural activities, applications on the fruit production systems are stills rare. In the present study we apply the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and the Ecological Footprint Analysis (EFA) at the same commercial nectarine orchard in Piedmont (Northern Italy) in order to highlight the differences both on the results and on the methodological issues. Great care was used to choose an equal boundary setting, to consider an identical schematization of the productive processes and to utilize data referring to the same production stage. In both indicators, the calculation was conducted considering the six orchard stages highlighted by Milà i Canals (2003). The LCA was conducted in compliance with the guidelines and requirements of the ISO 14040 standard series, while EFA calculations were performed by using the methodology and the specific conversion factors implemented by the Global Footprint Network.