ABSTRACT
Life cycle assessments of oil palm products Cécile Bessou, CIRAD, France; Heinz Stichnothe, Thünen Institute of Agricultural Technology, Germany; Amir F. N. Abdul-Manan, Saudi Aramco, Saudi Arabia; and Shabbir Gheewala, King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi, Thailand
1 Introduction
2 LCA principles and methodology
3 Results of LCA applied to oil palm products
4 Challenges in building LCA of oil palm products
5 Oil palm LCA improvement tracks
6 Conclusion
7 Where to look for further information
8 References
Quantifying environmental impact is becoming a requirement for agricultural commodity chains. Given the various pollution risks (e.g. eutrophication, global warming, ecotoxicity), and the opportunities to mitigate those risks (e.g. increasing nitrogen utilisation efficiency, nutrient recycling, carbon sequestration to reduce global warming), it is crucial to apply models and tools that allow for the identification of best practices in order to reduce the environmental impact of agriculture. It is particularly crucial for increasingly important crops such as oil palm that may impact the environment both during cultivation and due to land use change (LUC) for new plantations.
