Europe’s food ecolabels based on life cycle assessment need a common language

Confusion scenario: On the shelf in a European supermarket, two packs of pasta sit side by side. Both claim to be “climate friendly.” One carries a bright green “A” in a traffic-light scheme. The other shows a neat carbon footprint value: 1.8 kg CO₂ per kg. Which one is better? Which one should you choose?

If you’re confused, you’re not alone. Across Europe, a quiet revolution in food ecolabelling is underway, but it remains messy and fragmented, and according to new research, it may be eroding the very trust it is intended to build.

Why ecolabels matter

Food systems contribute roughly 30 percent to global greenhouse gas emissions. Without major changes in what we eat and how we produce it, climate targets will remain out of reach. Ecolabels, those small icons and scores on packaging, promise to guide consumers toward greener choices and incentivise producers towards more sustainable practices.

But here’s the catch: Europe’s ecolabel landscape is a patchwork of independent schemes, each with its own considered metrics, calculation method, and communication design. A new study led by the LCA-team at Department of Agroecology from Aarhus University offers the first comprehensive overview of these ecolabels based on LCA, and the findings are striking.

Inside the study

The team examined 31 food ecolabels based on LCA across the EU (27), the UK, Switzerland, and Norway. These labels aim to measure and communicate a food product’s environmental footprints. 

1. Inconsistent LCA method behind the labels:

• Different functional units: Some labels calculate impact per kilogram, others per portion, and one uses a “daily food unit” combining nutrition and energy.

• Different system boundaries: Does the label include cooking at home and waste disposal? For 34% of labels: yes. For the others: no.

• Different impact categories: While most focus only on climate impact, others include up to 16 environmental categories: from water use and land occupation to toxicity and resource depletion. A few even add social dimensions like animal welfare or working conditions.

The result? A dizzying diversity of approaches. Two labels assess the same product but arrive at completely different results, simply because they count differently. For consumers, this is more than confusing; it weakens trust in the very idea of ecolabeling.

1. Diversified communication approaches on the logos:

Beyond LCA methodology, the way labels communicate matters. Should they use letters, numbers, stars, or traffic-light colours? Should they show a single aggregated score or break down impacts into separate indicators?

The study found that 74 percent of labels use a graded format, often with colours or letters, while others stick to binary badges: a simple “approved” or “not approved.” Some combine absolute values (like grams of CO₂) with relative grades (A to G). But there’s no common standard for thresholds.

For example, the best grade for beef can mean anything from 0.15 kg CO₂ per kg in one scheme to 24.4 kg CO₂ per kg in another. That’s not just a technical detail; it’s a credibility gap.

1. The road toward harmonisation:

Europe is the global frontrunner in food ecolabeling. Yet without harmonisation, the proliferation of private and national schemes risks creating a marketplace of confusion. Producers may cherry-pick the label that makes them look best. Consumers may give up altogether.

The Product Environmental Footprint (PEF) from the European Commission provides a common LCA framework. But as the study quoted from the ecolabel owners, PEF is far from perfect: it’s costly, data-heavy, and doesn’t fully address biodiversity or soil health. 

The authors argue for urgent action on several issues: clear methodological guidelines tailored to food products, transparent rules for data quality, and standardised label formats that balance scientific rigor with consumer clarity.

“Ecolabels can drive sustainable choices,” the authors emphasised, “but only if they are credible, comparable, and easy to understand.”

For now, the supermarket shelf remains a battleground of logos and colours, a green maze where clarity is still a distant goal.

More information

Collaborators: Department of Agroecology at Aarhus University, Direction Economie Circulaire/Direction Bio´ economie Energies Renouvelables (ADEME), and Wageningen University. 

Funding: This research was funded by the Ministry of Food, Agriculture & Fisheries of Denmark (33010-NIFA-22-847).

Conflict of interest: The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Read more: The publication “Status of European food ecolabels based on life cycle assessment: methodological challenges towards convergence” is published in Sustainable Production and Consumption. It is written by Huayang Zhen, Bjørn Aamand Andersen, Vincent Colomb, Koen Boone, Lisbeth Mogensen, Fatemeh Hashemi, and Marie Trydeman Knudsen.
Contact: Huayang Zhen, Department of Agroecology, Aarhus University. Mail: huayang.zhen@agro.au.dk