Summary
This report, titled 'Life Cycle Assessment Mapping and Overview', issued on 18.11.2025, provides insights into how humanitarian organizations utilize Life Cycle Assessments (LCAs) to enhance environmental sustainability in relief supply chains, including findings and recommendations.
Content
This page provides information on the study commissioned by DG ECHO regarding a Mapping of Lifecycle Assessments (LCAs) of humanitarian food and non-food items.
On this page you will find the final report (Download 1). This report presents the main elements, findings and recommendations of the study on the mapping of existing Life Cycle Assessments (LCAs) of relief items used in humanitarian aid. The qualitative analysis focuses on how humanitarian organizations use LCAs to enhance environmental sustainability throughout relief supply chains. The report shows the main LCA goals, categories and methodologies, reviewing their use across relief items. It analyses interviews and stakeholder feedback, tracking how LCA has contributed to internal awareness, product specification, strategic decisions, procurement guidelines, and donor accountability mechanisms within the sector.
The mapping resulted in a list of LCAs available both publicly, and not publicly, and looked their key features: place of production and use of the items assessed, scope of the LCA (CO2 emissions only, or also other environmental impacts), and the methodology used. Apart from the mapping, the study provides an analysis of the current use of the LCAs in the humanitarian sector and provides recommendations for humanitarian organisations on how to best use LCAs for more environmentally sustainable procurement.
In addition, you can find the slides from the public presentation of the findings from 20 November 2025, conducted by DG ECHO and focal points from the research team of the INSPIRE+ consortium (Download 2). The documents are also available on DG ECHO's website here:
- Webinar recording: https://echocloud.echofield.eu/s/qT4tkkmrxkipPmx
- The conclusions and recommendations regarding LCA use in the humanitarian sector (under Downloads): https://civil-protection-humanitarian-aid.ec.europa.eu/what/humanitarian-aid/climate-change-and-environment_en
Thanks to DG ECHO for also making the video available online here.
