Open Access

The field of nutrition is facing numerous social, ecological and economic challenges in the coming decades. The food industry belongs to the most significant economic sectors worldwide and the increasing population of 9 billion in 2050 will cause a growing demand on food. So far, changing lifestyles, especially the global rising consumption of meat and dairy products are increasing environmental damage. Moreover our health and wellbeing are the direct result of healthy or unhealthy nourishment and influence follow-up indicators like individual and public health, the expense of the health sector and work productivity. The material footprint is a tool to measure and optimize the resource consumption of both products and their ingredients and the production processes along the whole value chain. It covers the whole life cycle of the products, from the extraction of raw materials to the processing industry, distribution, consumption, recycling, and disposal. In order to decrease resource consumption to a level in line with the planetary boundaries, the material footprint of household consumption should achieve a level of six to eight tonnes per capita in a year by 2050. This means a reduction in natural resource consumption by a factor of 5 to 10 in Western European countries. In order to ensure a decent lifestyle for all people in 2050, also the material footprint of nutrition has to be reduced significantly by 2050. The paper shows the relevance and role of nutrition in the overall material footprint of households on the basis of existing studies on the overall resource consumption caused by household consumption. Quantified meal and diet examples are given. It also discusses the causes of food waste and raises the question how a reduction of food waste is possible and can help decreasing the resource consumption in the food sector.

The paper suggests a sustainable material footprint of eight tons, per person, in a year as a resource cap target for household consumption in Finland. This means an 80% (factor 5) reduction from the present Finnish average. The material footprint is used as a synonym to the Total Material Requirement (TMR) calculated for products and activities. The paper suggests how to allocate the sustainable material footprint to different consumption components on the basis of earlier household studies, as well as other studies, on the material intensity of products, services, and infrastructures. It analyzes requirements, opportunities, and challenges for future developments in technology and lifestyle, also taking into account that future lifestyles are supposed to show a high degree of diversity. The targets and approaches are discussed for the consumption components of nutrition, housing, household goods, mobility, leisure activities, and other purposes. The paper states that a sustainable level of natural resource use by households is achievable and it can be roughly allocated to different consumption components in order to illustrate the need for a change in lifestyles. While the absolute material footprint of all the consumption components will have to decrease, the relative share of nutrition, the most basic human need, in the total material footprint is expected to rise, whereas much smaller shares than at present are proposed for housing and especially mobility. For reducing material resource use to the sustainable level suggested, both social innovations, and technological developments are required.

The paper presents a case study of applying crowdsourcing to library deliveries. The trial was conducted in the city of Jyväskylä in Finland as part of the Resource Wise Communities program funded by The Finnish Innovation Fund Sitra. The city has a population of 120 000 inhabitants and is facing the shut-down of half of the public libraries in order to adapt its economy to lowered revenues and compulsory cost savings. The assumption was that the level of service for customers not able to settle for e-books would be lowered and/or customers would have to travel longer distances. However, a research pilot was carried out where - instead of lowering the level of service in the area - books and other library media were delivered to customers' homes by utilizing a novel crowdsourced delivery service called PiggyBaggy. Crowdsourced delivery means that citizens deliver goods to each other along their way. Ideally, the deliveries would be made with minimal detour, along the way, thus maximizing the reduction in natural resource use and related environmental impacts from the transport. However, the transport fuel forms only one part of the overall footprint and in practice rebound effects such as drivers travelling longer distances motivated by monetary compensation, can reduce the targeted environmental improvement. The objective of our study was to investigate whether an existing consumer service, in this case the library public service, can adopt crowdsourced deliveries quickly from scratch, and to whether consumers participate in the deliveries in a way that has real sustainability benefits. Despite prevailing regulative challenges, the study found that existing library deliveries can be successfully crowdsourced. Each crowdsourced delivery reduced an average of 1.6 kilometers driven by car, despite 80 percent of the deliveries being made within less than a five-kilometer distance. Mobility related footprint reduction potential for Finland is also estimated.

Im Rahmen des Forschungsprojektes wurde auf der Ebene von privaten Haushalten untersucht, in welchem Ausmaß eine Bedürfnisbefriedigung mit materiellen Gütern innerhalb der Randbedingungen von globaler Gerechtigkeit, einer nachhaltigen Rohstoffnutzung und einer umweltverträglichen Gesellschaft möglich ist. Zur Bestimmung des Rohstoffbedarfs langlebiger Haushaltsgüter wurden das methodische Konzept der Verfügungskorridore entwickelt und empirisch fundiert sowie global tragfähige Ausstattungen für verschiedene Haushalte prototypisch dargestellt. Das im Rahmen des Projekts entwickelte Webtool veranschaulicht wesentliche Ergebnisse des Forschungsvorhabens. Vor dem Hintergrund ihrer eigenen Haushaltsausstattungen wird den Nutzer/-innen des Webtools das Forschungsthema "Rohstoffverbrauch und Nachhaltigkeit" exemplarisch veranschaulicht, wodurch eine konkrete Reflexion des eigenen Konsumverhaltens ermöglicht wird.