In this letter to the editor, Quantis’ Global Science Lead & Sustainability Consultant Alexi Ernstoff highlights a significant misunderstanding in the life cycle assessments (LCAs) of diets with respect to health and nutrition. Expert in health and nutrition in LCA, Ernstoff stresses that methods should promote health not indicate nutritional completeness.
Key messages include:
- When modelling environmental impacts of diets, scenarios must be comparable.
- Nutritionally complete diets can vary in the mass, energy, or nutrition consumed.
- Nutritionally complete diets can be associated with increased disease risks.
- The sensitivity of results to the assumed dietary scenarios must be understood.
- Methods should promote health not indicating nutritional completeness.
