Foodsteps has launched a series of carbon labels that allows businesses to calculate, reduce and label the environmental impact of their food.
The company claims it is “the first UK-based tech firm to provide carbon tracking and impact labelling to food businesses.”
Founded by Cambridge University alumni Anya Doherty, the firm was created in response to the challenges facing food businesses looking to improve their sustainability and reach net zero. The database that underpins the carbon labels was also developed alongside scientists and academics at Cambridge University.
Foodsteps stated the need for carbon labels within the food industry came from a lack of access to a standard database where businesses can easily find out the environmental impact of their recipes and ingredients.
In response, Foodsteps has developed “the first British-specific impact database” for food, covering over 1,000 ingredients and incorporating carbon footprint, pollution, water use and land use impacts.
Using their database solutions, Foodsteps said, businesses across the food industry can:
- view the sustainability impact of each of their products’ ingredients
- choose to print their own labels to clearly communicate the environmental impact of a product
- make use of the company’s virtual education tools, with each label containing a QR code that buyers can scan to learn more about the products’ impact and what the company is doing on sustainability.
The company claimed that the database “provides the breakthrough knowledge that could allow for widespread carbon labelling adoption across the industry should it be made mandatory by the UK government.”
