Report

Food Commodity Footprints, Global GHG footprints and water scarcity footprints in agriculture

Oxfam has asked CE Delft to provide insight into the global GHG (greenhouse gas) footprints and water (scarcity) footprints of seventeen major food commodities, along with a regional differentiation (for five continental regions). All aggregated results (also presented in these highlights) refer to these seventeen commodities. The five commodities with the highest annual global GHG footprint are rice, soybean, maize, palm oil fruit and wheat. Soil emissions (e.g. methane emissions from rice cultivation) and LUC (land-use change) emissions contribute most to the global GHG footprint. Water scarcity footprints are highest in Asia because of relatively high irrigation rates and water scarcity.