Abstract:Meat consumers around the world are increasingly paying attention to product quality and safety, and are starting to reduce their meat consumption, especially with regard to red meat. This trend is prevalent in households with children who prefer health-certified meat products. Our study compares meat consumption habits in households with and without children or adolescences (0-18 years). A structured questionnaire was distributed to 401 retail purchasers at 12 different points of sales of meat in the Piedmont region in northwest Italy. Socio-demographic variables and quantitative-qualitative meat consumption habits of retail purchasers were investigated. One part of the questionnaire analyzed the relative importance of 12 meat choice purchasing attributes by employing the Best-Worst scaling methodology, a type of choice experiment. Our research found that households without children (subset B) have higher weekly meat consumption habits than those with children (subset A). Alternatively, the households with children (subset A) have a diet characterized by a greater variety of protein sources, such as legumes and fish. Both of the considered subsets preferred trusted butchers for meat buying, with supermarkets as a second choice. However, only consumers of subset A bought meat from farm butchers. Our team performed a consumer analysis to identify meat consumption patterns in the two considered subsets. Simultaneously, a Best-Worst analysis evidenced several choice attributes with different relevance for the two investigated samples segmentation in three clusters of purchase.

The dairy sector accounts for a large share of all European agricultural production, at the same time however, it is one of the most ascribed sector contributors to the environmental impact of agriculture, particularly for greenhouse gas emissions. Simultaneously, it is a strategic sector for the economy but generates increasing debate in the community regarding the social aspects mainly related to the use of resources and the food-feed competition of livestock involving the reduction of human-edible crops. In this general framework, this study aims to compare four different dairy farming scenarios characterized by different use of environmental resources in the Alpine area, considering as a case study the production of the Toma di Lanzo cheese (a traditional cheese produced in the mountainous regions of Piedmont-Northwest Italy). The study envisaged the integrated use of three methodologies: Life Cycle Assessment, Life Cycle Costing and the assessment of human-edible feed conversion efficiency to jointly analyze environmental, economic and social aspects. The main results of this research highlighted how the utilization of local breeds, which maximize the efficiency in the use of territory resources, such as grasslands in a mountain environment, allowed dairy production to reduce emissions, when compared to the high-input traditional breeding systems. Although the mountain livestock systems have several critical issues mainly linked to social factors such as low generational turnover, work schedules, modest life quality of families, it is however possible to earn more income than in lowland scenarios. At the same time, this production system allows the Toma di Lanzo cheese-making heritage to be preserved. This mountain pasture cheese, to which superior organoleptic and nutritional characteristics are attributable, when compared to cheeses from the valley floor, incorporates traditional values, a link to the territory and the transmission of knowledge. With reference to food-feed competition in livestock involving the reduction of the use of human-edible crops and feedstuffs in animal diets, we found that grazing and grass-based feeding systems were one of the most sustainable ways to produce milk.

Common wheat, a fundamental commodity on international markets, is increasingly differentiated into commercial types on domestic markets to meet the demand of processing companies. Improver wheat, biscuit wheat, ordinary and superior bread-making wheat are commercial varieties with specific technological characteristics. Wheat farming systems are constantly evolving, and as a result, related environmental issues emerge. We applied an LCA (Life Cycle Assessment) analysis, where the functional unit was 1 tonne of grain for each typology and system boundaries were from cradle to farm gate. Primary data were used in the study, and special attention was paid to fertiliser use. From an LCA perspective, our findings show that nitrogen (N) plays an essential role in plant production although producing different waterborne and airborne emissions and nitrate leaching, for the 4 commercial typologies studied. Furthermore, the impact can be differentiated based on the technological features of the commercial types. Our results led us to observe that the four wheat types show contrasting economic and environmental performances.

Due to an error during production, the order of the first and last names of the authors are incorrect in the published paper [...]

Sustainability is one of the main goals of the development policy and is also progressively gaining importance in the wine industry. The peculiar draught wine market is also strongly influenced by it. The current competitive conditions of the sector and the evolution of consumption styles have led to an increasing need for more accurate management strategies and analysis activities to determine the performance of wineries. This study aims to analyse both the environmental and the economic concerns of a commercial development strategy carried out by an Italian winery that is using three packaging formats (glass bottle, one way PET keg, and reusable steel keg) in the sale of Falanghina PGI wine in three different markets areas (domestic, Italy; regional, Germany; and international, USA). The assessment of the environmental and economic impact of the different formats on the three scenarios through an LCA and LCC analysis shows that the economic and environmental sustainability of packaging types can vary significantly depending on the market destinations. Nevertheless, the results show that PET, and especially reusable materials such as steel, can lead to a marked reduction in impacts on the market for tapped wine.