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Life cycle assessment of tomato, eggplant, cucumber, and string beans production systems in Nagcarlan, Laguna Province, Philippines
Thesis Abstract:
Increasing population brings high demand for agricultural products which, in turn cause adverse environmental impacts during both production and transport. Environmental burdens of smallholder production of tomato, eggplant, cucumber, and string beans in Brgy. Bukal, Nagcarlan, Laguna were identified using the life cycle analysis (LCA) approach. The study aimed to assess the environmental impacts of materials and energy flow through production systems within the system boundary from land preparation to transport to market. The impact categories, global warming potential, acidification potential, eutrophication potential, and human toxicity potential were computed based on function unit of 1 kg of vegetable and 2,000 m2 production area. The inventory analysis involved collection of data on raw materials, energy consumption, and emissions.
The highest emission of 1.94 E-02 kg CO2-eq of GHG was obtained from the tomato production system, while string bean production showed the least at 1.60 E-02 kg CO2-eq kg-1 of vegetable. Similarly, the highest and least acidifying compound emission from fuel combustion were also found in tomato and string bean production; values obtained were 9.99 E-04 gm SO2-eq and 7.93 E-04 gm SO2-eq kg-1 of vegetable, respectively. The study recorded 1.05 E-02 kg PO4-eq of eutrophication compound as the highest discharge obtained from the eggplant production system, while the lowest value was from string bean production system at 7.8 E-03 kg PO4-eq per kg of vegetable. Eggplant production had the highest human toxicity potential (in terms of 1 kg vegetable) both in air and soil at 4.61 E+00 g 1,4 DCB-eq and 1.7 E+03 g 1,4 DCB-eq, respectively. Tomato production showed the BCA value as more than 1 while the others showed less.
Most impacts were directly due to farmers’ production practices. The use of the LCA approach in vegetable production provides informative feedback that can help decision-makers select the product or process that results in the least impact to the environment and human society. The study provided recommendations for improvement of crop management practices to reduce environmental impacts as well as to increase the productivity and economic viability.