Kiyotada Hayashi

EarthShift Global

Pesticide reduction is given high priority in the worldwide sustainability agenda. The reduction of pesticide impacts, rather than the reduction of application rates, has become a common criterion for monitoring policy progress. However, simplicity-an essential requirement in improving the applicability of pesticide impact assessment-may distort th...

Purpose Recent agricultural policies require the complementary use of area-based and product-based environmental indicators to assess agricultural system transitions because both alleviating productivity-environment trade-offs and increasing food value chain sustainability are crucial in successful policy decisions. However, there is a dilemma due...

Ripeness of fruits is one of the factors causing food losses in the supply chain. Food loss increases the environmental burden through additional production undertaken to compensate for the losses. Packaging decreases the losses and consequently, the environmental burden, but itself causes additional environmental burden. This study models the rela...

Packaging decreases food losses during transportation and the loss-related environmental load. However, excessive packaging can increase the environmental load for package production. We assessed environmental impacts throughout the peach life cycle and predicted the relationship between food loss reduction via packaging and environmental impact wi...

This dataset includes two kinds of data (for inventory analysis in Table A1 to A13, and precondition of waste and recycle for plastic and cardboard in Table A14) for conducting life cycle assessment (LCA) of strawberry-package supply chain with considering food loss during transportation Inventory analysis includes input data for LCA analysis. The...

This study assessed the damage area ratios of different packaging systems on the life cycle of strawberry caused by vibration during transportation from environmental perspective. The relationship between food loss reduction and environmental loads was evaluated to produce an ideal package with both lower food losses and environmental impacts. Life...

PurposeWe evaluated the environmental impacts of the peach transportation process using life cycle assessment with the damage area ratio as an indicator to assess both food loss and the environmental burden. A hot spot analysis was also conducted to identify the most relevant impact categories and processes in the peach life cycle.Methods The envir...

Purpose This study proposes spatially prospective life cycle assessment to cope with scenario uncertainty and applies it to a case study on land-use change in oil palm production to demonstrate the effectiveness and usefulness of the new approach. The scenario uncertainty in this case is classified as epistemic uncertainty, which is pervasive in li...

Purpose Characterization factors for biodiversity impact assessment derived from ecological zoning and land use classification have been proposed within life cycle assessment (LCA). However, their applicability to LCA of agricultural production systems has not yet been elucidated. This study clarifies correlations between regional-scale biodiversit...

Land use and land use change are central issues to consider during the establishment of sustainable oil palm production systems in tropical and neotropical areas. Owing to the limited availability of biodiversity data in these areas, ecoacoustics and soundscape ecology are expected to play an important role in assessing the impacts of oil palm prod...

Management of the negative environmental impact of pesticides used in paddy fields requires the quantification of the emissions reaching relevant environmental compartments and the determination of the factors that influence such emissions. The present study is the first to develop a simulation model for estimating the fractions emitted to the air...

Purpose This review develops and applies a visualization method for understanding how chemical fertilizer inventory data, including greenhouse gas (GHG) emission factors and fossil fuel energy requirements, have been used in previous life cycle assessment (LCA) studies of oil palm and discusses how inconsistencies detected in previous studies can b...

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Soil quality varies greatly with the management of agricultural land such as the application of fertilizer. Quantifying the impact on soil quality at a management level has been recognized as an urgent issue in life cycle assessment (LCA). This study is the first to estimate characterization factors for land occupation under different soil type, fe...

Growing demands for food and biofuels are causing deforestation in the tropics. Although the rate of deforestation is decreasing, it is still high and problematic (FAO 2010). Deforestation is mainly the transformation of tropical forest to agricultural land, and it causes environmental problems related to climate change, soil carbon sequestration,...

Impacts on ecosystem services that are related to agricultural land use greatly differ depending on management practices employed. This study aimed to reveal issues associated with evaluating ecosystem services related to land use at the management level during life cycle assessment (LCA) and to consider future challenges. Firstly, a relationship b...

The development processes of agricultural life cycle assessment (LCA) were reviewed through the survey of the international conferences of LCA on agri-food sectors. As a preparation step, activities of the EU project on harmonization of agricultural LCA was studies, after discussing the reasons why agriculture is an important topic in LCA. Then, ho...

Different international organizations and initiatives stress the growing recognition that biological diversity is a global asset of tremendous value to present and future generations. In the frame of Life Cycle studies, numerous efforts have been done in order to provide good enough indicators to assess biodiversity loss. The increasing awareness o...

An international effort was initiated to reach agreement on recommended default agricultural pesticide emission fractions for use in LCA. Consensual decisions on the assessment framework include（a）primary distributions are used as inputs for life cycle impact assessment（LCIA）,（b）framework and LCA application guidelines and documentation are compile...

This study conducted a life cycle assessment of new techniques and approaches in rice paddy cultivation. We evaluated reclaimed land in Hachirogata, located in Japan’s Akita Prefecture. Non-puddling cultivation is a technique of planting rice without the puddling. A rotary plow is used to plant the rice in finely crushed soil. Non-puddling allows a...

Sustainability information and decision support can be two important driving forces for making sustainable transitions in society. However, not enough knowledge is available on the effectiveness of these two factors. Here, we conducted an experimental study to support the hypotheses that acquisition of sustainability information and use of decision...

In comparative life cycle assessments of agricultural production systems, analyses of both the trade-offs between environmental impacts and crop productivity and of the uncertainties specific to agriculture such as fluctuations in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and crop yields are crucial. However, these two issues are usually analyzed separately....

We established a research initiative to construct life cycle inventory (LCI) database of agricultural production systems in Asian countries. Our activities started from the preparation of LCI data on rice production systems in each country, because rice is an important common crop in Asian countries. In order to deal with diversity of). cultivation...

Purpose This study aims to compare crop rotation systems used in organic farming (organic rotation systems) with those of both conventional farming (conventional rotation systems) and continuous rice cropping systems. Life cycle assessment (LCA) is performed based on land- and product-based indicators. Methods Seven crop rotation systems for rice,...

This paper introduces the Special Volume (SV) dedicated to the 2012 Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) Food Conference. During recent years, these conferences have seen a rapid increase in the number of participants, reflecting the development of an interdisciplinary research and development community at the intersection between the agronomic, food/nutrit...

Practical applications of life cycle assessment (LCA) to agricultural production systems require articulating uncertainties caused by scenario indeterminacy, because practitioners do not have sufficient knowledge about agricultural input production processes. However, current understanding about scenario uncertainties is still limited on account of...

A multi-input multi-output model is developed by extending the life cycle assessment framework for analysing the relationship between agricultural production and environmental impacts. The inputs include farmland and materials such as fertilisers, pesticides and animals. The outputs are of two types: one is agro-economic production, such as crop yi...

Objective. An extended water footprint (EWF) and an occupied water footprint (OWF) are proposed in this study as indices of water resource consumption. EWF represents the burden of water resource consumption in flow base, and has a unit of area in which the water supply equals to the subject consumption. Similarly, OWF is derived in stock base and...

There is wide agreement in the literature that non-technical factors play a decisive role in the successful implementation of bioenergy projects. One underlying reason is that such projects require the involvement of many stakeholders, such as feedstock producers, engineers, authorities and the concerned public. We analyze the role of bioenergy-spe...

Purpose Earlier studies on agricultural life cycle assessment recommend that practitioners use two functional units—product weight and land area—because agriculture entails commodity production and land use. However, there are still ambiguities in this approach from the perspective of decision support. The purpose of this paper is to provide recomm...

Objective. Life cycle assessment（LCA）and decision analysis were compared with each other, in order to clarify the effectiveness of decision support methodologies for establishing sustainable society based on biomass utilization. First, conjoint analysis applied to life cycle impact assessment（LCIA）and multi-attribute value theory（MAVT）in decision a...

Earlier applications of the life cycle assessment (LCA) to organic agriculture concern comparisons with conventional agriculture under the assumption that year-to-year variations of agricultural production are negligible. Although the comparisons based on averages are important, it is necessary to investigate the variability in environmental impact...

The human health and environmental issues related to food, feed, and bio-based systems, range widely from greenhouse gas emissions and energy use to land use, water availability, soil quality, water quality and quantity, biodiversity losses, and chemical exposure. Threats that stem from other issues, including food quality and food security, the de...

We conducted a life cycle assessment of energy crop production for bioethanol to clarify the potentialities of biomass utilisation systems in Japan, focusing on cumulative fossil energy demand and global warming potential. Their reductions were evaluated under two scenarios; one was improving cultivation technologies and breeding of new crop variet...

Objective. Because most Japanese soybeans are cultivated in paddy fields under rotational cropping, life cycle assessment (LCA) of soybean production needs to take into account a whole crop rotation including rice cultivation. In order to investigate the environmental impact associated with organic soybean production in Japan, this study carried ou...

The potential eco-synergetic effects of using two waste flowsfor the substitution of mineral fertilisers is assessed from nutrient and environmental points of view. The two wastes are: composted organic municipal waste (slow release of nutrients) and nitrate polluted water (rapid nitrogen release).Catalonia is selected as a representative Mediterra...

Many sustainability indicators have been used for assessing rural development. They evaluate relative performance of alternative rural development projects and programs from economic, environmental and social perspectives. However, they do not illustrate why a project outperforms others and thus a conceptual framework for explaining the results is...

Crop-derived first-generation biofuels are controversial because of their competition with food supplies and the uncertainty regarding their environmental performance. However, they are currently being used in practical applications, particularly because the second and third generation biofuels are not likely to replace them for another few years....

Objective. The purpose of this paper is to review recent trends in the development of life cycle inventories（LCI）for agricultural production systems and to introduce an LCI database for agricultural production and biomass utilization in Japan called the NARO LCI database. Results and Discussion. Agricultural production systems differ in several imp...

Increased public focus on agri-environmental issues and recent policies on agricultural sustainability have necessitated the construction of a life cycle inventory (LCI) database for agricultural production systems. However, the current progress of LCI database construction is far from being complete in both developed and developing countries. In t...

Increased public focus on agri-environmental issues and recent policies on agricultural sustainability have necessitated the construction of a life cycle inventory (LCI) database for agricultural production systems. However, the current progress of LCI database construction is far from being complete in both developed and developing countries. In t...

Increased public focus on agri-environmental issues and recent policies on agricultural sustainability have necessitated the construction of a life cycle inventory (LCI) database for agricultural production systems. However, the current progress of LCI database construction is far from being complete in both developed and developing countries. In t...

Two pilot biofuels projects in Japan have allowed a better understanding of the actual land use, processing requirements, and impacts to the environment and society of biofuels. Through the use of Total Cost Assessment (TCA), this study looks at the costs and benefits of Japanese investments in biofuels production. One project focuses on fuel from...

Many cultivation practices have been improved in order to decrease environmental burdens of paddy rice production in Japan. Therefore, the importance of life cycle assessment (LCA) to assess the environmental impacts of whole production systems particularly that of rice production has increased. However, the applications of LCA to rice production a...

Objective. The purpose of this paper is to conduct comparative life cycle assessment of super high-yield and conventional rice production systems. Since super high-yield rice production needs further energy and resource inputs as compared with the conventional production, the judgment of relative superiority should be based on the assessment of who...

A multi-input multi-output model is developed by extending the life cycle assessment (LCA) framework for analyzing the relationship between agricultural production and environmental impacts. The inputs include farm land and materials such as fertilizers, pesticides, and animals. The outputs are of two types: one is agro-economic production such as...

Optimum crop protection strategies are not always feasible because of social constraints. For example, paddy-upland rotation, which is a common weed control and soil fertility management method in Japan, is not always practiced. When group decisions on cooperative land rotation that were undertaken to comply with government policy on reducing rice...

Many studies have been conducted for assessing the environmental impacts of organic agriculture. They compare, in general, a few agricultural systems including organic and conventional production. The comparison, however, raises several issues to be clarified from system thinking based on life cycle assessment (LCA). Therefore, this paper reviews a...

This chapter reviews the multicriteria analysis applied to the selection problems in agricultural systems. It also discusses life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) from the decision analytic framework. Special attention is paid to the attributes (evaluation criteria) used for evaluating agricultural systems by considering their impacts on the environm...

Increased public attention to sustainable production and consumption necessitates the environmental impact assessment of agricultural production systems, and thus the life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) of agricultural practices has become important. This paper presents an approach to integrate environmental performance (impacts) and economic perfo...

The paper develops a simulation-based procedure for a design of protective structure by means of multi-attribute selection. Attention is centered on uncertainties related to both accidental actions, which must be sustained by the protective structure, and behavior of the structure under these actions. The proposed procedure serves for a comparison...

The applications of and recent issues on life cycle assessment (LCA) for agriculture are reviewed in order to provide an integrated perspective on environmental and food safety issues. First, the relationship between the good agricultural practice (GAP) approach and LCA of agricultural production systems is discussed. Second, applications of LCA to...

A method using quality adjust working hours is developed to evaluate agricultural systems from the viewpoints of profitability and ease of work. The method is applied to agricul-tural extension services in Japan in order to clarify the superiority of new vegetable cultiva-tion systems. The results show that indicators made by this method can be use...

A multi-objective programming approach for evaluating agri-environmental policy is presented, in which various management practices are introduced to reduce environmental problems caused by, for example, fertilizer and pesticide application. Particular attention is paid to environmental impacts of agricultural practices. After comparing with an eco...

The Environmental Stewardship Scheme provides payments to farmers for the provision of environmental services based on agricultural foregone income. This creates a potential incentive compatibility problem which, combined with an information asymmetry on farm land heterogeneity, could lead to adverse selection of farmers into the scheme. However, t...

A methodology was presented for selecting a farming system from multiattribute discrete alternatives by multicriteria analysis. An ex ante evaluation of vegetable production systems was performed in addition to a review of previous case studies to demonstrate the usefulness of this methodology and difficulties in applying it. The various methods us...

This paper reviews multicriteria analysis applied to agricultural resource management. The applications utilize either methods for selecting multiattribute discrete alternatives (including multiattribute utility theory) or methods for solving multiobjective planning problems (including goal programming). Our main purpose is to classify and evaluate...

This paper reviews the weighting procedures proposed as revisions of the analytic hierarchy process from a practical standpoint. First, the modifications of the 1-to-9 scale are discussed as a way to cope with the criticisms of the AHP. The balanced scale and the 8-based multiplicative scale are treated and the measures to express the inconsistenci...

A methodology is presented for aiding agricultural decisions using multiattribute value models with interval numbers. The evaluation procedures are based on values and weights elicitation. The main features are (1) introducing interval numbers to deal with imprecision and uncertainty, (2) utilizing swing weights to properly treat the relationship b...

The influence of management practices on the environmental impacts of paddy rice production was analysed using life cycle assessment (LCA) with a strong focus on uncertainty. The environmental impact categories that were assessed comprised greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and energy use. Farm accountancy data about paddy rice cultivation, prepared by...