Assessing the environmental implications of sustainable public procurement of food

Sustainable public procurement (SPP) is increasingly recognized as a policy tool to improve the environmental performance of food systems, yet there is limited empirical evidence on how procurement strategies influence environmental outcomes. This study assesses the environmental implications of municipal food procurement in a rural Swedish region using life cycle assessment (LCA). Procurement data from Östersund Municipality were used to construct baseline and alternative scenarios that reflect policy targets and objectives, including increased sourcing of organic and local foods, substitution of beef with game or legumes, and reductions in plate waste. Environmental impacts were evaluated using the Impact World + method across multiple indicators, including climate change, eutrophication, biodiversity, toxicity, and resource use. The results show that procurement strategies have differing effects across impact categories. Measures targeting food composition and consumption, such as reducing beef consumption and plate waste, lead to consistent reductions across several indicators, whereas strategies focused on sourcing and production methods, such as organic and local, yield more mixed outcomes, with improvements in some categories but increases in others. Substituting minced beef with local game and reducing food waste result in the largest overall reductions, while increasing organic procurement leads to relatively small changes across most indicators. These findings highlight the importance of multi-indicator assessments and show that focusing on a single indicator, or target, risks overlooking trade-offs. The study provides empirical evidence supporting more targeted, evidence-based procurement strategies and highlights the need for improved life cycle inventory data.