PurposeThe aim of the paper is to assess the role and effectiveness of a proposed novel strategy for Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) data collection in the food sector and associated supply chains. The study represents one of the first of its type and provides answers to some of the key questions regarding the data collection process developed, managed and implemented by a multinational food company across the supply chain.MethodsAn integrated LCI data collection process for confectionery products was developed and implemented by Nestlé, a multinational food company. Some of the key features includes (1) management and implementation by a multinational food company; (2) types of roles to manage, provide and facilitate data exchange; (3) procedures to identify key products, suppliers and customers; (4) LCI questionnaire and cover letter and (5) data quality management based on the pedigree matrix. Overall, the combined features in an integrated framework provide a new way of thinking about the collection of LCI data from the perspective of a multinational food company.Results and discussionThe integrated LCI collection framework spanned across 5 months and resulted in 87 new LCI datasets for confectionery products from raw material, primary resource use, emission and waste release data collected from suppliers across 19 countries. The data collected was found to be of medium to high quality compared with secondary data. However, for retailers and waste service companies, only partially completed questionnaires were returned. Some of the key challenges encountered during the collection and creation of data included lack of experience, identifying key actors, communication and technical language, commercial compromise, confidentiality protection and complexity of multi-tiered supplier systems. A range of recommendations are proposed to reconcile these challenges which include standardisation of environmental data from suppliers, concise and targeted LCI questionnaires and visualising complexity through drawings.ConclusionsThe integrated LCI data collection process and strategy has demonstrated the potential role of a multinational company to quickly engage and act as a strong enabler to unlock latent data for various aspects of the confectionery supply chain. Overall, it is recommended that the research findings serve as the foundations to transition towards a standardised procedure which can practically guide other multinational companies to considerably increase the availability of LCI data.

中文翻译：

---

基于跨国公司角色的提高生命周期库存数据可用性的框架

目的本文的目的是评估拟议的生命周期清单 (LCI) 数据收集新策略在食品部门和相关供应链中的作用和有效性。该研究代表了同类研究中的第一个，并为跨国食品公司在整个供应链中开发、管理和实施的数据收集过程的一些关键问题提供了答案。方法开发了糖果产品的综合 LCI 数据收集过程并由跨国食品公司雀巢实施。一些主要特点包括 (1) 由跨国食品公司管理和实施；(2) 管理、提供和促进数据交换的角色类型；(3) 识别关键产品、供应商和客户的程序；(4) LCI 问卷和求职信以及 (5) 基于谱系矩阵的数据质量管理。总体而言，集成框架中的组合特征提供了一种从跨国食品公司的角度思考 LCI 数据收集的新方法。结果和讨论集成 LCI 收集框架跨越 5 个月，产生了 87 个新的糖果 LCI 数据集从 19 个国家/地区的供应商收集的原材料、主要资源使用、排放和废物排放数据。与二手数据相比，收集的数据被发现具有中等至高质量的质量。然而，对于零售商和废物服务公司，只返回了部分完成的问卷。在收集和创建数据过程中遇到的一些关键挑战包括缺乏经验、识别关键参与者、沟通和技术语言、商业妥协、保密保护和多层供应商系统的复杂性。提出了一系列建议来解决这些挑战，包括供应商环境数据的标准化、简洁和有针对性的 LCI 问卷以及通过图纸可视化复杂性。结论集成的 LCI 数据收集流程和战略已经证明了跨国公司在快速参与方面的潜在作用并作为强大的推动者来解锁糖果供应链各个方面的潜在数据。总体，