Tracking the environmental impacts embedded in commodity consumption

This dashboard provides estimates of global environmental impacts and risks driven by consumption and production activities. To achieve this, the production of, and selected environmental impacts and risks associated with, over 160 agricultural commodities across 240 producer countries / territories are ‘embedded’ within domestic and international supply chains, with the dashboard showing how these are then linked with the consumption activities of 44 countries / territories and 5 'rest of world' regions.

To navigate the dashboard, please use the drop-down menus below to select the focal perspective you are interested in and click 'Update Data'. The charts will adapt to present data associated with your choices.

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About

This dashboard is provided, free of charge, as a resource for users to explore the sources and sinks of environmental impact and risk associated with commodity supply chains. The dashboard was developed by the Stockholm Environment Institute (including the Sustainable Consumption Production group within the York Centre) and the Joint Nature Conservation Committee to support the development of an indicator set for monitoring the overseas impacts of UK consumption. The results, however, are relevant for global analyses of production and consumption activities.

Dashboard development was supported by the UK Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra), the UK Research and Innovation’s Global Challenges Research Fund through the Trade, Development and the Environment Hub project (project ES/S008160/1), and the Trase Project. Production of the underlying data set was commissioned and supported by Defra. We are also grateful for collaborations with Florence Pendrill and Martin Persson (Chalmers University of Technology) and Thomas Kastner (Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre) who have provided underpinning data and methodological assistance.

We plan to update and improve the dashboard periodically as newer data, methods and indicator sets become available.

Methodology

The data used in this dashboard are created within SEI’s Input-Output Trade Analysis (IOTA) framework, built around a hybridised physical-financial Multi-Region Input-Output (MRIO) model (Croft et al. 2018, 2021). In this application, IOTA utilises commodity level production and trade data along with monetary financial flows to provide estimates of the movement of goods from national-level points of production through to final consumption, regardless of supply chain length and complexity. These supply chains are extended via the application of environmental impact indicators, which in turn allow for the flows of embedded impacts to be captured.

The subsequent results allow for a range of perspectives to be assessed, compared and analysed, from the production or consumption end of the supply chain, across individual or multiple commodities, and over a range of metrics.

Frequently Asked Questions

Indicator development and application Methodology and scope Terminology and interpretation Other

What do I need to know about the indicator if I’m considering it as part of the Convention on Biological Diversity negotiations?

Is there a brief and accessible introduction to what the indicator set is and how I can use the dashboard?

How can I use the information in this dashboard to create a national indicator of consumption impacts?

How often will the dashboard be updated?

Get the data

You can download the full data set here .

Terms and conditions of use: We make the data freely available for use. Whilst we have undergone steps to check the quality and accuracy of data provided, we provide on an 'as is' basis. The user assumes the entire risk associated within any use made of this information and SEI, JNCC and other partners do not accept any liability for damage arising from the use of the information, and make no representation regarding the advisability or suitability of specific decisions made by the user. If using charts, data, information, graphs or maps from this site, attribution is required. You must clearly attribute the work to the CommodityFootprints.earth platform and provide a link to https://www.commodityfootprints.earth.