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Journal of Cleaner Production xxx (2016) 1e8

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Journal of Cleaner Production

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Environmental impact assessment of organic and conventional tomatoproduction in urban greenhouses of Beijing city, China

Xueqing He a, Yuhui Qiao a, *, Yuexian Liu b, Leonie Dendler c, Cheng Yin a,Friederike Martin a, d

a Beijing Key Laboratory of Biodiversity and Organic Farming, College of Resources and Environmental Sciences, China Agricultural University, Beijing100193, Chinab College of Resources and Environment, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, Chinac Sustainable Consumption Institute and Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, United Kingdomd Albrecht Daniel Thaer-Institute of Agricultural and Horticultural Sciences, Humboldt-Universit€at zu Berlin, Germany

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history:Received 11 June 2015Received in revised form6 December 2015Accepted 7 December 2015Available online xxx

Keywords:Environmental impact assessmentUrban agricultureGreenhouse organic tomato productionSustainable food consumption

* Corresponding author. Tel.: þ86 10 62731166.E-mail address: [email protected] (Y. Qiao).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2015.12.0040959-6526/© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Please cite this article in press as: He, X., egreenhouses of Beijing city, China, Journal o

a b s t r a c t

Urbanization has contributed to rapid development of greenhouse vegetable production in NorthernChina resulting in negative environmental impacts caused by the overuse of agricultural inputs. A shifttowards organic consumption and production has been promoted as one of the potential solutions to thischallenge. Early indications for such a shift can already be observed in many major Chinese cities. In thispaper, a life cycle assessment (LCA) approach was used to examine the environmental impacts of organicand conventional production of tomatoes in greenhouses in suburban Beijing, China. Results showedclear environmental benefits associated with a 54.87% lower environmental impact index for organictomato production compared to its conventional counterpart. For the organic system, eutrophication andsoil eco-toxicity contributed the most with 56.39% and 37.87%, respectively, mainly due to manureapplication. For the conventional system, aquatic eco-toxicity ranked first with 59.45%, followed byeutrophication (25.70%) and soil eco-toxicity (12.12%) e mainly due to the application of chemicalpesticides and fertilizers. The results of the LCA analysis suggest a positive environmental evaluation ofcurrent trends towards organic production and consumption in urban China. However, the implicationsof accompanying trends towards direct, cold chain delivery as well as greater land demands within theorganic system should be considered. Also, more effort should be made to help organic farmers to applyorganic fertilizers more efficiently in order to reduce remaining significant soil eco-toxicity impacts frommanure application.

© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction

Urbanization has contributed to rapid development of green-house vegetable production in Northern China to improve thequality and quantity of the produce. The total area of protectedvegetable cultivation estimated to be approximately 3200 ha inBeijing in 2013 (Beijing Statistical Yearbook, 2014). Among that,tomato is one of the most widely grown vegetables, which istypically produced in poly-tunnel greenhouses, occupying morethan 2133 ha in Beijing area, accounting for 68.1%.

Protected cultivation has resulted in negative environmentalimpacts caused by the overuse of agricultural inputs, such as

t al., Environmental impact af Cleaner Production (2016),

fertilizers and pesticides (Mu~noz et al., 2008a,b) contributing torising environmental and, crucially connected, food safety prob-lems e both increasingly prominently discussed within societalissues in China (Liu et al., 2013; Bai et al., 2013). For example, Chenet al. (2004) reported that greenhouse tomato crops in Beijingreceived more than 1000 kg N ha�1 per growing season frommanure and fertilizer applications. Many actors from the corporate,civil society, academic and governmental sector have suggested atransition towards organic consumption and production as a moresustainable alternative as well as one of the potential solutions tothis challenge.

A large number of comparison studies between organic andconventional farming systems carried out on a range of productsand in different contexts suggest organic production as moreenvironmentally sound, due to its lower consumption of fossil

ssessment of organic and conventional tomato production in urbanhttp://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2015.12.004

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1 Normally, conventional vegetables bought by consumers in downtown Beijingcome from commercial production bases from provinces such as Shandong orHainan Province, but less likely from Beijing suburbs.

2 The environment impact of traps production is insufficient and will not beconsidered in this calculation.

X. He et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production xxx (2016) 1e82

energy and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions with less contributionto global warming (Pimentel et al., 1983; Flessa et al., 2002;Gündogmus, 2006; Hoeppner et al., 2006; Olesen et al., 2006;Kaltsas et al., 2007; Liu et al., 2010). Moreover, organic productshave been presented as a healthier and safer food choice (Dendlerand Dewick, this volume) driving up consumption figures, espe-cially in China's first tier cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, orShenzhen (CNCA, 2014).

However, research on the environmental performance oforganic and conventional production in greenhouses nearby citiesis still insufficiently available, especially regarding environmentalpollution due to excessively applied agricultural inputs in green-house cultivation. Nowadays, more and more vegetables are pro-duced intensively in greenhouses, including organic vegetableproduction.

This study aims to address the environmental impacts ofgreenhouse production of organic and conventional tomato insuburban Beijing e China's second largest city and one of thelargest cities in the world through a Life Cycle Analysis (LCA).

LCA is a tool to analyze the environmental impact of a product inall stages in its life cycle, including resource extraction, productionof materials, product parts and the product itself; transportation,usage and disposale either through recycling or final discard. It hasbeen mainly used for: (a) analyzing the origins of environmentalimpacts, such as global warming, acidification, eutrophication,human toxicity, aquatic toxicity, soil toxicity related to a particularproduct; (b) comparing factors for improvement for a given prod-uct; (c) designing new products; and (d) choosing between anumber of comparable products (Guinee, 2004).

The specific objectives of the study are 1) to describe the stagesof the greenhouse production system and its components 2) tocompare the environmental impacts from conventional versusorganic greenhouse production per ton of tomatoes produced and3) to assess the environmental impacts from agricultural inputsapplied during the greenhouse cultivation. After outlining thematerial andmethods used to conduct this analysis, wewill presentthe main findings of our LCA and discuss the results with theliterature and wider sustainability implications. The last sectionwill conclude the potential benefits and challenges associated witha transition to organic production and consumption in urban China.

2. Materials and methods

2.1. Case study area

The case study was conducted in the suburbs of Beijing, namelythe districts of Pinggu, Chaoyang, Daxing, Changping, Shunyi,Huairou and Yanqing County. Eight organic and eight conventionalfarms were visited in pairs (Fig. 1), with two organic farms inPinggu district and one organic farm the other six organic farmsevenly distributed in each of the other six districts.

Beijing has a population of 21 million inhabitants with a vege-table consumption of 11 million tons every year (Wang and Mu,2015). Beijing has a typical continental monsoon climate with anaverage annual precipitation of 447e580 mm and an averagetemperature ranging between 10 and 12 �C. During the winterseason, vegetables can therefore only be produced in greenhouses.In 2013, 67% of the total vegetable production in Beijing was pro-duced in greenhouses (Li and Han, 2015).

2.2. Life cycle assessment methodology

The principles of LCA are described in the ISO standards 14040and 14044 (ISO, 2006a,b), which define four phases: goal andscope definition, inventory analysis, impact assessment, and

Please cite this article in press as: He, X., et al., Environmental impact agreenhouses of Beijing city, China, Journal of Cleaner Production (2016),

interpretation. The main decisions made during these four phasesare briefly described in the following sections.

2.2.1. Goal and scope definitionThe framework of the study was designed in the goal and scope

definition, encompassing the functional units and system bound-aries. The study focused on the tomato production chain, includingcultivation and distribution but not covering consumption.Consequently, the system boundaries of the LCA extended frommineral and fossil fuel extraction to the market, excluding thestages of retailing, home consumption and waste management(Fig. 2). While the eight organic farms delivered their organic to-matoes directly to downtown Beijing,1 the conventional farmsdistributed their produce to local farmers' markets with shorttransportation. The organic and conventional tomato greenhouseproduction system in this study was divided into three subsystems:production of agricultural input materials, farming and trans-portation (Fig. 2). The functional unit for the analysis was onemetric ton of tomatoes.

2.2.2. Life cycle inventory analysisAn inventory of production data, emissions and resources used

was compiled for the entire life cycle. Datawas collected during thecourse of 2013 through questionnaire-based interviews with thedirectors of the relevant organic and conventional farms (Table 1).All farms cultivated tomatoes as well as other vegetables.

While information on the amount of diesel used during theproduction process was derived from the interviews, data on fossilenergy needed for fertilizer and pesticide production was calcu-lated through the consumption of primary energy factors in China(Liang, 2009). The ‘Environmental Impact Assessment of CircularAgriculture' was used to obtain information on emissions, such asCO, CO2, NOx, SO2, CH4 and N2O, which derive from the energyrequired during agriculture material production (Liang, 2009).

During the farming stage, ammonia volatilization and nitrateleaching were 23.77% and 12.50%, respectively, of the nitrogeninput for tomatoes (Hao et al., 2012; Zhao et al., 2010; He et al.,2005). Direct N2O emissions emerged during the application ofinorganic nitrogen, organic fertilizer, and biological nitrogen fixing(1.25% of the N released as N2O). Induced emissions from ammoniaand nitrate losses were also considered. The respective factors were1% for ammonia-N and 2.5% for nitrate-N. NOx-N was calculated as10% of the N2O emissions (Brentrup et al., 2004). Phosphorus losswas calculated as 0.2% of inputs from chemical/organic phosphorussources (Wang et al., 2007).

In conventional tomato production, airborne pesticide residueswere determined using a standard residue rate of 10% per unitweight of pesticides, 1% of freshwater, and 43% of soil (Wang et al.,2012).

In organic tomato production, different agriculture measuresare used to control pests, with some physical measures such ascolor plate traps.2 Sometimes farmers also use small amounts ofbio-pesticides instead of chemical pesticides. The toxicity of bio-pesticides was not considered in our analysis as farmers usuallyapply a small amount of bio-pesticides that easily decomposes inthe environment with little toxicity for human beings.

Heavy metal (Cd, Pb, As, Cu, Zn) losses were considered in termsof inputs of agricultural materials and farming. Inputs of heavy


Fig. 1. Sites location of organic/conventional tomato systems (the above map is of the P.R. of China and the below map is of urban Beijing).

Fig. 2. System boundary, relevant inputs, outputs of organic/conventional tomato systems.

Table 1Management practices for tomatoes in organic/conventional arable farmingsubsystem.

Input and yield Organic Conventional

N (kg$hm�2) 1341 ± 409 1824 ± 891P2O5 (kg$hm�2) 1564 ± 479 1960 ± 1137K2O (kg$hm�2) 1389 ± 424 1605 ± 888Irrigation (m3$hm�2) 3413 ± 554 4407 ± 874Diesel (kg$hm�2) 45.0 ± 0.00 45.0 ± 0.00Agricultural plastic cover (kg$hm�2) 106.5 ± 37.1 84.3 ± 66.5Pesticides (kg$hm�2) 0.05 ± 0.004 13.7 ± 4.6Yield (kg$hm�2) 57,188 ± 7055 75,938 ± 16,741

X. He et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production xxx (2016) 1e8 3


metal came mainly from organic manure and fertilizers. Heavymetal content in the organic manure and fertilizers were estimatedaccording to Liang et al. (2009), Peng et al. (2010) and Zhao et al.(2010).

2.2.3. Life cycle impact assessmentThe life cycle impact assessment aims to categorize emissions

and resource inputs for interpretation. The assessment involvesthree steps: characterization, normalization, and weighting. Thefollowing environmental impacts were considered: demand fornon-renewable energy resources, land resource depletion, waterresource depletion, global warming, acidification, eutrophication,


Table 3Reference value and Weight of environmental impact.

Environmental impact category Unit Reference value Weight

Energy depletion MJ/t 2,590,457 0.15Land occupation m2/t 988.17 e

Water depletion m3/t 2193.90 0.13Global warming kg/CO2-eq/t 6869 0.12Acidification kg/SO2-eq/t 52.26 0.14Aquatic eutrophication kg/PO4-eq/t 1.90 0.12Human toxicity kg/1,4-DCB-eq/t 197.21 0.14Aquatic eco-toxicity kg/1,4-DCB-eq/t 4.83 0.11Soil eco-toxicity kg/1,4-DCB-eq/t 6.11 0.09

The reference value and weight value according to Liang et al. (2009); Huijbregtset al. (2000); Wang et al. (2007).


human toxicity, aquatic toxicity, and soil toxicity. Demand for non-renewable energy resources was determined according toFrischknecht et al. (2004). The global warming potential (GWP)over 100 years was calculated according to the CO2-equivalentfactors from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC,2001). The eutrophication, acidification, and aquatic toxicity po-tential were estimated according to the EDIP97 method (Hauschildand Wenzel, 1998). The human toxicity potential was computedaccording to the CML01 method (Guin�ee et al., 2001) and the soiltoxicity potential was calculated according to Nemecek et al.(2008).

The equivalent coefficient of emissions according to Huijbregtset al. (2000) and Deng and Wang (2003) was used (Table 2)considering the methods described by Wang et al. (2007),Huijbregts et al. (2000) and Liang (2009) for normalization andweighting. The normalization for land resource and water resourcedepletion was computed using per capita data from China's Na-tional Bureau of Statistics (NBS 2000) (Table 3). The weightingvalues used are in reference with Wang et al. (2007), who con-ducted research in the same research area e the North China Plain.

3. Results

3.1. Resource demand

The primary resources used in organic and conventional tomatoproduction in suburban Beijing included renewable (e.g. land andwater) and non-renewable (e.g. fossil fuels) resources. Compared tothe conventional farming system, the demand for non-renewableenergy resources in the organic tomato system was 31.50% lower,whereas water depletion was 1.73% higher. The land area fororganic production was 177 m2 per ton, 29.98% more landcompared to conventional tomato production (Table 4).

3.2. Characterization of pollutant emissions

The total global warming potential of organic farming was20.57% lower than conventional farming. The total acidificationpotential in the organic system was 5.9265 kg SO2-eq/t, similar toconventional tomato cultivation (5.9493 kg SO2-eq/t). The aquaticeutrophication potential of organic tomatoes was 3.5519 kg PO4

3�-eq/t, similar to the results of conventional tomato farming(3.5891 kg PO4

3�-eq/t) (Table 5).

3.3. Characterization of toxicity

The toxicity impact category in the organic tomato productionsystem only included the effects of heavy metals on the soil

Table 2The equivalent coefficient of the emissions inventory for environmental impact potentia

Emissions inventory Global warming Acidification Aquatic eutrophication E

CO2-eq/t SO2-eq/t PO4-eq/t

CO2 1 eCO 2 mCH4 21 fN2O 310 0.13 cNOx 310 0.7 0.13 bNH3 1.88 0.33 CSOx 1 CNO3

� 0.42 PNH4 0.33 ZPtot 3.06 ACOD 0.022

Huijbregts et al. (2000); Deng and Wang (2003).


ecosystem, caused by the application of organic manure. In general,the soil eco-toxicity potential was higher in the organic tomatoproduction system (Table 5). For the conventional production, theeffects of pesticides and heavy metals on humans and aquaculturewere additionally included. Pesticides dominated the toxicity po-tential for humans. Thus, pesticides and heavy metals generatedhigher soil eco-toxicity and aquatic eco-toxicity potential in theconventional tomato greenhouse production. The human toxicitypotential and aquatic eco-toxicity potential were 0.0589 kg 1,4-DCB-eq/t and 23.2579 kg 1,4-DCB-eq/t for the conventional pro-duction system.

3.4. Environmental indicators

During the normalization step, each of the environmentalimpact potentials was divided by the world per-capita environ-mental impact normalization factor for 2000. This was done inorder to normalize environmental impacts and calculate the envi-ronmental index for organic and conventional tomato greenhouseproduction systems. The two major environmental impacts of theorganic tomato production system were soil eco-toxicity andaquatic eutrophication. The values for soil eco-toxicity and land usewere higher in the organic system than in the conventional system(Table 5). For the conventional system, aquatic eco-toxicity wasfound to be the major impact followed by soil eco-toxicity andaquatic eutrophication.

In the weighting step, the normalization results weremultipliedby the corresponding weighting factor. Afterwards, values weresummed to attain the aggregate environmental index of organicand conventional tomato production. The results show that theenvironmental impact index of 0.402 for organic tomato produc-tion was e 54.87% lower than for conventional tomato production(0.891) (Table 5). Farming contributed to the largest share of the

ls.

missions inventory Human toxicity Aquatic eco-toxicity Soil eco-toxicity

1,4-DCB-eq/t

mpenthrin 8.4 370 0.68ancozeb 4.8 28,000 16

olpet 2 82,000 110aptan 0.59 2100 0.041enomyl 0.021 6800 3.5u 1200 14d 1500 170b 9.6 33n 92 25s 210


Table 4Resource use inventories and emissions inventories of a functional unit plant production in organic/conventional tomato system Unit: kg/t.

Inventory Agricultural materials productionsystem

Arable farming system Transportation system

Organic Conventional Organic Conventional Organic Conventional

Energy depletion MJ/t 59.274 418.818 34.040 26.1890 337.165 183.457Land occupation m2/t 177.442 136.516Water depletion m3/t 0.0003 0.610 60.068 59.049HC 0.013 0.010 2.316E-05 1.781E-05 0.0006 0.0004CO 0.005 0.020 0.0005 0.0004 0.436 0.237CO2 0.718 38.723 2.542 1.956 30.997 16.866NH3 0.008 2.934 2.897N2O 0.0001 0.0007 0.462 0.456 0.001 0.0005NOx 0.003 0.127 0.050 0.049 0.038 0.021NO3

- 5.580 5.509SOx 0.002 0.018 0.003 0.002 0.016 0.009CH4 0.0005 0.001 5.588E-06 4.299E-06 0.005 0.003Ptot 0.018 0.055 0.049NH4

- 0.060COD 0.358BOD 0.027Cd 2.364E-08 0.001 0.0008Pb 3.435E-07 0.017 0.009As 9.466E-08Cu 1.111E-07 0.110 0.077Zn 8.991E-07 0.322 0.206empenthrin 0.116mancozeb 0.147folpet 0.021captan 0.104benomyl 0.033

Table 5Environmental indices of one-ton tomato in organic/conventional system.

Environmental impact category Unit Environmental impactpotentials

Normalization values Environmental indices

Organic Conventional Organic Conventional Organic Conventional

Energy depletion MJ/t 430.4790 628.4643 0.0002 0.0002 2.49E-05 3.64E-05Land occupation m2/t 177.4418 136.5160 0.1796 0.1382Water depletion m3/t 60.0682 59.0486 0.0274 0.0269 0.0036 0.0035Global warming kg/CO2-eq/t 207.2148 260.8720 0.0302 0.0338 0.0036 0.0041Acidification kg/SO2-eq/t 5.9265 5.9493 0.1134 0.1138 0.0159 0.0159Aquatic eutrophication kg/PO4-eq/t 3.5519 3.5892 1.8893 1.9091 0.227 0.229Human toxicity kg/1,4-DCB-eq/t 0.0589 2.99E-04 4.18E-05Aquatic eco-toxicity kg/1,4-DCB-eq/t 23.2579 4.8152 0.53Soil eco-toxicity kg/1,4-DCB-eq/t 10.3373 7.3358 1.6919 1.2006 0.152 0.108In total 0.402 0.891


impact, namely: 99.67% for organic and 99.00% for conventionaltomato greenhouse production. In regard to the organic system,eutrophication and soil eco-toxicity contributed the most to theenvironmental impact (56.39% and 37.87%, respectively). For theconventional system, aquatic eco-toxicity ranked first with 59.45%,followed by eutrophication 25.70% and soil eco-toxicity 12.12%(Fig. 3).

4. Discussion

4.1. The environmental impact of two production systems: themanagement aspects

In the organic tomato production system, the environmentalimpact index caused by the usage of organic manure was 0.395,accounted for 98.34% of the total environmental impact index;followed by water depletion (irrigation water). In the conventionaltomato production, the environmental impact index was domi-nantly influenced by applied pesticides (0.542), organic manure


(0.300) and fertilizer (0.045), accounting for 60.83%, 33.67% and5.05%, respectively (Fig. 4).

Because of the shortage of organic manure, the organic farmspurchased organic manure from other places, which led to sub-stantial energy consumption from transportation (47.87% of theenergy depletion) (Fig. 5). The eight organic farms delivered theirorganic tomatoes to the markets in downtown Beijing through coldchain transportation. This resulted in significant energy consump-tion with 29.50% of demand for non-renewable energy comingfrom tomato production transportation. Production of agriculturalplastic cover and farming contributed 13.60% and 7.81%,respectively.

In contrast, conventional farmers transported their tomatoes tolocal farmers markets through non-temperature controlled trucks,resulting in comparatively less transport related energy consump-tion. The proportion of transportation and farming were only29.19% and 4.17%, respectively. Similar to results by Liu et al. (2010),we found that the agricultural input stage of conventional farmingconsumesmore fossil energy compared to the organic supply chain.


Fig. 3. Analysis of environmental impact of organic/conventional tomato production.

0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%

ORG

CON

contribution of environmental impact (%)

0.395

0.300

0.004

0.542 0.045

Organic manure

Diesel

Agricultural plastic coverTomato transportation

Irrigation water

Pesticides

Fertilizer

Fig. 4. Analysis of environmental impact index of organic/conventional tomato production. ORG: organic tomato production, CON: conventional tomato production.

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

ED-ORG

ED-CON

GW-ORG

GW-CON

contribution of environmental impact (%)

47.87%

16.46%

13.26%

29.50%

7.43%

8.17%

13.60%

55.72%

28.74%

76.68%

49.84% 10.84% TS-Organic manureTS-TomatoTS-FertilizerMS-DieselMS-Plastic coverMS-FertizerMS-PesticideFS-DieselFS-Organic manureFS-Fertizer

Fig. 5. Energy depletion and global warming in organic/conventional tomato production system. GW: global warming, ED: energy depletion, TS: transportation subsystem, MS:agricultural material production subsystem, FS: arable farming subsystem.


The demand for non-renewable energy resources for the conven-tional system came mainly from the production of agriculturalinput materials (66.64%), in particular the production of fertilizersand pesticides (Duan, 2007).

At the subsystem level, farming contributed the most to globalwarming in both tomato production systems, accounting for 77.88%(or 161.3705 kg CO2-eq/t) in the organic and 60.76% (or 158.5124 kg


CO2-eq/t) in the conventional tomato greenhouse production sys-tem. The production of agricultural inputs contributed 30.05% tothe global warming potential of the conventional tomato produc-tion, which can be mainly attributed to emissions during the pro-duction of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. Transportationcontributed 21.26%in the organic and 9.19% in the conventionaltomato production to global warming potential. The mode and



distance of transportation to the end-consumer and the organicmanure transportation led to a higher share within the organicsystem (Fig. 5). At the agricultural inputs level, organic manurecontributed the largest share of global warming in both organic andconventional tomato production, 89.94% for organic and 54.94% forconventional tomato production, respectively. With regards to theemission levels, the main greenhouse gas was N2O, whichaccounted for 69.16% in the organic system and 54.24% in theconventional system. This goes in line with previous findings in thewheat system (Biswas et al., 2010).

The acidification potential of tomato production was dominatedby NH3, which is released through volatilization during and afterapplication of nitrogen fertilizers (Brentrup et al., 2004). At theagricultural inputs level, the usage of organic manure contributedthe largest share in regard to acidification potential: 99.34% fororganic and 78.65% for conventional tomato production (Fig. 6).With regards to the emission level, the NH3 released duringfarming contributed 93.08% and 91.55% to the acidification poten-tial for the organic and the conventional tomato production,respectively. The acidification potential of tomato production wasmainly dominated by NH3 and NO3

�, accounting for more than90.00%. Rising use of organic fertilizer increased N losses throughleaching and runoff (Du et al., 2011; Jia et al., 2013).

The usage of organic manure also contributed the most to theaquatic eutrophication potential, accounting for 99.89% of organicand 80.21% of conventional tomato greenhouse production (Fig. 6).With regards to the emission level, NH3 and NO3

- released fromfarming contributed 27.26% and 65.98% to aquatic eutrophicationfor organic tomato production, respectively. NH3 accounted for26.64% and NO3

� for 64.47% of aquatic eutrophication in the con-ventional tomato production. This shows that aquatic eutrophica-tion was dominated by NH3 and NO3

- released during the farmingstage.

Human toxicity and aquatic eco-toxicity could mainly beattributed to the use of chemical pesticides during conventionaltomato production. In order to apply less bio-pesticides, organicfarmers used ecological measures such as crop rotation, light trapscolor plate traps to control pests. However, eco-toxicity risks alsoincreases with rising application of organic fertilizer (Wang et al.,2014). In particular, organic manure tends to release heavymetals, which greatly affects soil eco-toxicity in both productionsystems and was the main contributor to soil eco-toxicity in theorganic tomato system.

Our study identified aquatic eutrophication as the factor forthe highest environmental risk during organic greenhouse to-mato production, followed by soil eco-toxicity. Organic manurehad the greatest anthropogenic effect on the environmentduring organic tomato production. In the conventional tomato

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%

A-ORG

A-CON

AE-ORG

AE-CON

contribution of environmental im

3.76%

1.25%

99.34%

78.65%

99.89%

80.21%

Fig. 6. Acidification and aquatic eutrophication in organic/conventional tomato producti


greenhouse production, aquatic eco-toxicity potential was thehighest, followed by aquatic eutrophication potential. Chemicalpesticides had the largest effect during conventional tomatoproduction.

4.2. Environmental optimization of organic production system

Overall, our LCA showed clear environmental benefits associ-ated with a transition from conventional greenhouse production toorganic greenhouse production. In particular, a conversion toorganic agricultural production offers great potentials to ban theuse of pesticides, which has been named as the main source for theenvironmental impact index as well as for human toxicity andaquatic eco-toxicity.

However, our results also show that increasing organic green-house vegetable production should not be seen uncritically. Inparticular, current organic consumption patterns seem to concurwith a shift towards direct, cold chain delivery to consumers. Whilethere are certainly positive health implications linked to anincreasing consumption of fresh, organic vegetables (Baranski et al.,2014), our study showed that it is also linked to significant envi-ronmental effects. These trends should be further studied,including potential measures to reduce associated environmentalimpacts. We also have to take into account the higher land usedemands, which are associated with organic greenhouse produc-tion in correspondence with findings of other organic studies (e.g.Garnett and Wilkes, 2014). With increasing competition for land,especially in China's urban areas, this is arguably a significantbarrier for larger scale transitions to organic production and con-sumption and should be further investigated. Moreover, the largeamount of nitrogen input from animal manure application onorganic farms implied that both research and extension efforts arenecessary to help farmers to use fertilizers more efficiently andthereby reduce the potential risk of eutrophication with nitrogenand soil eco-toxicity by heavy metals. For example, soil testingcould be an option to increase fertilizer efficiency. Meanwhile, moresustainable agriculture measures, such as crop rotation, legumi-nous crops, cover crops, green manure, physical trapping, might betaken to guarantee the supply of soil nutrients, control pests andincrease productivity.

As this case study focused on suburban Beijing, there are limi-tations to generalize our findings. However, our analysis corre-sponds with other comparison studies of organic and conventionalagricultural production systems. Moreover, as Zhang et al. (thisvolume) outline, current consumption and production trends inBeijing can in many regards be seen as the forefront of futureconsumption and production developments in China, especiallyconsidering projected urbanization trends. As such, the

70% 80% 90% 100%

pact (%)

17.10%

16.92% TS-Organic manureTS-TomatoTS-FertizerMS-DieselMS-Plastic coverMS-FertizerMS-PesticideFS-DieselFS-Organic manureFS-Fertizer

on system. A: acidification, AE: aquatic eutrophication. See Fig. 5 for TS, MS and FS.



implications of our study arguably go beyond the boundaries of thegiven case.

5. Conclusion

Current trends in urban China suggest increasing consumptionof fresh vegetables, which are produced in urban or peri-urbangreenhouses. Amplified by raising public concerns on environ-mental pollution and food safety, part of the consumption andproduction has shifted towards organic production systems, a trendwidely promoted by sustainability scientists, activists and policymakers. Comparing LCA data of organic and conventional green-house tomato production, our study has supported the overallpositive effects of such a shift from an environmental perspective.These are mainly linked to potential reductions in the use of syn-thetic fertilizers and pesticides. However, the environmental im-plications of accompanying trends towards direct, cold chaindelivery as well as greater land demands within the organic systemshould be considered. Also, more effort should be made to helporganic farmers to apply organic fertilizers more efficiently in orderto reduce remaining significant impacts in terms of soil eco-toxicityand eutrophication.

Acknowledgment

This work was supported by the National Planning Office ofPhilosophy and Social Science “Research on agriculture productionservice system for environment protection and food safety” (No.11AZD095), the National Key Technology R&D Program in the 12thFive-Year Plan of China (No. 2014BAK19B00).

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http://www.bjstats.gov.cn/nj/main/2014-tjnj/index.htm

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http://www.fcrn.org.uk/sites/default/files/fcrn_china_mapping_study_final_pdf_2014.pdf

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