The LCAgMetrics project has delivered a major upgrade to Australia’s agricultural life cycle data infrastructure, strengthening how environmental performance is measured, reported, and communicated across agri-food supply chains.

Delivered by Lifecycles in partnership with AgriFutures Australia, and funded through the Australian Government’s Sustainability Reporting Uplift Grant Round, the project comprehensively expanded and modernised the AusAgLCI dataset within the Australian Life Cycle Inventory (AusLCI). This work responds to growing domestic and global demand for credible, science-based sustainability metrics grounded in Life Cycle Assessment (LCA).

The updated dataset provides contemporary, regionalised life cycle inventory data for more than 1,000 farm-gate agricultural products and an additional 190 post-farm agri-food products, capturing processing, transport, and storage. Coverage now spans major commodities including grains, livestock, horticulture, dairy, rice, cotton, sugar, and emerging sectors previously absent from AusLCI.

The project plays a pivotal role in quantifying up-to-date on-farm improvements, enabling recognition and adherence to sustainability standards. By improving data quality, consistency, and accessibility, LCAgMetrics enables industry, government, and supply-chain actors to generate robust environmental metrics, support sustainability reporting, and demonstrate Australia’s agricultural credentials in global markets. Together, these outcomes establish a durable foundation for transparent decision-making and the transition to a more resilient, sustainable agricultural sector.

Acknowledgments:

The update of the AusAgLCI data set was funded as part of two projects:

• AgriFutures Australia Project PRO-017538 (LCAgMetrics), titled Equipping Australian agriculture with sustainability metrics project. This project was a partnership between AgriFutures Australia and leading sustainability consultancy, Lifecycles. It was funded by the Australian Government’s Sustainability Reporting Uplift Grant Round, as part of the National Agriculture Traceability Grants Program.
  

• Grains Research & Development Corporation (GRDC) Project CSP201-013RTX led by CSIRO, which funded the update of grain crops (cereals, oil seeds and pulses).

We acknowledge the Project Reference Panel members who guided the project and industry experts who reviewed data.