Tourism management and industrial ecology: A case study of food service in Taiwan

The main purpose of industrial ecology is to evaluate and minimize impacts from economic activities. Tourism, as an economic activity, results in a full range of environmental impacts and should be regarded as any other industry. Hence, the application of industrial ecology in tourism was investigated to enhance environmental management of catering. More specifically, boxed food in Taiwan was taken as a case study to demonstrate this new approach. The framework for studying boxed food was based on material flow analysis. Boxed food analysis can be divided into two parts: the meal box and the contents. Meal boxes were inventoried with a life cycle assessment (LCA). According to the findings of this study, environmental impacts from a PP meal box production were more expensive than others, while those from a PS meal box production were the lowest. The life cycle inventory analysis of the contents will be investigated with a new approach system in the next phase of our work. This new approach is an integration of the LCA with the Hazard Analysis Control Point (HACCP) system.