What Are Category Assessments?

Category assessments provide a generalized view of the climate impacts based on representative values for entire product categories (e.g., all milk products). The data used typically relies on these representative values, which do not accurately reflect the specific impacts of individual products.

These assessments are less detailed and do not account for variations between individual products within the category. They are suitable for gaining a broad understanding of the climate impact across a product category, relying on secondary data sources and publicly available information. Because they require less detailed data, they are easier and faster to perform. Category assessments are useful for initial evaluations, benchmarking, identifying general trends, and setting baselines. They are ideal for companies starting their sustainability journey or those with very large, diverse product portfolios.

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Challenges with Current Category Assessments

However, current category assessments also present limitations. Today, grocery retailers face significant hurdles when assessing their Scope 3 emissions using category average data. These challenges impede progress towards net-zero goals:

• Poor Data Representation: Emission factors often fail to accurately reflect specific product categories, leading to imprecise environmental impact assessments.
• Inconsistent Data Sources: Current public databases do not cover all products, forcing retailers to rely on multiple data sources, making it difficult to compare values accurately.
• Static Information: Emission factors don't capture ongoing improvements in electricity mix transitions, land-use change reductions, and product composition evolutions.
• Time-Consuming Processes: Matching emission factors to diverse product assortments is labor-intensive, slowing decision-making and reporting.

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Introducing inoqo Category Assessment and inoqo Category Assessment+

To address the challenges of current category assessments, we proudly present our latest innovation: inoqo Category Assessment and inoqo Category Assessment+. These cutting-edge solutions provide the most dynamic, country-specific, and granular emission factors for your extensive range of product categories.

Unlike most databases used today to estimate Scope 3 emissions, our emission factors reflect significant sustainability improvements, such as:

• Reduction of land use change
• Transition to renewable electricity
• Shifts in product assortments towards lower-impact options

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With inoqo, you gain access to the most up-to-date and representative data for your Scope 3 emission reporting, all from a single, reliable source—the inoqo Impact Database.

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Why Choose inoqo Category Assessment+?

Our innovative offerings provide several key benefits:

• Highly Representative Emission Factors: Our emission factors accurately reflect the reality on the shelf by considering country- and category-specific values.
• Increased Granularity: High number of emission factors allowing differentiation of products within same categories (Veggie vs vegan pizza)
• Country-Specific Factors: We account for country-specific variables such as single ingredient origins (e.g., meat), multi-ingredient import/export mix, electricity mix, and retail location.
• Extensive Data Coverage: Covering 200+ territories, our data adapts to changing global conditions.
• Time-Saving Automation: Automated emission factor mapping streamlines the process.
• Regular Updates: We regularly update key factors like land use change, deforestation rates, electricity mix, and product composition to ensure accuracy.

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With inoqo, you’re not just getting a tool—you’re gaining a comprehensive, up-to-date, and highly accurate solution to manage and report your Scope 3 emissions more effectively.

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Why Choose inoqo?

• Easy Start: Utilize granular and dynamic category-representative emission factors.
• Scalability: Conduct climate assessments for thousands of private label and third-party brand products at scale.
• Comprehensive Analysis: Account for ingredients, composition, and production processes.
• Incentives for Producers: Our methodology encourages producers to share primary data.

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Learn more about inoqo's Category Assessment+
Interested in understanding how inoqo can help you reduce Scope 3 emissions?

Download our PDF: Get an in-depth overview of inoqo Category Assessment and inoqo Category Assessment+.

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Watch our Webinar: Migros' Road to Net-Zero: Integrating Category-Based and Product-Specific F&B Impact Assessments

Discover in the webinar how retailers can:

• Start assessing and reducing Scope 3 emissions using our dynamic, category-based emission factors.
• Dive deeper into hotspot categories with inoqo's product impact assessment solutions.

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‍Let's Collaborate on Your Scope 3 Emission Reduction!

At inoqo, we conduct product impact assessments for grocery retailers, F&B brands, and other food companies, calculating the climate, biodiversity, and social impact of all your food and beverage products. Reach out to us at hello@inoqo.com to explore how we can guide your business towards a low-impact future.

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