RTRS developed the Soy Footprint Calculator

During the last decade, soybean production recorded a significant increase from 210 million tons in 2008/09 to 337 million in 2018/19. Awareness of environmental and social impacts has increased with the pace of production and many participants in the soy value chain have begun to develop strategies to ensure that the soy used in their supply chains is sourced sustainably.

However, soy is often not visible in the final product or is not used directly in the production process, but its by-products (flour, oil, lecithin, shell pellets, etc.) are part of the products we find on supermarket shelves. For this reason, it is difficult to check whether soy was used directly or indirectly in the foods we consume, and even more difficult is to quantify the total volume they contain. 

To facilitate this task and provide transparency to the processes involved in the use of soy, from production to consumption, the International Responsible Soy Association (RTRS), a global platform that promotes the production, processing and responsible marketing of soy at a global level, developed the Conversion Factor System and the Soy Footprint Calculator, a tool that allows users to calculate in a practical and rigorous way the amount of soy used as an input for the production of certain soy products* (flour, hull pellets, oil, lecithin, etc.), animal food (feed) and food for human consumption (e.g. beef, chicken, milk or eggs). 

The tool is public and free, and works like any other calculating machine: Selecting the type of product (soy*, animal feed or human consumption) and entering the volume (tons, kilograms, liters), you obtain the result and the amount of soy necessary as an ingredient to prepare the selected product.

To perform the calculations, the calculator uses the RTRS Conversion Factor System, a conversion method that was developed based on rigorous technical and research work. This work included the understanding and analysis of each of the stages of the soy production processes and their results, in order to obtain and deliver accurate and necessary information to carry out an adequate calculation of the soy consumed and contained in the various products analyzed for this phase of production. tool.

 The RTRS Conversion Factor System presents two alternative conversion methods that can be chosen according to the needs of each calculator user. 

Allocation by economic value: This method uses conversion factors that recognize multiple uses of soybeans and assumes that any of them has associated by-products that are applied in other segments (for example, the production of lecithin results in, in addition to the lecithin itself, oil, flour and pellets of shell). Therefore, this method uses the value of different products to clearly represent that soybean demand is not always driven by a single product in particular. 

Allocation on demand: This method uses conversion factors that recognize the physical volume of soy necessary to provide the byproduct/s required by the product. This does not take into account the other by-products also included in the manufacturing process. 

The technical report on the RTRS Soy Footprint Calculator is public and available online in Spanish, English and Portuguese.

Click here to learn more.