Climate & Environment
True Cost Accounting (TCA)
Accounting that prices the hidden environmental, social and health costs of products — most developed for food systems.
Definition
True cost accounting is an approach to measuring and valuing the full costs and benefits of economic activity — including externalities normally invisible in prices: pollution, health damage, ecosystem degradation, underpaid labour, alongside positive impacts such as carbon sequestration and community benefit. Most developed for food systems (the TEEBAgriFood framework), TCA studies estimate the hidden costs of global food systems in the trillions of dollars annually — more than the sector's market value added.
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