UNEP and SETAC have worked together through the UNEP/SETAC Life Cycle Initiative to develop these guidelines from 2004 till 2009. An updated version is published in 2019.
A key objective of the UNEP/SETAC Life Cycle Initiative is to help extend life cycle assessment (LCA) methods and practices: Social and socio-economic LCA guidelines complementing environmental LCA and Life Cycle Costing, contributing to the full assessment of goods and services within the context of sustainable development.
Visit websites of Life Cycle Initiative and Social LC Alliance
These Guidelines proposes a two-fold classification of social impacts: by stakeholder categories and impact categories. A set of subcategories includes social and socio-economic issues of concerns.
These issues are being inspired by the ISO 26000 social responsibility issues that were already known in 2008 and beginning of 2009 (with help of ISO 26000 Task Group Leader Pierre Mazeau).
A social and socio-economic Life Cycle Assessment (S-LCA) is a social impact (and potential impact) assessment technique that aims to assess the social and socio-economic aspects of products and their potential positive and negative impacts along their life cycle encompassing extraction and processing of raw materials; manufacturing; distribution; use; re-use; maintenance; recycling; and final disposal. S-LCA complements Environmental-LCA (E-LCA) with social and socio-economic aspects. It can either be applied on its own or in combination with E-LCA.