EDITORS: This event is not open to the public. If you would like to send a reporter and/or photographer, please RSVP to Helaine Hunscher, (734) 764-1412, [email protected]by Oct. 15. ANN ARBOR—The media is invited to join the students and staff of the University of Michigan’s School of Natural Resources and Environment (SNRE) on Oct. 16 to enjoy yogurt compliments of Stonyfield Farm. Five hundred cartons of Stonyfield Farm yogurt, bearing the logo of the school’s Center for Sustainable Systems (CSS), will be handed out from 2:45 p.m.-3:15 p.m. on the first floor of the Chemistry Building, 930 North University. Photographers are welcome. The yogurt extravaganza is being held to celebrate a successful collaboration between the center and the New Hampshire-based maker of organic yogurt. At Stonyfield Farm’s request, CSS recently completed a life cycle assessment of the company’s product delivery system. The assessment details and analyzes every step in the process, from obtaining the natural resources needed to make the yogurt cartons, through the manufacturing process, to final disposal of the empty containers. To recognize CSS’s efforts, the lids of Stonyfield Farm yogurt containers will carry the CSS logo for an undetermined period of time. "Our corporate mission is to be a good environmental steward. We want our company to be a model to demonstrate that an environmentally concerned business can also be profitable," said Nancy Hirshberg, vice president for natural resources at Stonyfield Farm. She predicts that the U-M study eventually will result in major changes to the company’s packaging. "It was incredibly valuable, and the information will give us the ability to implement changes on many levels." Food Gatherers, an Ann Arbor organization, made the event possible by providing refrigeration and delivery of the yogurt; in return, the agency will also receive 500 cups for distribution to the needy. "This was a great opportunity for us to collaborate with a local agency and support our own community," said SNRE professor Gregory Keoleian who directed the life cycle analysis project.

To close the loop, the event organizers plan to collect the used yogurt containers, clean them, and return them to Stonyfield Farm for recycling. Learn more about the Center for Sustainable Systems at http://css.snre.umich.edu/. The life cycle assessment is at http://css.snre.umich.edu/css_doc/CSS01-02.pdf. For information about Stonyfield Farm, visit http://stonyfield.com/.