The application of lifecycle and risk assessment methodologies for environmental assessment of agricultural products is growing and produces interesting results. This allows comparisons between agricultural and technological routes of production. An evaluation of such assessments provides increased insight in the supposed environmental friendliness of naturally produced substances. Three cases are considered: carvone (derived from caraway seed) and a chemically-produced sprouting inhibitor, onion oil (derived from onions) and a potentially equivalent chemical mixture, and a starch derivative for paper coating (derived from potatoes) and other paper coating agents. In the case of paper coating the agricultural route seems more environmentally friendly than the technological route. For the other cases the technological route seems to be preferable on environmental grounds. The evaluation of these assessments shows two ways to improve the environmental performance of agriculturally-grown products: (a) developing agricultural products with a high content of the useful substance and (b) increasing the energy efficiency and material efficiency (e.g. by means of development of marketable by-products and waste prevention) of the extraction and conversion steps by scaling up of processing and by technological innovation. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science B.V.