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| Land Use and Greenhouse Gas Emissions Associated with the Average US Diet Were Nearly Twice the World Average per capita values, 2009
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Installment 11 of Creating a Sustainable Food Future shows that for people who consume high amounts of meat and dairy, shifting to diets with a greater share of plant-based foods could significantly reduce agriculture’s pressure on the environment. It introduces a protein scorecard ranking foods from lowest (plant-based foods) to highest impact (be...
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... First, we quantified the per person effects of applying the diet scenarios in Table ES-1 to the consumption pattern of a high-consuming country-the United States ( Figure ES-3). This analysis shows how, among high-consuming populations, the three diet shifts could significantly reduce per person agricultural land use and greenhouse gas emissions. ...
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... found that producing the food for the average Ameri- can diet in 2009 required nearly one hectare of agricul- tural land, and emitted 1.4 tons of carbon dioxide equiva- lent (CO 2 e), before accounting for emissions from land-use change. These amounts of land use and greenhouse gas emissions were nearly double those associated with the average world diet that year ( Figure ES-3). Animal-based foods (shown in red, orange, and yellow in Figure ES-3) accounted for nearly 85 percent of the production-related greenhouse gas emissions and nearly 90 percent of agri- cultural land use. ...
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... analysis of the three diet shifts, summarized in Figures ES-3 and ES-4, yields the following insights: ...
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... average diet of the United States 27 is a case in point. Figure 3 compares the average daily diets of the world and the United States in 2009 based on the number of calories of each food type consumed, as well as the asso- ciated land-use needs and greenhouse gas emissions. In the United States, the average daily diet contained nearly 500 more calories than the average world diet, including nearly 400 additional animal-based calories. ...
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... production generates more greenhouse gas emissions per unit of human-edible output than every other com- monly eaten animal-based food. Greenhouse gas emissions from cattle production originate from five main sources: Ruminants such as cattle were responsible for 47 percent of production-related greenhouse gas emissions from agricul- ture in 2010, without taking land-use impacts into account ( Figure 13). 141 Because total greenhouse gas emissions from agricultural production represented 13 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions in 2010, ruminants contributed about 6 percent of total global greenhouse gas emissions in 2010, before accounting for land-use change. ...
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... appendix contains further detail on the data sources, calculation methods, and assumptions behind each of the diet shift scenarios in this paper. Table B1 also contains fur- ther detail on the caloric composition of the reference diets and scenarios presented in Figures ES-3, 3, 6, 10, and 15. ▪ Lower the number of calories actually consumed in 2009 by each country's calorie adjustment factor, applying the factor equally across all food categories in each country. ▪ For 2050, assume the number of obese and over- weight people will increase by 50 percent relative to 2009 (from approximately 2.1 billion to approximately 3.1 billion). ...
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... footprint estimates, when overlaid with maps of water stress, can also identify "hotspots" where water footprint reduction is most urgent. Figure 3), when multiplied by the world population of 6.8 billion, do not equate to the annual estimates of global land-use change emissions (around 5 billion tons CO 2 e globally per year as given in Smith et al. 2014). (Multiplying 8 tons CO 2 e per person by the world population would lead to an estimate of more than 50 billion tons CO 2 e globally, about 10 times higher than actual land-use change emissions.) ...
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Citations
... Efectos especialmente preocupantes en el caso del consumo de carne de vacuno: se estima que, junto a la carne de cordero, este aúna el 50% de las emisiones totales de gases de efecto invernadero procedentes de la ganadería (Poore y Nemecek, 2018). Esta tendencia apunta al alza: se estima que en un escenario como el actual, la demanda mundial de carne de ternera podría llegar a incrementarse en un 95% para 2050, concentrando gran parte del crecimiento en países donde el consumo de estos productos era tradicionalmente bajo, tales como China e India (Ranganathan, 2016;Rayner et al., 2006). ...
Documentos recientemente elaborados desde organismos internacionales de gran relevancia —la ONU, la OMS o la UE— ponen de manifiesto una realidad innegable: la existencia de una creciente preocupación por el cambio climático y, especialmente, sus efectos sobre la salud del planeta y las personas. El debate para identificar las causas de este fenómeno y desarrollar estrategias para mitigar sus efectos es una cuestión central en la agenda política internacional. No obstante, y pese a las evidencias que subrayan la importancia de la alimentación para lograr este objetivo, ¿es este un asunto central en los análisis y estrategias de las instituciones internacionales? Partiendo de esta pregunta, este trabajo tiene como objetivo analizar el papel de la alimentación en los documentos internacionales seleccionados, considerados como la “hoja de ruta” para afrontar el cambio climático. Para ello, se ha realizado un análisis léxico y semántico de cuatro documentos clave tanto por su relevancia, como por su implicación en acciones políticas a escala global: “Cambio Climático: Informe de Síntesis” (IPCC, 2014), la “Agenda 2030 para el desarrollo sostenible” (ONU, 2015), el “Acuerdo de París” (ONU, 2015) y el “Pacto Verde Europeo” (Comisión Europea, 2019). Los resultados muestran que, si bien la alimentación sí está presente en los debates internacionales sobre cambio climático, no tiene un peso importante. Las escasas referencias identificadas aluden a la producción agroalimentaria y no a los patrones de consumo o la dieta, pese a que la evidencia científica indica que será precisamente en estas donde residirá la clave para lograr cambios en el sistema agroalimentario y, por ende, para alcanzar un desarrollo sostenible.
... In Canada, as in other high-income countries, meat and dairy consumption is much higher than the global average, exceeding both dietary requirements (Ranganathan et al 2016) and consumption levels that are aligned with the goal of keeping anthropogenic impacts within planetary boundaries , Willett et al 2019, Clark et al 2020. Recent research, based in part on results of self-reporting food consumption recall surveys, has shown that the consumption of livestock-derived foods currently contributes up to 75% of food-related GHG emissions in Canada, with red and processed meats alone contributing nearly half (Veeramani et al 2017, Auclair and Burgos 2021, Topcu et al 2022. ...
Food systems are a major driver of resource depletion and environmental degradation globally, with livestock-derived food production accounting for a disproportionate fraction of these impacts. At the same time, meat, eggs, and dairy products are important sources of protein, energy, and micronutrients in human diets. Higher rates of red and processed meat consumption has, however, also been linked to increased heath risks in high-income countries. Given the important role that livestock-derived foods play in both planetary and human health, it is important to understand patterns in their consumption and how these have changed over time. Here, we report and assess changes in Canadian apparent consumption of livestock-derived foods, as both mass of edible unprocessed products and total contained protein, between 1960 and 2020. We used Statistics Canada food availability data, as it is the closest available proxy for historical consumption data. The animal foods included are dairy, eggs, and chicken, turkey, pork, and beef meat, with results expressed in kilograms of boneless meat, shell-less eggs, and total milk solids per capita per year. Total national apparent livestock food consumption was also calculated, by multiplying annual per capita availability by national population, for each year included in this analysis. Results indicate that, over the last six decades, apparent per capita consumption of livestock-derived foods in Canada has remained surprisingly constant, peaking in the 1970s at 108 kg/person/year, and varying narrowly between 91–101 kg/person/year for the most recent 35 years. The composition of Canadians’ livestock-derived food intake, however, does appear to have changed markedly, with apparent consumption of beef declining since its zenith in the late 1970s, while the apparent consumption of chicken meat has grown rapidly. Substantial reductions in the consumption of livestock foods in Canada are required to stay within planetary boundaries.
... Likewise, agri-food industry actors have used campaigns to gain consumer trust by highlighting corporate social responsibility or social purpose activities to dispel concerns around the negative health, social, and/or environmental externalities associated with overconsuming their branded products and services [14]. Memorable advertising, education, and social change campaigns have been proposed as a potential strategy to shift consumers' behaviors towards more sustainable products and dietary patterns within a broader policy, systems, and environmental change approach [1,15]. ...
... Ranganathan et al., 2016 [15] describe four strategies for shifting consumption away from animal-based proteins and towards plant-based proteins and sustainable diets that include minimizing disruption, selling a compelling benefit, maximizing awareness, and evolving social norms. While campaigns promoting plant-based products and plant-rich dietary patterns utilize these strategies, they compete against RPM campaigns that have also used these strategies for decades to influence Americans' dietary behaviors [15]. ...
... Ranganathan et al., 2016 [15] describe four strategies for shifting consumption away from animal-based proteins and towards plant-based proteins and sustainable diets that include minimizing disruption, selling a compelling benefit, maximizing awareness, and evolving social norms. While campaigns promoting plant-based products and plant-rich dietary patterns utilize these strategies, they compete against RPM campaigns that have also used these strategies for decades to influence Americans' dietary behaviors [15]. For instance, this study observed that starting in 2021, amidst growing concern about the environmental impacts of RPM products, the Beef and Pork Checkoff programs launched corporate sustainability campaigns highlighting the sustainability practices of small-and medium-scale farmers, an example of "selling a compelling benefit". ...
United States (U.S.) and global experts recommend that populations reduce red and processed meat (RPM) intake and transition to plant-rich, sustainable diets to support human and planetary health. A systematic scoping review was conducted to identify the landscape of media campaigns that promote plant-rich dietary patterns, traditional plant proteins, and novel plant-based meat alternatives (PBMA) and that encourage or discourage RPM products to Americans. Of 8321 records screened from four electronic databases, 103 records were included, along with 62 records from gray literature sources. Across 84 media campaigns (1917–2023) identified, corporate marketing campaigns (58.6%) were most prevalent compared to public information (13.8%), corporate sustainability (12.6%), countermarketing (5.7%), social marketing (4.6%), and public policy (4.6%) campaigns. Findings indicate that long-running corporate RPM campaigns, many with U.S. government oversight, dominated the landscape for decades, running alongside traditional plant protein campaigns. Novel PBMA campaigns emerged in the past decade. Many civil society campaigns promoted plant-rich dietary patterns, but few utilized social norm or behavior change theory, and only the Meatless Monday campaign was evaluated. The U.S. government, academia, businesses, and civil society should commit more resources to and evaluate the impact of media campaigns that support a sustainable diet transition for Americans, restrict and regulate the use of misinformation in media campaigns, and prioritize support for plant-based proteins and plant-rich dietary patterns.
... Various studies claim that a movement toward plantfocussed diets could improve nutrition, reduce zoonotic disease outbreaks, minimize animal suffering, and mitigate environmental strain (Parodi et al., 2018;Ranganathan et al., 2016;Smetana et al., 2015). Flexitarianism is cited specifically as a consumption practice that might carry forward the "protein More than a vehicle to deliver the end goal of a global dietary shift, flexitarianism has potential to encourage equity within the local transition processes that make up these larger changes. ...
Flexitarianism was one of the top food trends of the summer in 2020. Characterizing reductions in meat eating as representative of the reflections on personal and societal health that were taking place at the time, Canada’s largest food retailer, Loblaw situated the company’s expanded plant-based offerings as a response to a “new us” that was emerging from the COVID-19 pandemic. This article explores the protein pathways that Loblaw opens and closes by promoting “flexitarian choices for our changing lifestyles”. Focussing on reduced beef consumption as a target of flexitarian intervention, I situate flexitarianism in relation to calls for a “protein transition”, which would address the risks the dominant beef industry poses to animal, human, and planetary wellbeing. Drawing from a larger case study on beef shopping at Loblaw supermarkets, I consider the extent to which the version of flexitarianism on display at Loblaw supermarkets might support the status quo in the dominant beef industry. As a flexible framework, flexitarianism holds potential to respond contextually to the needs of varying food networks in Canada. As a defined consumer demographic, however, flexitarianism is poised to reroute this flexibility away from diverse food systems toward adaptable investments, which would insulate financial portfolios from the risks of intensive animal agriculture without requiring meaningful changes within those industries.
... Given efficient protein isolation techniques can largely mitigate digestion, absorption, and bioavailability issues, the likely explanation for these findings is the more preferable amino acid composition of whey compared with plant-based proteins (16). Further, increasing societal (13)and governmental (17,18) drives for reducing reliance on animal-derived proteins, optimizing this aspect of plant-based sports nutrition is an important academic and applied goal. ...
Purpose
Whey protein ingestion is typically considered an optimal dietary strategy to maximize myofibrillar protein synthesis (MyoPS) following resistance exercise. While single source plant protein ingestion is typically less effective, at least partly, due to less favorable amino acid profiles, this could theoretically be overcome by blending plant-based proteins with complementary amino acid profiles. We compared the post-exercise MyoPS response following the ingestion of a novel plant-derived protein blend with an isonitrogenous bolus of whey protein.
Methods
Ten healthy, resistance trained, young adults (male/female: 8/2; age: 26 ± 6 y; BMI: 24 ± 3 kg·m ⁻² ) received a primed continuous infusion of L-[ ring - ² H 5 ]-phenylalanine and completed a bout of bilateral leg resistance exercise before ingesting 32 g protein from whey (WHEY) or a plant protein blend (BLEND; 39.5% pea, 39.5% brown rice, 21.0% canola) in a randomized, double-blind crossover fashion. Blood and muscle samples were collected at rest, and 2 and 4 h after exercise and protein ingestion, to assess plasma amino acid concentrations, and postabsorptive and post-exercise MyoPS rates.
Results
Plasma essential amino acid availability over the 4 h postprandial post-exercise period was ~44% higher in WHEY compared with BLEND ( P = 0.04). From equivalent postabsorptive values (WHEY, 0.042 ± 0.020%·h ⁻¹ ; BLEND, 0.043 ± 0.015%·h ⁻¹ ) MyoPS rates increased following exercise and protein ingestion (time effect; P < 0.001) over a 0-2 h (WHEY, 0.085 ± 0.037%·h ⁻¹ ; BLEND, 0.080 ± 0.037%·h ⁻¹ ) and 2-4 h (WHEY, 0.085 ± 0.036%·h ⁻¹ ; BLEND, 0.086 ± 0.034%·h ⁻¹ ) period, with no differences between conditions during either period or throughout the entire (0-4 h) postprandial period (time × condition interactions; all P > 0.05).
Conclusions
Ingestion of a novel plant-based protein blend stimulates post-exercise MyoPS to an equivalent extent as a whey protein, demonstrating the utility of plant protein blends to optimize post-exercise skeletal muscle reconditioning.
... beneficial to ecosystems regarding the preservation of open landscapes and grasslands3, when the whole livestock sector has significant negative impact (Ranganathan et al., 2011). Similarly, Housing & building sector showed positive score, as it covered actions such as housing renovation when urban planning and development are missions carried out at the local governments' level and so are beyond the scope. ...
... In the case of "Recycling" or "Reuse", this could be due to the fact they were not central aspects of the project, there being a predominance of the study of other urban environmental problems with consequences more visible to the students. For the "Sustainable Food" category, these types of habits have a greater environmental impact at a regional or global than urban level (Ranganathan et al., 2016). In the case of this and other categories, the environmental project seems to have occasioned a necessary "adjustment" in the perception of environmental problems that were perceived as local and which, however, are global or regional in scale. ...
Well into the 21st century, the environmental crisis is more relevant than ever. To face this challenge, citizens with pro-environmental attitudes and adequate levels of environmental awareness are needed. As future adult citizens, adolescents should be a priority for environmental educators. The objective of the study is to determine the effectiveness of the Project-Based Learning (PBL) methodology in the improvement of the level of environmental awareness of secondary school students. To this end, a project related to the surrounding environment was designed and applied in the Spanish educational context. The nature of the research methodology was mixed (quantitative-qualitative), with the application of a pretest-posttest single group design. The instrument used was an environmental awareness test with a Likert-type scale and a set of open questions. The results obtained indicate a statistically significant rise in the level of environmental awareness in the participant group-class, leaving the effectiveness of the PBL in the referred level and educative context patent. There were some limitations in the research, including small sample size and the particular conditions of the exposed context, which should be resolved for future research in other educational contexts in order to generalise the findings of this study. Keywords: project based learning, environmental education, environmental awareness, environmental literacy, secondary education, Spain
... Understanding the market potential of low carbon beef is crucial for informing production, processing, and marketing decisions. It also contributes to the policy and societal debate surrounding sustainable food consumption as mentioned in various studies (see e.g., Chang et al., 2021;Ranganathan et al., 2016) and discussed in the EAT Lancet Commission on Food, Planet, Health report (2019). ...
Accurately reflecting expected prices in stated preference designs can be challenging for foods like ribeye steak, which exhibit stark fluctuations in prices across time and space. To address this issue, we introduce a novel price vector design, the reference‐price‐informed (RP‐informed) design, which directly incorporates individual's reference prices into discrete choice experiments. By presenting consumers with posted prices that align with their expected prices, this design reflects real‐world food markets. We test this design in a discrete choice experiment evaluating consumer preferences for “low carbon” beef. Our results project a very small market share of low‐carbon ribeye (3%–5%) with conventional meat taking up most of the market. Our results also show that a reference‐price‐informed design reduces reference price uncertainty and leads to more conservative market share estimates than traditional designs, thus preventing the potential overestimation of product's market potential.
... A shift to more sustainable food production and consumption practices is therefore necessary to achieve the United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (3). As production of plant-based foods is less resource-intensive than production of animal-based foods (4), replacing the latter with the former has become one of the cornerstones of the sustainable diet paradigm (5)(6)(7). In this regard, the healthy and sustainable diet proposed in 2019 by the EAT-Lancet Commission advocates for a reduction in the global consumption of animal-based foods and an increase in the consumption of plant-based foods, including plant-based protein foods, so that efforts to feed the world's population remain within the planetary boundaries (8). ...
... Materials and methods").3 SE and 95% CI are calculated using 200 bootstrap resamples.4 MUFA, monounsaturated fatty acids; PUFA, polyunsaturated fatty acids; Q, quarter; RA, reference amount; SFA, saturated fatty acids.intakes ...
... Materials and methods").3 SE and 95% CI are calculated using 200 bootstrap resamples.4 MUFA, monounsaturated fatty acids; PUFA, polyunsaturated fatty acids; Q, quarter; RA, reference amount; SFA, saturated fatty acids. ...
Introduction
Many dietary guidelines promote the substitution of animal proteins with plant-based proteins for health benefits but also to help transitioning toward more sustainable dietary patterns. The aim of this study was to examine the food and nutrient characteristics as well as the overall quality and costs of dietary patterns consistent with lower intakes of animal-based protein foods and with higher intakes of plant-based protein foods among French Canadian adults.
Methods
Dietary intake data, evaluated with 24 h recalls, from 1,147 French-speaking adults of the PRÉDicteurs Individuels, Sociaux et Environnementaux (PREDISE) study conducted between 2015 and 2017 in Québec were used. Usual dietary intakes and diet costs were estimated with the National Cancer Institute’s multivariate method. Consumption of animal- and plant-based protein foods was classified into quarters (Q) and differences in food and nutrient intakes, Healthy Eating Food Index (HEFI)-2019 scores and diet costs across quarters were assessed using linear regression models adjusted for age and sex.
Results
Participants with lower intakes of animal-based protein foods (Q1 vs. Q4) had a higher HEFI-2019 total score (+4.0 pts, 95% CI, 0.9 to 7.1) and lower daily diet costs (-1.9 CAD, 95% CI, -0.7 to 0.7).
Discussion
In a perspective of diet sustainability, results from this study among French-speaking Canadian adults suggest that a shift toward a dietary pattern focused primarily on lower amounts of animal-based protein foods may be associated with a better diet quality at lower costs. On the other hand, transitioning to a dietary pattern focused primarily on higher amounts of plant-based protein foods may further improve the diet quality at no additional cost.
... If subsidies were repurposed, the availability of nutritious foods would increase because they would be more affordable (Willett et al., 2019;Rosenzweig et al., 2020;Ranganathan et al., 2016). But there is a range of trade-offs, including impacts on producers' incomes and potential increases in poverty and undernourishment (Fao UAU, 2021). ...
... Investing in infrastructure for small-scale producers: A wide range of supply chain infrastructure innovations from the farm to the end-user can help minimize producer and consumer costs while reducing the food system's environmental footprint by reducing the land, water, and energy needed per unit of the nutritious foods needed for a healthy diet (Monteiro et al., 2013;Rosenzweig et al., 2020;Ranganathan et al., 2016). While international trade will play an essential role in climate change to ensure diverse foods and nutrients reach consumers worldwide (Wood et al., 2018;Geyik et al., 2021;Foong et al., 2022), domestic production could be a localized primary source of nutritious foods in most countries. ...
With climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic, and ongoing conflicts, food systems and the diets they produce are facing increasing fragility. In a turbulent, hot world, threatened resiliency and sustainability of food systems could make it all the more complicated to nourish a population of 9.7 billion by 2050. Climate change is having adverse impacts across food systems with more frequent and intense extreme events that will challenge food production, storage, and transport, potentially imperiling the global population's ability to access and afford healthy diets. Inadequate diets will contribute further to detrimental human and planetary health impacts. At the same time, the way food is grown, processed, packaged, and transported is having adverse impacts on the environment and finite natural resources further accelerating climate change, tropical deforestation, and biodiversity loss. This state-of-the-science iterative review covers three areas. The paper's first section presents how climate change is connected to food systems and how dietary trends and foods consumed worldwide impact human health, climate change, and environmental degradation. The second area articulates how food systems affect global dietary trends and the macro forces shaping food systems and diets. The last section highlights how specific food policies and actions related to dietary transitions can contribute to climate adaptation and mitigation responses and, at the same time, improve human and planetary health. While there is significant urgency in acting, it is also critical to move beyond the political inertia and bridge the separatism of food systems and climate change agendas that currently exists among governments and private sector actors. The window is closing and closing fast.