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Articles
https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-022-00489-9
1Department of Agricultural Sciences, Faculty of Agriculture and Forestry, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland. 2Helsinki Institute of Sustainability
Sciences (HELSUS), University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland. 3Department of Food and Nutrition, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland. 4Ruralia Institute,
Faculty of Agriculture and Forestry, University of Helsinki, Mikkeli, Finland. 5Department of Built Environment, School of Engineering, Aalto University,
Helsinki, Finland. 6Natural Resources Institute Finland, Helsinki, Finland. ✉e-mail: rachel.mazac@helsinki.fi
Burgeoning food demands from growing and urbanizing
populations, paralleled with increases in the consumption
of animal-source foods (ASFs), drive an ever-larger pressure
from food systems on the environment1,2. While causing one third
of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions globally3, agriculture is
also the leading contributor to the Earth system surpassing planetary
boundaries in biodiversity loss and nutrient flows2. Concurrently,
the additional burden of malnutrition, associated with poor or insuf-
ficient diets, further indicates that food systems are failing to meet
health needs4. Such recent research has catalysed broad conclusions
that urgently compel transitions towards sustainable diets5–7.
Many products, here termed ‘novel/future foods’ (NFFs), have the
potential to reduce environmental impacts of diets while meeting
essential nutritional needs in broader populations8. Novel foods are
those produced from new production technologies or that are under
novel regulatory frameworks such as cell-culturing technologies—
cultured meat, eggs, milk, plants, algae, bacteria and fungi9. Future
foods are those for which our production capacity has the potential to
scale up and/or for which consumption may increase due to emerg-
ing climate change mitigation concerns, such as insects and spirulina;
some foods may overlap in both the novel and future categories, such
as mussels (Mytilus spp.) or chlorella (Chlorella vulgaris) produced
with novel technologies8. Such NFFs may provide nutritious alterna-
tives to ASFs while meeting multiple sustainability goals8,9. Compared
with currently available plant-based protein-rich (PBPR) options
such as legumes, pulses and grains, NFFs can have a more complete
array of essential nutrients such as protein, calcium, vitamin B12 and
omega-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids, they are more land-
and water-efficient than current ASFs8. Additionally, alternative forti-
fied food products can be developed, but the taste and texture of meat
are key drivers in the development of cultured meat in particular10.
In this paper, we combine novel and future foods into a selection of
NFFs for which data on environmental impacts are available8.
Studies on alternative dietary pattern scenarios (for example,
vegetarian, vegan or flexitarian)11–13 or currently consumed dietary
patterns (for example, Mediterranean or New Nordic diets)14–16 con-
firm that large shifts from current diets towards more plant-based
diets are needed. Vegan and flexitarian or partially omnivore diets,
mainly reducing meat consumption, will be important diet shifts
for synergistic benefits to health and environmental outcomes17,18.
However, due to less favourable profiles in terms of some nutrients
in plant-based options such as pulses and grains, diet-level com-
parisons with omnivore and plant-based diets are also needed to
investigate the feasibility of including NFFs in future diets to meet
nutritional needs with lower impacts. Additionally, studies compar-
ing multiple environmental impacts of diets including NFFs are l ack-
ing, and a broadened understanding of the NFFs that best balance
the trade-offs in impacts and nutrition can inform the development
of sustainable options for future diets and recommendations18,19.
Here we estimated the prospect of reducing the global warm-
ing potential (GWP), scarcity-weighted water use (WU) and land
use (LU) of current European diets (CDs). More specifically, we
optimized the average European diet according to three diet types,
which varied in their inclusion of ASFs, PBPR alternatives and NFFs.
All NFF, omnivore (OMN) and vegan (VEG) diets were optimized
to meet nutritional adequacy and feasible consumption constraints.
Results
Current average and optimized diets. Some food groups were
consistently decreased in the optimized diets, irrespective of mini-
mized objective function—notably, all beverages, dairy, meats, fish/
seafood, animal fats, starchy roots/tubers and spices/condiments
Incorporation of novel foods in European diets can
reduce global warming potential, water use and
land use by over 80%
Rachel Mazac 1,2 ✉ , Jelena Meinilä3, Liisa Korkalo 2,3, Natasha Järviö 1,2,4, Mika Jalava 5 and
Hanna L. Tuomisto 1,2,6
Global food systems face the challenge of providing healthy and adequate nutrition through sustainable means, which is exac-
erbated by climate change and increasing protein demand by the world’s growing population. Recent advances in novel food
production technologies demonstrate potential solutions for improving the sustainability of food systems. Yet, diet-level com-
parisons are lacking and are needed to fully understand the environmental impacts of incorporating novel foods in diets. Here
we estimate the possible reductions in global warming potential, water use and land use by replacing animal-source foods with
novel or plant-based foods in European diets. Using a linear programming model, we optimized omnivore, vegan and novel food
diets for minimum environmental impacts with nutrition and feasible consumption constraints. Replacing animal-source foods
in current diets with novel foods reduced all environmental impacts by over 80% and still met nutrition and feasible consump-
tion constraints.
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