NEW DELHI: Unless current eating habits, especially the Western style high meat diet, are changed the world will move towards ever increasing greenhouse gas emissions, says a new study. By 2050, food production alone will reach, if not exceed, the global targets for total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, if business as usual continues, the study warns.
The study, carried out by scientists from the universities of Cambridge Aberdeen and published today in Nature Climate Change, says that we should all think carefully about the food we choose and its environmental impact. A shift to healthier diets across the world is just one of a number of actions that need to be taken to avoid dangerous climate change and ensure there is enough food for all.
Here is what they calculate: as populations rise and global tastes shift towards meat-heavy Western diets, increasing agricultural yields will not meet projected food demands of what is expected to be 9.6 billion people - making it necessary to bring more land into cultivation. Deforestation will increase carbon emissions as well as biodiversity loss, and increased livestock production will raise methane levels. They argue that current food demand trends must change through reducing waste and encouraging balanced diets.
If we maintain 'business as usual', say the authors, then by 2050 cropland will have expanded by 42% and fertilizer use increased sharply by 45% over 2009 levels. A further tenth of the world's pristine tropical forests would disappear over the next 35 years.
"There are basic laws of biophysics that we cannot evade," said lead researcher Bojana Bajzelj from the University of Cambridge's department of engineering.
The study's authors write that halving the amount of food waste and managing demand for particularly environmentally-damaging food products by changing global diets should be key aims that, if achieved, might mitigate some of the greenhouse gases causing climate change.
"Western diets are increasingly characterised by excessive consumption of food, including that of emission-intensive meat and dairy products. We tested a scenario where all countries were assumed to achieve an average balanced diet — without excessive consumption of sugars, fats, and meat products. This significantly reduced the pressures on the environment even further," said the team.
The 'average' balanced diet used in the study is a relatively achievable goal for most. For example, the figures included two 85g portions of red meat and five eggs per week, as well as a portion of poultry a day.
"This is not a radical vegetarian argument; it is an argument about eating meat in sensible amounts as part of healthy, balanced diets," said Cambridge co-author professor Keith Richards. "Managing the demand better, for example by focusing on health education, would bring double benefits — maintaining healthy populations, and greatly reducing critical pressures on the environment."
