This is the conclusion of a research that calculated the environmental advantages of “greener” meals on our plates.
According to scientists, such meals might reduce environmental pressures by more than 80% when compared to the usual European diet.
However, it is unclear if customers will desire to change their dietary patterns.
A slew of novel foods is being created with the goal of delivering high-protein, nutrient-dense diets while being kind on the environment by consuming less water and land.
Scientists in Finland investigated the nutritional profile of several of these items as well as three environmental pressures: water consumption, land use, and possible carbon emissions.
They claim that substituting alternative foods for meat, dairy, and other animal products might lessen these consequences by more than 80% while providing a more comprehensive variety of vital nutrients than a strictly vegetarian or vegan diet.
However, they discovered that relatively low-tech alternatives, such as eating less meat and more vegetables, had a similar impact on the environment.
“You can have significant reductions in environmental impacts in terms of global warming potential, land use, and water use with significant reductions in animal-sourced foods and substitutions with novel or future foods and plant-based protein alternatives,” said Rachel Mazac of the University of Helsinki.
She did, however, claim that a vegan diet resulted in “equal reductions in effects.” And “you may have an approximately 75 percent decrease across all of your effects” in a diet with a 75 percent reduction in animal-sourced goods.
The study, published in Nature Food, looked at novel foods that are predicted to become more common in our diets in the next years, many of which use high-tech ways to “grow” animal and plant cells in bioreactors.
While these are “promising” findings, Dr. Asaf Tzachor of the University of Cambridge, who was not part of the study team, believes that consumers’ hesitation to change their diets may “postpone, or even block, this much-needed transformation.”
Numerous studies have indicated that shifting to a plant-based diet is beneficial to both health and the environment.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has suggested a shift to balanced meals rich in plants such as grains and vegetables, with a modest amount of sustainably produced meat and dairy.
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