27 September 2024

Consumers who ‘over consume’ red meat could cut global food emissions by 32% by shifting some of what they eat to legumes and nuts

A global shift towards a diet that reduces ‘overconsumption’ in meat and dairy products could cut 17% of global food emissions annually, new research shows. According to the study, if consumers with higher dietary emissions reduced their red meat consumption in favour of more legumes and nuts, global food-system emissions would fall by 32%. At the same time, improving the diets of “underconsuming” populations would result in a 15% increase in dietary emissions. Also, dietary emissions are more culturally nuanced than we tend to think; it’s not automatically the case that less wealthy societies have lower emissions diets. Read the paper in Nature Climate, or a very good summary of it in Carbon Brief.

The food industry is focused on Scope 3 production emissions – but what about diet change? 

The food industry’s focus on production emissions as part of its Scope 3 reporting, will “only take us so far”, given the scale of the change needed to reduce emissions in the food system. That point was made by Anna Taylor, exec director of the Food Foundation, as part of a panel discussion with dairy processors and food manufacturers this week, run by Sustainable Foods Event 2024. While industry focus on production is welcome, there is a real need for food companies and retailers to use their levers to make it easier for consumers to shift their diets, through marketing, prices, promotions, and product development. “We’re not talking about big shifts, we’re talking about small shifts with big impacts,” she said. Agricultural subsidies need to help farmers diversify their incomes as part of a just transition, and there is a huge opportunity for British growers to grow the market for fruit, veg and pulses, she added. Dairy processor, First Milk, said the country needs action on the level seen after WW2 to support the transition. Watch it here.

Greater nuance is needed when discussing the healthiness of plant-based meat alternatives

A study by the Food Foundation of 104 products sold in UK supermarkets found that grouping all plant-based alternatives into a single category hides a wide variation in health and nutrition. The proportion of ultra processed foods (UPFs) within each plant-based meat alternative category varies considerably – but more processed products can be a useful stepping stone for encouraging citizens to shift their diets. However, less processed alternatives (beans and grains) offer the greatest number of co-benefits. Read the report.

Well designed policy mixes are key to government intervention actually cutting emissions

Researchers used machine learning to analyse 1,500 climate policies implemented between 1998 and 2022 across 41 countries. They identified the 63 most successful ones with total emission reductions between 0.6 billion and 1.8 billion metric tonnes CO2. Some of those successes involved rarely studied policies and unappreciated combinations. “Our insights on effective but rarely studied policy combinations highlight the important role of price-based instruments in well-designed policy mixes and the policy efforts necessary for closing the emissions gap,” said researchers. Read it in Nature,

Government’s nutrition advisers are paid by world’s largest food companies

More than half of the experts on the UK government’s advisory panel on nutrition have links to the food industry, a BMJ analysis has found. At least 11 of the 17 members of the Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN) have conflicts of interest with Nestlé, sugar manufacturer Tate and Lyle, and the world’s largest ice cream producer, Unilever. They’ve done a nice mapping exercise of all the links – read it in the BMJ. 

Combining multiple mitigation strategies could reduce US beef emissions by 30%

Under current supply chain conditions, the US beef industry has the theoretical potential to mitigate emissions by 30% (8% from emission reductions and 22% from carbon sequestration and storage) through practices that primarily increase the carbon storage of working lands. Practices that had the greatest potential for reducing emissions included the use of silvopasture systems, and integrating legumes into growing soy and wheat as feed. See fig 4 for the list of practices. Lots of images mapping emissions across production and supply chain. Read more in Nature Food.

Persuade climate sceptics by joining the dots on things they care about, and explaining that there is scientific consensus 

Telling people that scientists almost unanimously agree that human-caused climate change is happening can help to nudge their thinking in that direction. A study tested this ‘consensus message’ across 27 countries and found that the people least familiar with the message, or who were sceptical of climate science, were the most likely to change their perspective when presented with it. However, this message doesn’t always translate to a lasting shift in perspective – for that we need to be having more personally relevant conversations about the people, places and things that people love. Start with things your audience cares about, such as food prices, national security or fishing, says Matthew Goldberg, a climate-communication researcher at Yale University. “There is a climate-change angle to almost everything,” he adds. The next step is to listen carefully and “connect the dots” between a person’s experience and local climate information, Goldberg says. Read the study in Nature Human Behaviour or an article about it on the Nature website.

Insect populations have declined by 37% in arable fields in Sussex 

The country’s longest-running invertebrate study, run by the Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust, studied insects in cereal fields across 12 farms in Sussex between 1970 and 2019. Overall invertebrate abundance declined by 37% across all taxa, and by 48% when excluding the most numerous taxa. Most declines occurred in the first decade of the study, most increases in the 1990s, with further declines from 2010. Cropping, field size, pesticide use and weather all had an impact. Read it on Royal Entomological Society website.

Westminster round-up

Defra could be in for big cuts in the Autumn Budget

The farming press has been digging around and is warning that Defra could be in for big spending cuts in the Autumn Budget. This comes after the news that Defra is giving back £100m to the government in underspent money, that would otherwise have been spent on ELMs. This cut would mean at least 239,000 fewer hectares of nature-friendly farmland, according to research by the RSPB. Read more.

NHS investigation raises some key issues on diet, but fails to join the dots

The independent investigation into the state of the NHS earlier this month said ‘bold action on obesity & and regulation of the food industry’ was ‘sorely lacking’. There were a few other bits and pieces about food, poverty and climate, but some large gaps too in recognising the scale of diet-related ill health a d joining the dots. Read the investigation, and my quick digest of it. Read more. 

Government announces online ban for junk food ads  

Online adverts for junk food will not be allowed after 9pm from next year under new government rules introduced to tackle childhood obesity. Here’s a good round up from James Toop, the chief exec of Bite Back, which has been campaigning on the issue. Read more. 

Schools will pilot breakfast club from April 

Around 750 schools with primary aged pupils will be funded by the Treasury to pilot breakfast clubs from April 2025. The government is planning to unveil the children’s wellbeing bill early next year, outlining plans for free breakfast clubs in all primary schools in England. Read more.