Telecoupled environmental impacts of current and alternative Western diets

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2020.102066Get rights and content
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Highlights

  • Low-meat and no-meat diets rely strongly on global pollinator abundance and diversity.

  • The location of land and water footprints differs among USA diets.

  • Low-meat diets support natural nitrogen fixation despite lower demand for land.

  • Trade-offs between global and local impacts of dietary shift call for sustainable trade.

Abstract

Low-meat and no-meat diets are increasingly acknowledged as sustainable alternatives to current Western food consumption patterns. Concerns for the environment, individual health or animal welfare are raising consumers’ willingness to adopt such diets. Dietary shifts in Western countries may modify the way human-environment systems interact over distances, primarily as a result of existing trade flows in food products. Global studies have focused on the amount of water, land, and CO2 emissions embodied in plant-based versus animal-based proteins, but the potential of alternative diets to shift the location of environmental impacts has not yet been investigated. We build on footprint and trade-based analyses to compare the magnitude and spatial allocation of the impacts of six diets of consumers in the United States of America (USA). We used data on declared diets as well as a stylized average diet and a recent dietary guideline integrating health and environmental targets. We demonstrate that low-meat and no-meat diets have a lower demand for land and utilize more crops with natural nitrogen fixation potential, yet also rely more widely on pollinator abundance and diversity, and can increase impacts on freshwater ecosystems in some countries. We recommend that governments carefully consider the local impacts of the alternative diets they promote, and minimize trade-offs between the global and local consequences of dietary shifts through regulation or incentives.

Keywords

Dietary change
Trade
Land use change
Ecosystem services
Telecoupling
Trade-offs
EAT diet

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