Abstract
The impact of beef consumption on sustainability is a complex and evolving area, as sustainability covers many areas from human nutrient adequacy to ecosystem stability. Three sustainability assessment frameworks have been created to help policy makers unpack the complexities of sustainable food systems and healthy sustainable dietary change. However, none of these frameworks have yet to be applied to a case study or individual policy issue. This paper uses a hybrid version of the sustainability assessment frameworks to investigate the impact of reducing beef consumption (with a concurrent increase in consumption of plant-based foods, with a focus on legumes) on sustainability at a UK level. The aim of this paper is to understand the applicability of these overarching frameworks at the scale of an individual policy. Such an assessment is important, as this application of previously high-level frameworks to individual policies makes it possible to summarise, at a glance, the various co-benefits and trade-offs associated with a given policy, which may be of particular value in terms of stakeholder decision-making. We find that many of the proposed metrics found within the sustainability assessment frameworks are difficult to implement at an individual issue level; however, overall they show that a reduction in beef consumption and an increase in consumption of general plant-based foods, with a focus around legumes production, would be expected to be strongly beneficial in five of the eight overarching measures which were assessed.
Highlights
The definition of a sustainable diet as formulated by the 2010 Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) International Scientific Symposium on Biodiversity and Sustainable Diets is: “Diets with low environmental impacts which contribute to food and nutrition security and to healthy life for present and future generations
The Population Share with Adequate Nutrients (PAN) score may decrease for Europe and North America due to a decrease in caloric intake for these regions which currently have higher than the recommended caloric intake
While the potential benefits of reducing beef consumption were not quantified for each indicator, large reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are expected, as beef has one of the highest greenhouse gas emissions per kilo of any food in the UK: 12.14 kg CO2e for UK-produced beef, as compared with 1 kg CO2e for mushrooms [38]
Summary
The definition of a sustainable diet as formulated by the 2010 Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) International Scientific Symposium on Biodiversity and Sustainable Diets is: “Diets with low environmental impacts which contribute to food and nutrition security and to healthy life for present and future generations. Sustainable diets are protective and respectful of biodiversity and ecosystems, culturally acceptable, accessible, economically fair and affordable, nutritionally adequate, safe, and healthy, while optimizing natural and human resources.” [1] This definition covers many dimensions and associated metrics. This paper takes an applied case study approach to determine if these proposed frameworks can be applied to a specific issue or scenario, and assist policymakers in understanding the potential implications of individual policy options. This is in contrast to the nation-state or global level of application that the sustainable diet assessment frameworks have been used at up to now
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