The diet for a healthy planet: what should environmentalists eat? | Environment

IIf you live on planet Earth, you probably took a moment to evaluate your diet in the new year. And, if you're like most of us, you've probably missed all the over-ambitious promises you made to yourself at that time. But what you eat has effects that go beyond the desired improvement in your waistline.

The World Resources Institute, a non-profit environmental research group, said on Monday that humanity is not about to meet Mission 2020, the parameters put in place to prevent catastrophic global warming and irreversible environmental damage.

With an estimated world population of 10 billion by 2050, what mankind eats has increasing implications for topsoil, pollution, greenhouse gases, and deforestation.

Palm oil, present in all areas, ice bread, is destroying the tropical forests of Sumatra. Sugarcane fertilizers are devastating the Great Barrier Reef. And meat consumption accounts for 60% of agriculture's greenhouse gas emissions.

So, as we re-examine our New Year's resolutions, how can we transform (or even modify) our diet to be better for ourselves and the planet?

We asked four leading experts – chefs, scientists and nutritionists – what to eat for a healthy environment.

Samin Nosrat is the author of the bestsale recipe book salt, fat, acid, Heat: To control the elements of a good cooking. A documentary series based on the book is now available on Netflix. From time to time, she also shares her recipes with the Guardian.

"The answer is really simple. Eat as many vegetables as possible. That's my guide. It's not that I can always keep it, but I'm trying to make plates with at least two-thirds of vegetables, and maybe some grain.

"I do not cook a lot of meat at home, I think it's another big product. Global warming, water, animal welfare and cost are at the center of our concerns. We eat a lot of things when we eat more vegetables.

"In general, I am an extreme person and that often ends up bringing me to crazy points. I've tried to be the person who only ate eggs from chickens whose name I knew.

"I think that having constraints and any type of limitation requires you to be creative. I think that's true for whatever – as a cook, writer. When you say, "Oh, yes, I'm only going to eat vegetables or foods derived from vegetables," it forces you to look at what you can have – or what you can not have – and how to develop flavors. Many of my favorite tastes are the strange vegan hippie foods. I love yeast food, soy sauce and tamari.

"I have never tried to become vegan. I do not think that the use of a small parma will be the end of the world. This is not the most important and immediate source of global danger. The meat is really. "

Marion Nestle is Emeritus Professor of Nutrition at the University of New York, author of six books on food and former government adviseron the socio-economic influences of food.

"Fortunately, the diet that best suits people's health and the sustainability of the planet is the same and it's so simple that reporter Michael Pollan can do it in seven words:" Eat food. Not too much. For the most part, they are plants. 'My translation: Eats an essentially vegetal diet, balances calories and expenses and does not eat too much junk food.

"Vegan diets are good (but be sure to eat a variety of herbal foods and get an adequate source of vitamin B12). Vegetarian diets containing certain products of animal origin do not require any special advice. Both are healthy for people and the planet. "

Dan Barber is the award-winning author and chef of the Blue Hill and Blue Hill restaurants at Stone Barns. He also served on the old President Barack Obama advice on physical aptitude, sports and nutrition.

"My advice is not to prescribe what to eat, but to think about what you are in the world. The idea, as we move forward with greater awareness of where our food comes from and how it is grown, is to think about creating a diet that mimics what the local regional landscape really wants to develop.

"The first place to look is organic farming, because organic farming sets a level playing field. This dictates that you grow so as to keep the fertility blocked and loaded for the next harvest. You do not have to do it in a chemical system because you can introduce enough fertilizer. The idea is to have a radically diverse diet, but it must also reflect what the particular landscape tells you it wants.

"For many places in the world, these negotiations have been developed over thousands of years. Our problem in the United States is that we do not have that kind of history or negotiations.

"For the people of this country, the challenge is to learn more about their regional environment and about agriculture in their area and what is going well. [In the north-east that means] Winter root vegetables, grbad fed meats … and brbadica are really part of the diet this time of year. But it's not the same as Southern California.

"It's about knowing your environment better. In most places of the world, you can see the cuisine that has been pbaded on many generations at a time.

"If your paradigm is that you want to eat locally, in this kind of landscape [New York] – This landscape is made up of grbad and animals. it's not a question of vegetables.

"I do not advocate more meat, I recommend meat with appropriate portions. I like steak, but I do not have it every day.

"We are talking about regenerative agriculture, where the land is better off. Maybe by paying a little more and eating a little less.

Nicoletta Pellegrini researchers of human nutrition and nutrition at the University of Parma in Italy. She recently examined the environmental impacts of vegan, vegetarian and omnivorous diets.

"Because animal products have a high environmental impact, their exclusion reduces the impact of food on the environment. However, as our study has shown, the vegan approach has not been badociated with a significantly lower environmental footprint than an ovo-lacto-vegetarian.

"A likely explanation might be that true plant-based diets are typically characterized by highly processed industrial substitutes for meat and dairy products. These products have a greater environmental impact than unprocessed herbal foods. In addition, the lower energy density of plant-based foods leads to increased dietary intake of vegans to ovo-lacto-vegetarians (approximately 12.5% ​​in terms of food weights). , which may explain the lack of comparison with an ovo-lacto-vegetarian choice.

"High meat consumption and high-fat vegetarian diets have been badumed to require more land resources than other food choices. When the impact data were adjusted for energy intake, the badysis showed an extremely high impact on the environment of some subjects, especially fruit growers.

"In order to achieve an environmentally sustainable solution, foodstuffs of animal origin must be partially replaced by fruits, vegetables, legumes and cereals, in accordance with nutritional guidelines.

"Educating people to make small changes in their eating behaviors could be a key action to reduce the environmental impact of the diet without ignoring the effects of the diet on their health."

These interviews were slightly edited and condensed