Evaluating the environmental impact of the food production and consumption system

Transcription

1 Evaluating the environmental impact of the food production and consumption system and options for reducing this impact by making healthy dietary choices Hans Blonk Contents 1. Short intro BEC 2. Environmental impact of food 1. Global scale, EU level and the Netherlands 3. Impact of current food consumption 4. Options for mitigation (the Netherlands as an example) 1. eating more healthy, according to national food based dietary guidelines. 2. eating different (Less meat, Mediterranean) 3. eating just enough according to nutritional upper and under limits 4. shifts in products and production 5. Conclusions 6. Where and how to intervene and research questions

2 1.1 Blonk Environmental Consultants (Blonk Milieu Advies) Mission: Giving shape to sustainability Key words: Agro-production chains Quantitative assessment Creating insight Implementation Believe: High quality information is needed for good quality decisions Environmental impact: main issues and role of agriculture Most urgent issues are Related to agriculture: Biodiversity loss by land occupation Disruption of nitrogen an phosphorus cycle Contribution to GHG impact Johan Rockström et. al. Nature: Vol September

3 2. Environmental impact of agriculture (land occupation) Environmental impact of agriculture (GHG)

4 Things are getting worse

5 1. The overall global picture Major environmental issues (contribution) 1. Loss of fertile soil (> 80%) 2. Loss of biodiversity (>80%) 3. Depletion of water resources (>80%) 4. Contribution to Greenhouse gas impact (<20%) While agriculture needs to supply: more Food more Materials more Fuels???? What is the contribution in environmental impact of food production chain in EU EU: 27% (JRC 2010) Weighed over many environmental impacts Netherlands: 20-30% (Blonk 2008, Vringer 2010, Nijdam 2003) Depending on the environmental impact category

6 3 How to determine environmental impact of food consumption pattern Food cons. Impact = Px = Product x I x = Impact x The impact of a food product: Example Carbon Footprint Carbon footprint is sum of weighed GHG emissions in lifecycle of a product. Farming Transport Processing Transport Retail Consumption GHG kg CO 2 eq CO 2 fossil 1 CO 2 biogenic 0 CH 4 25 N 2 O

7 3. Example bread GHG emissions of bread production kg CO2-eq/1000 kg bread kg CO2-eq Supply chain of raw materials Energy use bakery 28 Distribution to retail Wastage retail (extra production) -30 Use as feed material Storage consumer Wastage consumerl (extra production) functional unit

8 3. functional unit Carbon footprint per kg protein dairy meat egg fish Meatalternative Kg CO2eq/kg protein

9 3. Fossil energy use per kg protein dairy meat egg fish Meatalternative MJ fossil/kg protein Mitigation by dietary choices : GHG impact of women

10 4. Mitigation by dietary choices : land occupation Mitigation by dietary choices Land occupation : All meat is replaced by chicken meat

11 4. Mitigation by dietary choices : observations on environmental impact Reduction up to 15-20% is possible by eating conform national food dietary guidelines Further 10-20% reduction is possible by eating vegetarian or eating Mediterranean. Possibilities of reducing impact in beverages and processed foods are not studied yet. Technical potential is high (drinking water instead of beverages) Percentages are valid for Dutch situation!!!!!!! Mitigation by dietary choices : eating just enough: searching the minimum impact We conducted tentative study on reducing the carbon footprint by using linear programming Currentmenu Kg CO2eq/day Optimized menu Kg CO2eq/day reduction Men % Women %

12 4. Eating just enough, shift in nutrients intake Daily menu men Gram Product g CO 2 -eq 1027 Water 106 Orange 23 Cerealbar 28 Cerealbar with raisins 34 Broccoli 149 Mixed nuts, raisins, dried fruits 447 Pan cakes 213 Whole grain bread with peanut butter 18 Whole grain bread with vegetable spread 29 Whole grain bread with pate 8 Herring Totaal gram CO- 2 -eq Eating just enough, shift in nutrients intake Parameter Men current intake/day Men intake/day minimum CF Energy kcal 2760,0 2700,0 Total protein g 95,0 91,5 Total fat g 106,0 124,6 Saturated fatty acids g 39,0 26,6 Mono saturated fats cisg 33,0 50,6 Poly saturated fats g 22,0 39,8 Trans fatty acids g 3,0 0,3 Cholesterol mg 240,0 - Carbohydrate s total g 323,0 301,9 Mono & disacharidesg 165,0 113,8 Polysacharidesg 158,0 - Fibres g 22,1 35,1 Water g 2884,0 1500,0 Alcohol g 19,0 - Ca mg 1135,0 1000,0 Fe mg 12,2 16,5 Retinol equivalents µg 1176,0 1000,0 Vitamin B1 mg 1, Vitamin B2 mg 1,8 1,5 Vitamin B6 mg 2,1 1,5 Folic µg 220,0 300,0 Vitamin B12 µg 4,8 2,8 Vitamin D µg 3,8 4,9 Vitamin C mg 99,0 70,

13 4. Mitigation by shift to organic or local product?? no clear answer Denmark Germany Organic Netherlands conv minus Netherlands org Conventional England conv minus England org England Germany conv minus Germany org Denmark conv minus Denmark org Netherlands kg CO2 eq. per 1000 kg meat kg CO2 eq. per ton fresh meat Mitigation by shift to meat alternatives not every alternative is better!! GHG impact/ kg protein chicken pork

14 5. Conclusions Healthy eating goes hand in hand with environmental friendly eating due to reduction of caloric intake, protein intake. Shifting to other sources of proteins may be good for health and environment, but be cautious Challenge is to explore the full range of mitigation options and not stick to the obvious Recommendations (panel discussion) Reduce over consumption of: 1) calories, 2) protein rich foods and 3) beverages. Identify desirable shifts within food categories based on environmental assessment (e.g. beef poultry legumes) to give consumers a perspective and producers a challenge

15 Research issues (identified for Europe, Pluimers & Blonk 2011) The assessment of interaction of health and environmental aspects of food consumption patterns is relatively new. Further development of this discipline will require environmental and nutritional researchers to learn each other s language. recommendations: Develop a consistent database containing environmental and nutritional data that can be used to evaluate the impact of dietary shifts Food-based dietary guidelines (FBDG) should include both health and environmental aspects. tool needs to be developed to help nutritionists include environmental aspects when developing FBDG. Start the development of a harmonized European database of national and regional food consumption patterns and other surveys