Disclaimer: Before diving in, I want to acknowledge that I have so much unearned privilege, including food security, education, whiteness, and income, and am well aware that I do not have the lived experience of many people who cannot afford food with dignity at this time.
Second disclaimer: I am not an economist.
Food prices are getting a lot of attention at the moment because of inflation, and they’ve likely impacted your practice in some way. You’re probably already aware that climate change has serious implications for farming and food prices, so I’m not going to cover that here. Instead, I’m going to show some overlapping benefits of key climate change mitigation strategies on food affordability.
First, the big picture: a cool chart showing food prices since 1850: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/real-commodity-price-index-food-products
I find this data so interesting for lots of reasons. Beef and coffee were so expensive in the 1970s! And how was pork cheaper than sugar in 2015? You’ll notice, though, that the two most consistently expensive foods since about 1960 are beef and lamb. Meat is often the most expensive item in consumers’ grocery budgets, and the most impacted by inflation. This is because large farmed mammals take so many resources (land, feed crops, energy, agrochemicals, water) to produce. This makes meat inherently more vulnerable to supply chain disruptions and energy price shocks than plant foods, even with federal subsidy programs for meat and dairy in North America. If you’ve been following our work for a while now, you’ll know that meat from ruminant animals (like beef and lamb) also generates the most greenhouse gas emissions among commonly eaten foods.
The dataset listed at the start of this article gives us a zoomed-out picture of food prices over time, but it doesn’t capture what’s going on right now with food affordability. To see what has happened since the pandemic, take a look at this data on food prices since 2006: https://www.imf.org/en/Blogs/Articles/2022/09/30/global-food-crisis-demands-support-for-people-open-trade-bigger-local-harvests
Clearly the pandemic, war in Ukraine, and various climate shocks (flooding, droughts, fires) have dramatically increased food prices in the last three years, which has driven up food insecurity. These effects have been felt inequitably around the world, with regions in Africa, Asia, and Central America experiencing the most food insecurity. While climate change affects everyone around the world, regions and individuals have vastly different resources to cope with price increases and climate factors like unpredictable weather and pests.
Many people are aware that meat is expensive right now, but they may not realize the mutual benefits of eating less meat, especially beef and lamb, on their household food costs as well as their climate impact. A study published in the Journal of Hunger and Environmental Nutrition looked at the costs of one week of foods based on meeting the “MyPlate” recommendations (in the U.S.) and found that a plant-based diet was more affordable, even when expensive items like olive oil were added. This finding (since replicated a few times around the world) has been obscured by media stories on the higher relative costs of new plant-based items like Beyond Burgers. The “rich-world vegan” message ignores the many plant protein foods that are affordable and climate-friendly. On a side note, for all the local food enthusiasts out there, Canada grows a ton of pulses and legumes, especially lentils and peas. Also, fun food fact–I just learned that pea pods are a fruit! Weird.
So how can dietitians (and others) support nutritious, affordable, and climate-friendly eating in a rich country like Canada? The two most impactful strategies for reducing emissions in the food system are plant-rich diets and reduced food waste. Both of these strategies are budget-friendly, so you could consider how they might be implemented or increased wherever you work. For example, if you’re developing a menu for an institution, try replacing beef and lamb with plant protein foods like beans, lentils, peas, tofu, or tempeh. Some other climate-friendly, nutrient-dense options are bivalves like mussels, oysters, and clams, small fish, and meat from smaller, non-ruminant animals.
Reducing food waste is just as important as plant protein to addressing greenhouse gas emissions and saving money on groceries. Interestingly, Canadians seem to be more interested in this strategy than trying plant-based foods (scroll up to Figure 8). If you’re interested in helping others reduce food waste in your practice setting, this webpage reviews food waste and loss across the supply chain in Canada, and includes key actions as well as what’s being done currently by various agencies. It’s well worth reviewing.
So there you go: we can help mitigate climate change and help people save money on groceries in one go. Again, I’m not proposing these as blanket solutions to solve food insecurity in Canada–I just wanted to note some alignment in price and emissions.
I hope you all get some rest over the holidays, and enjoy some favourite foods with loved ones!
Anneke