Environmental and nutritional impact of diets with less meat and dairy – Modeling studies in Dutch children

Abstract

Food has a considerable environmental impact. Diets with less meat and dairy reduce the load on the environment but may give nutritional challenges. Risk groups for inadequate micronutrient intakes include children. In a modeling study, we estimated the load of various dietary patterns on environmental aspects as well as on nutritional adequacy.Energy and nutrient intake and environmental impact (land use and greenhouse gas emission (GHGE)) were assessed for actual consumption patterns (reference scenario) and for two replacement scenarios. In the replacement scenarios, 30% or 100% of meat and dairy foods were randomly replaced by comparable plant-derived foods. Data from the Dutch National Food Consumption Survey in 1267 children aged 2-6 yr (2005)(2006) were included and combined with food composition data and environmental loads.Full replacement of meat and dairy foods by plant-derived foods resulted in substantial lower environmental impact (land use and greenhouse gas emission) when compared to the actual situation (see figure 1). In children, estimated saturated fatty acids intake was 26% lower and fiber intake 29% higher. After 100% meat and dairy replacement by plant foods, children's mean intakes of calcium, zinc and vitamin B1 decreased with 5-13%, and intake of vitamin B12 with 49%, while intake of iron was 10% higher. Calcium intake was below and vitamin B12 above recommendations in all scenarios for children. In girls aged 4-6 y, 100% meat and dairy replacement resulted in 15% and 20% of children with inadequate intakes for zinc and vitamin B1. Plant derived iron might be less bioavailable than iron from animal derived foods. Replacement of meat and dairy by plant-derived foods is beneficial for the environment and for health by lowering saturated fatty acids intake and by increasing the fibre level. Alertness is needed with respect to adequacy of zinc and vitamin B1 intakes in young girls and with respect to the reduced bioavailability of iron. Fig. 1. Estimated changes in environmental (evaluated for meat and dairy and replacing foods) and nutritional (evaluated for total diets) impacts after meat and dairy replacements.

Do low-carbon-emission diets lead to higher nutritional quality and positive health outcomes? A systematic review of the literature

“…Fe was the only micronutrient for which dietary associations between an increase in micronutrient level and a reduction of GHGE were very slightly predominant (twenty of thirty-eight diets), but the reasons for this are unclear as the studies for which this is the case did not report Fe content of separate food groups ( 28 , 30 , 33 ) . Zn levels, in contrast, were lower in reduced-GHGE diets in twenty-five of twenty-nine scenarios.…”

“…We screened the title and abstracts of 2027 entries from four databases (FCRN Research Library, PubMed, Web of Science and Scopus) and three reference lists. From these, we identified sixteen studies (18)(19)(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25)(26)(27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33) that present data linking GHGE and nutritional information or health outcomes of 100 dietary patterns and yielding data on 346 cases of effects on nutritional quality or health outcomes of reduced-GHGE diets. Table 2 details the studies included in the current review.…”

“…Thirteen studies reported the GHGE and macronutrient content of diets (19,(22)(23)(24)(25)(26)(27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33) . Six studies, five of which were modelled based on health or meat content (25,26,(30)(31)(32)(33) and one on tax scenarios (24) , found that diets with lower GHGE also had a consistently lower saturated fat content. While no study found a consistent relationship between lower GHGE and lower salt or sugar content of the diets that they evaluated, four studies found that lower-GHGE diets were consistently associated with elevated levels of salt (18,32) and sugar (19,22,32) .…”

Consumo alimentar no Brasil: influência da carne bovina no impacto ambiental e na qualidade nutricional da dieta

“…Nosso estudo encontrou tendência de aumento no consumo inadequado de ferro, zinco e vitamina B 12 quanto menor o consumo de carne bovina. Na Holanda, a substituição de 100% de carnes e laticínios por alimentos vegetais na dieta de crianças resultou em diminuição de 5% a 13% na ingestão de cálcio, zinco e vitamina B 1 e de 49% na ingestão de vitamina B 12 , além de aumentar a ingestão de ferro com menor biodisponibilidade 24 .…”

Assessing the inclusion of seafood in the sustainable diet literature

“…Not all studies of sustainable diets include seafood (see, e.g., Brunelle, Dumas, & Souty, 2014;Doran-Browne, Eckard, Behrendt, & Kingwell, 2015;Erb et al, 2016;Goldstein, Hansen, Gjerris, Laurent, & Birkved, 2016;Kernebeek, Oosting, Feskens, Gerber, & Boer, 2014;Marlow, Harwatt, Soret, & Sabaté, 2015;Raphaely & Marinova, 2014;Reisch et al, 2013;Sabaté, Sranacharoenpong, Harwatt, Wien, & Soret, 2015;Temme et al, 2013). The reasons behind the exclusion were…”