Impact of Meat Consumption on Climate Change and Solutions for Food Sustainability

Running head: FOOD SUSTAINABILITY
Food sustainability
Name of the student:
Name of the University:
Author’s note

1FOOD SUSTAINABILITY
Introduction:
Developed and developing countries across the world are witness to many signs of
climate change. Apart from environment changes and disturbance in the ecological balance of
nature, high production of meat and consumption of animal based product has been
recognized as a major contributing factor to climate change as it leads to high green house
gas (GHG) emission and energy expenditure (Koerber, Bader & Leitzmann 2017). Hence,
due to such adverse impact of meat consumption on environment and climate, one of the
proposed solution is to motivate the public to reduce eating animal based products and raise
awareness regarding the negative impact of meat consumption on climate changes. However,
there might be several challenges as well barriers to implementing such solutions in actual
setting. The main aim of this literature review is to analyze the impact of meat consumption
on climate change and identify implications of different solutions to resolve the issue and
promote food security in the community.
Literature synthesis:
Past research evidence suggested different solutions to address the issue of meat
consumption and climate change. For example, González, Frostell and Carlsson-Kanyama
(2011) focused on directly evaluating the impact of energy use and green house gas (GHG)
emissions based on different food items consumed. The study evaluated 84 individual food
items based on energy used and GHS emission occurring during refrigerated and non-
refrigerated transport. The key findings from the study were that energy use and emissions
for plant based food was lower compared to animal based food items. Hence, the key
solutions proposed in response to negative impact of animal production and climate change
included engaging in efficient food consumption and developing national and international
policies to shift focus to plant-based food. Reducing condition may lead to protein deficiency.

2FOOD SUSTAINABILITY
However, the author claimed that protein deficiency is linked to not having variety of food
instead of lack of food. Compared to the study by González, Frostell and Carlsson-Kanyama
(2011), which introduced the solution of introducing convenience food item after identifying
increase in GHG emissions, Reynolds et al. (2015) explored the effectiveness of sustainable
diets in reducing GHG emissions. The study was done by explopration of GHG emission
using three different functional units and comparison of portion size. Compared to González,
Frostell and Carlsson-Kanyama (2011), Reynolds et al. (2015) used more rigorous method to
evaluate sustainability of different food items.
By comparing the energy content of 88 commonly consumed food items to their GHG
emissions, the study revealed that red meat had higher per unit energy consumption compared
to other food groups. However, the study Reynolds et al. (2015) revealed that when food
items like fruits and vegetables are consumed in lower portion size, these foods have higher
relative emissions. The relative emission was different for foods consumed in low amount
such as dairy products. However, in contrast to animal based food products, the energy
emissions of plant based food product are found to be low. Hence, based on this finding, the
researcher defined sustainable diet by combining nutritional compositions based on its impact
on the environment. However, the definition is ambiguous which cannot be interpreted easily.
von Koerber, Bader and Leitzmann (2017) gave a much clearer definition by defining
sustainable diets as wholesome diet which includes plant based food items with low
preference for processed foods. Therefore, the choice of functional units is an area that should
be reported in future studies to further develop the idea of convenience food and its role in
reducing climate change related affects.