Why Eating Locally Sourced Food Won't Save The Planet

Hello everyone. Welcome to our KZbin channel "OurEden". This video is titled “Eating Locally Sourced Food Will NOT Save The Planet”.
In this video, we discuss the root causes of agricultural emissions, which are most prominent in meat and dairy.
It’s pretty easy to overlook the effect our diets have on the environment. But food production and waste are attributed to 19.1 billion tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions per year, that’s around 34% of global emissions. Transport miles make up a very small portion of the total greenhouse gas emissions associated with them and the choice of what you eat is much more important.
It is impossible to separate our food production, processing, and distribution from our environment. Unfortunately, the industrial or “conventional” way of producing food causes large-scale environmental degradation.
Food waste produces 3.3 billion tons of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change. If food waste were a country it would be the third largest emitter of greenhouse gases after the US and China. By the year 2050, the world's population will increase 33% to 10 billion.
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Credits:
Footage from Adobe Stock and Pexels.
▶References:
[1] - Crippa, M., Solazzo, E., Guizzardi, D. et al. Food systems are responsible for a third of global anthropogenic GHG emissions. Nature Food (2021).
[2] - Ritchte H. Our World In Data. How much of global greenhouse gas emissions come from food? ourworldindata.... (2021)
[3] - Stein, Alexander J., and Fabien Santini. "The sustainability of “local” food: a review for policy-makers." Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies (2021): 1-13.
[4] - Hannah Ritchie and Max Roser. OurWorldInData. Environmental Impacts Of Food. ourworldindata.... (2021)
[5] - Hannah Ritchie. OurWorldInData. The carbon footprint of foods: are differences explained by the impacts of methane? ourworldindata.... (2020)
[6] - Poore, J. and Nemecek, T., 2018. Reducing food’s environmental impacts through producers and consumers. Science, 360(6392), pp.987-992.
[7] - Hannah Ritchie. OurWorldInData. ourworldindata.... (2020)
[8] Mike Berners-Lee “There is No Planet B: A Handbook for the Make or Break Years. ISBN-9781108821575 (2019).
[9] FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP and WHO. In Brief to The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2020. Transforming food systems for affordable healthy diets. (2020)
[10] - Hannah Ritchie. OurWorldInData. (2020)
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#food #emissions #transport #environment #foodproduction #greenhousegas #globalemissions #agriculturalemissions #meat #dairy #foods #OurEden

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TRANSCRIPT - References in description We are always told to eat local. But is eating locally grown food really the best thing we can do for the environment? It’s pretty easy to overlook the effect our diets have on the environment. But food production and waste are attributed to 19.1 billion tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions per year, that’s around 34% of global emissions [1-2]. This can be further broken down into many facets of farming, food production, and transport practices. Usually when it comes to such massive emissions, we can point the finger at large companies. But in the case of food, that’s an astonishingly high percentage of emissions for something as individuals we have a lot of control over. In developed countries, a large portion of the food we eat is grown thousands of miles away from where we consume it. So, perhaps eating locally is the best thing to focus on? It’s quite a logical change to make. Why would you want your food to be shipped, or even flown, all the way across the world, when you can eat food grown down the road? Surely that's better? Well.. it depends what you want to focus on. Eating locally sourced food definitely has its benefits. Production and processing food locally contributes to the revitalisation of local land, provides employment and crucially, reduces transport miles [3]. But, how significant are transport miles on the total greenhouse gas emissions of the food we eat? Well, it turns out that, for most diets, it’s much more important to focus on what we eat, rather than where it comes from. Let’s go through a quick example: Whilst there are many valid ethical arguments against choosing to eat avocados, they are most often associated with having a high “carbon footprint” due to their air miles, making environmental vegetarians and vegans who eat them, look like hypocrites. But is this really the case? Let’s take a look at the humble quarter pounder, if we *just* take a look at the beef for now, this ¼ pound of beef has 6.85 kg of CO2 equivalent emissions associated with it (113.3981 g product * (6.04 kg CO2e / 100 g product)) [4]. Let’s compare that to a single avocado, which has 0.375 kg of CO2e emissions associated with it (150 g product * (0.25 kg CO2e / 100 g product)) [5]. That means, that for just the 228 calories worth of beef in a quarter pounder, you could have just over 18 avocados, that’s just under 3000 calories (160 calories per avocado * 18.26 avocados per ¼ pounder beef patty) worth (6.85 kg CO2e Per ¼ Pound Beef / 0.375 kg CO2e Per 150 g Avocado). So even the environmentally destructive avocado is still much less damaging than beef, when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions. It turns out, that for a large portion of foods, transport miles make up a very small portion of the total greenhouse gas emissions associated with them [4, 6], and the choice of what you eat is much more important. Here, each colour refers to a different source of emissions from the product, such as land use or food processing. This tiny sliver is the emissions related to transport. In the case of beef, only 0.3 of the 60 kg of CO2e emissions are due to transport, in the case of poultry, it’s 0.3 out of the 6.1 kg total. In tofu, it’s 0.2 out of the 3 kg total. The reason why these numbers are so low, is that only 0.16 % of all food products are air freighted [7]. What you will notice is that the worst emitters are meat and dairy products, especially red meats. But why is this? Well, it turns out that animals are just really inefficient. For every 1000 kcal of meat we can consume, animals will have eaten just under 3000 kcal of edible crops and just under 6500 kcals of grass and pasture, these edible crops could have been enough to feed the average gym bro for a day, and some of the grass and pasture could have been used to grow more food, or for biodiverse land, which could also sequester CO2 from the atmosphere [8]. And when you consider cows and sheep, they also emit a very large quantity of methane while they’re at it, which is a part of why red meat is particularly damaging. This inefficiency goes beyond greenhouse gas emissions. Globally, we produce just under 6000 calories of edible crops per person per day, as well as just under 4000 calories per person of human inedible grass and pasture. Yet, once we consider some basic losses and the vast inefficiencies of animal produce, we are left with just 2530 calories per person [8], per day, which would be fine if we lived in an equal world, but according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, around one in ten people globally are undernourished, and this is only set to increase as the human population grows and food crises become more likely [9]. Therefore, if you want to have the most impact on both mitigating climate change and world hunger, it is best to focus on what you eat, by reducing or ideally eliminating animal products from your diets. If we take a more conservative estimate of global food production emissions being 13.7 Gt per year, just under 30% of global emissions, then just removing beef and lamb from the world's diets would eliminate 7.1 Gt of CO2e, and becoming vegan would reduce to reduce global emissions by over 30%, eliminating 14.7 Gt, that’s enough to make our diets carbon negative, due to a reduction in emissions from food, as well as carbon sequestration due to regained land! [10] And, of course, if you already have a low carbon diet, and you’re choosing between some seasonal veg, feel free to pick the local produce, since every little helps. Please consider subscribing and click the bell icon if you’d like to stay up to date with our videos. And finally, thank you to all our Patrons who help make this content possible. If you want to support this type of content please consider joining. Here you get early and ad-free access to our videos, bloopers and outtakes and even contribute to polls on which topics we discuss and which charities see a share of our income. And as always, look after yourselves, each other and most importantly, the planet around you. Thanks again, OurEden.

[@DrSporea]

Good point, well made!

[@OurEden]

Thanks Radu!

[@Dr_Tim_Sidnell]

That outro though 😉

[@ThatGuyBen1995]

Good stuff, keep it up I'm definitely guilty of thinking 'this beef is alright, at least it hasn't traveled far'

[@joespennies]

This video neglected to describe the public health value from eating locally grown food, in that it develops local community. The concept of outsourcing or externalizing production is part of the root of the problem and so the concept of localizing most production becomes part of the root of the solution.

[@OurEden]

What would you describe as the public health benefits of local food as opposed to food from external regions? In that case, do those benefits vary location to location?

[@joespennies]

@@OurEden knowing the farmer builds community, knowing the soil builds resilience. Community and resilience are key factors for anyone anywhere.

[@MagicBoterham]

2:49 What is contained in the "farm" emissions category? Bit of an odd label.

[@OurEden]

These are the emissions that occur on farm sites; methane emissions, emissions from fertilsier and machinery emissions