The report – Eating the Planet: Feeding and fuelling the world sustainably, fairly and humanely – was published this month by Friends of the Earth and Compassion in World Farming (CIWF). Focusing on land and biomass use, it found that if the industrialised world cut its meat consumption by half it would be possible to feed the world in 2050 without massive agricultural expansion, intensive crop and animal farming, or any further deforestation.
If developed countries adopted healthier, lower-meat diets, and food were distributed more equally at a global level, then options for providing sufficient food and fuel would be greatly expanded, thereport said. It concluded too that a lower-meat diet could see greenhouse gases reduced by as much as 80 per cent. Western countries currently eat meat at least seven times a week, but using a series of projected world diets, the report recommends reducing that to twice or three times a week.