The ongoing nutrition transition thwarts long-term targets for food security, public health and environmental protection

AbstractThe nutrition transition transforms food systems globally and shapes public health and environmental change. Here we provide a global forward-looking assessment of a continued nutrition transition and its interlinked symptoms in respect to food consumption. These symptoms range from underweight and unbalanced diets to obesity, food waste and environmental pressure. We find that by 2050, 45% (39–52%) of the world population will be overweight and 16% (13–20%) obese, compared to 29% and 9% in 2010 respectively. The prevalence of underweight approximately halves but absolute numbers stagnate at 0.4–0.7 billion. Aligned, dietary composition shifts towards animal-source foods and empty calories, while the consumption of vegetables, fruits and nuts increases insufficiently. Population growth, ageing, increasing body mass and more wasteful consumption patterns are jointly pushing global food demand from 30 to 45 (43–47) Exajoules. Our comprehensive open dataset and model provides the interfaces necessary for integrated studies of global health, food systems, and environmental change. Achieving zero hunger, healthy diets, and a food demand compatible with environmental boundaries necessitates a coordinated redirection of the nutrition transition. Reducing household waste, animal-source foods, and overweight could synergistically address multiple symptoms at once, while eliminating underweight would not substantially increase food demand.

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The future of animal-source food demand and supply in Africa

10.31235/osf.io/fswmj ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Dolapo Enahoro ◽

Nhuong Tran ◽

Chin Yee Chan ◽

Adam M. Komarek ◽

Karl M. Rich

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

Population Growth ◽

Food Demand ◽

Demand And Supply ◽

Animal Source Foods ◽

Animal Source ◽

Trade Offs ◽

Emerging Issues ◽

Per Capita ◽

Animal Source Food

Demand for animal-source foods (ASF) has grown substantially in Africa over the last four decades, fueled mainly by population growth, urbanization, and modest gains in per capita incomes. Further growth over the medium and longer terms is expected as these trends in external drivers continue, with implications of this growth reflecting a multitude of economic, environmental, and public health trade-offs. This paper provides a focused, forward-looking perspective on key emerging issues around changes in ASF consumption and supply in Africa.

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The Role of Animal-Source Foods in Sustainable, Ethical, and Optimal Human Diets

Science, Technology, and Innovation for Sustainable Development Goals ◽

10.1093/oso/9780190949501.003.0017 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 344-364

Author(s):

Julia de Bruyn ◽

Brigitte Bagnol ◽

Hilary H. Chan ◽

Delia Grace ◽

Marisa E. V. Mitchell ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Sustainable Development ◽

Natural Resources ◽

Food Systems ◽

Human Growth ◽

Micronutrient Deficiencies ◽

Healthy Human ◽

The Sustainable Development ◽

Animal Source Foods ◽

Animal Source ◽

Nutritional Needs

Achieving sustainable, ethical food systems in support of human and planetary health is among the greatest challenges facing the global community. Globally, 815 million people are chronically undernourished, 108 million children and 604 million adults are obese, and more than two billion people are at risk of micronutrient deficiencies. Animal-source foods (ASFs), including milk, meat, fish, and eggs, provide high-quality protein and a variety of micronutrients in forms readily absorbed and used by the human body. Current research continues to explore the nutritional contributions of ASFs, their interactions with other dietary components, and their role in healthy human growth and development. This chapter uses the framework of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) to consider the value of ASFs in human diets across a range of settings. It discusses opportunities for multidisciplinary efforts that harness science, technology, and innovation (STI) to mitigate risks of foodborne disease, to promote the efficient management of natural resources, to reduce nutrient losses within livestock value chains, and to support gender- and culturally sensitive communication around livestock management and human nutrition. In support of the economic, social, and environmental dimensions of sustainable development, this chapter proposes opportunities to meet the nutritional needs of current and future populations while supporting biodiversity and conserving scarce natural resources.

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Mental health status of laboratory technicians participated in the fight against COVID-19 in Hanoi

10.31124/advance.16575311 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Trúc Trịnh ◽

Yen Tran

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

Mental Health ◽

Health Status ◽

Food Systems ◽

Human Life ◽

Medical Personnel ◽

Significant Loss ◽

Health It ◽

Health Food ◽

The World

<p>The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a significant loss of human life throughout the world, and it poses an unprecedented threat to public health, food systems, and the workplace. COVID-19 has a significant impact on our lives right now; in addition to physical health, it has an influence on human mental health, particularly among medical personnel.</p>

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Animal source foods for the alleviation of double burden of malnutrition in countries undergoing nutrition transition

Animal Frontiers ◽

10.1093/af/vfz031 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 9 (4) ◽

pp. 32-38 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Teena Dasi ◽

Kiruthika Selvaraj ◽

Raghu Pullakhandam ◽

Bharati Kulkarni

Keyword(s):

Nutrition Transition ◽

Double Burden ◽

Animal Source Foods ◽

Animal Source ◽

Double Burden Of Malnutrition

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The role of seafood in sustainable diets

Environmental Research Letters ◽

10.1088/1748-9326/ac3954 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

John Zachary Koehn ◽

Edward Hugh Allison ◽

Christopher D. Golden ◽

Ray Hilborn

Keyword(s):

Food Systems ◽

Ghg Emissions ◽

Production Method ◽

Meat Production ◽

Environmental Costs ◽

Animal Source Foods ◽

Sustainable Diets ◽

Animal Source ◽

Nutritional Benefits ◽

Fish And Shellfish

Abstract Recent discussions of healthy and sustainable diets encourage increased consumption of plants and decreased consumption of animal-source foods for both human and environmental health. Seafood is often peripheral in these discussions. This paper examines the relative environmental costs of sourcing key nutrients from different kinds of seafood, other animal-source foods, and a range of plant-based foods. We linked a nutrient richness index for different foods to life cycle assessments of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the production of these foods to evaluate nutritional benefits relative to this key indicator of environmental impacts. The lowest GHG emissions to meet average nutrient requirement values were found in grains, tubers, roots, seeds, wild-caught small pelagic fish, and farmed bivalve shellfish. The highest GHG emissions per nutrient supply are in beef, pork, wild-caught prawns, farmed catfish, tilapia and farmed crustaceans. Among animal-source foods, some fish and shellfish have GHG emissions at least as low as plants and merit inclusion in food systems policymaking for their potential to support a healthy, sustainable diet. However, other aquatic species and production methods deliver nutrition to diets at environmental costs at least as high as land-based meat production. It is important to disaggregate seafood by species and production method in ‘planetary health diet’ advice.

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Circularity in animal production requires a change in the EAT-Lancet diet in Europe

Nature Food ◽

10.1038/s43016-021-00425-3 ◽

2022 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Benjamin van Selm ◽

Anita Frehner ◽

Imke J. M. de Boer ◽

Ollie van Hal ◽

Renske Hijbeek ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Food Systems ◽

Food System ◽

Arable Land ◽

Careful Consideration ◽

Dietary Guidelines ◽

Poultry Meat ◽

Allocation Model ◽

Animal Products ◽

Animal Source Foods ◽

Animal Source

AbstractIt is not known whether dietary guidelines proposing a limited intake of animal protein are compatible with the adoption of circular food systems. Using a resource-allocation model, we compared the effects of circularity on the supply of animal-source nutrients in Europe with the nutritional requirements of the EAT-Lancet reference diet. We found the two to be compatible in terms of total animal-source proteins but not specific animal-source foods; in particular, the EAT-Lancet guidelines recommend larger quantities of poultry meat over beef and pork, while a circular food system produces mainly milk, dairy-beef and pork. Compared with the EAT-Lancet reference diet, greenhouse gas emissions were reduced by up to 31% and arable land use reduced by up to 42%. Careful consideration of the feasible substitutability between animal-source foods is needed to define potential roles of animal products in circular human diets.

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Applying a Political Economy of Health standpoint to traditional food acquisition practices and the inequitable prevalence of obesity and diabetes amongst First Nations peoples in British Columbia

Environmental Health Review ◽

10.5864/d2014-028 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 57 (03) ◽

pp. 65-70 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Colin Merz ◽

Malcolm Steinberg

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

British Columbia ◽

First Nations ◽

Food Systems ◽

Food Sovereignty ◽

Nutrition Transition ◽

Traditional Food ◽

Obesity And Diabetes ◽

Political Economy Of Health ◽

Public Health Protection

The inequitable population prevalence rates of obesity and diabetes being experienced by First Nations peoples in British Columbia require public health protection practitioners to deepen their inquiry into the social determinants of these chronic conditions. These attempts need to be placed within the context of food insecurity that is garnering growing attention from public health at large and, more specifically, within the emerging Indigenous consensus understanding of the relationship between the ongoing nutrition transition and the inequitable prevalence rates of these conditions. We suggest that these reflections are productively theorized from a Political Economy of Health standpoint and supported by representative findings from the First Nations Regional Longitudinal Health Survey. This theoretical perspective supports the viewpoint that the inequitable expression of these chronic conditions can be attributed to the nutrition transition that populations experienced as they were shifted from a traditional subsistence diet to a commoditized, industrialized food production system. This analysis also supports the structural recommendations of the British Columbia Food Systems Network Working Group on Indigenous Food Sovereignty that would remove barriers and threats to traditional food acquisition. These include making environmental protection and conservation of biological diversity a priority in all land use planning; setting aside adequate tracts of land for the protection, conservation, and restoration of Indigenous food systems; giving priority to traditional food and cultural values in contemporary forestry, fisheries, rangeland, and agrarian management policies and practice; and giving priority to Indigenous food and cultural harvesting over commoditized, export-oriented commercial harvesting. Public health protection practitioners will be progressively challenged to support these recommendations by the communities they serve. Although there is no guarantee that implementation of these recommendations will reverse the trend of decreasing participation rates in traditional food harvesting in British Columbia, we suggest that unless many of the systemic irrationalities, vested interests, and historically unjust rationales for maintaining the status quo with respect to Indigenous food sovereignty are interrogated and challenged, an ancient lifeway grounded in demonstrably sustainable traditional food harvesting practices will remain threatened.

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