As China, India, and other countries develop their economies, their food preferences change: instead of starchy plant foods such as rice and yams, consumers gravitate to meat and processed foods laden with sugar and unhealthy fats, according to new research from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.
Using a computer model that projected development trends in place before the COVID pandemic, the study forecasts that, as a result, within 30 years, global food demand will grow by 50 percent and demand for meat and milk will double.
As a consequence, more than four billion people – about 45 percent of the world’s expected population – will be overweight by 2050, more than a third of them obese.
In addition to the damage that obesity and a diet of processed foods do to human health, the shift to animal products also threatens land and water use, the study points out.
Studies have shown that grazing beef cattle to feed a population takes substantially more land and water than does raising enough plants to nourish the same number of people.
As demand for meat rises, more and more land is likely to be deforested or otherwise cleared for pasture, a process already well underway in South America’s Amazon River basin.
At the same time, the world’s growing population will continue to demand more land on which to live, creating a clash between demands for livable and arable land.
The Potsdam study’s authors urge a concerted global public health campaign to foster healthy, plant-based eating habits to conserve land, water, and human health.
TRENDPOST: Evidence is overwhelming that the developed world’s current diet – known as SAD, the “standard American diet” of red meat, processed foods, sugars, and unhealthy fats – is ruining health, despoiling land with industrial-scale meat farms and feedlots, and claiming a huge share of potable water.
A shift in consumer awareness is already underway, pushing brands to shift to healthier ingredients and stores to stock more organic foods.
But research and experience both have found that people have a harder time changing their eating habits than sticking to an exercise program, which is hard enough.
Consequently, guiding future generations toward healthier eating and a diet that treats meat as a condiment and not the foundation begins with parents making these choices for children. That shift, coupled with nutrition education and ongoing public health messaging, will have the power to reverse worldwide trends now in place toward poor nutrition, obesity, and the misdirected use of water and land.
