Food and climate
Food is one of the most personal parts of our footprint, and one of the most hopeful: a few small swaps make a real difference, and nobody has to give up what they love.
CA$8 per tree, VAT included
of greenhouse gases (CO2e) for a kilogram of beef from a beef herd. Lamb is about 40 kg and cheese 24 kg.
Our World in Data, Poore & Nemecek (2018)of CO2e for a kilogram of peas. Tofu is about 3 kg, chicken 10 kg and pork 12 kg.
Our World in Data, Poore & Nemecek (2018)of the emissions of most foods come from transport. For beef from a beef herd, it is 0.5%.
Our World in Data, Hannah Ritchie (2020)Most of a food's footprint is made before it leaves the farm: the land it needs, the feed for the animals, fertiliser, and the methane that cows and sheep produce as they digest grass. That is why the differences between foods are so large, and why the same kind of food can have a smaller or larger footprint from one farm to another.
These are global averages per kilogram of food, in kilograms of CO2-equivalents, from a large study by Poore and Nemecek that Our World in Data publishes:
They are per kilogram of food, not per portion, and a kilogram of cheese goes much further than a kilogram of potatoes. But the picture is clear: beef and lamb are at the top, and beans, peas and vegetables at the bottom.
Local food is lovely, and it supports farmers near you. For the climate, though, what you eat matters far more than where it comes from. Transport is less than 10% of the emissions of most foods, and only 0.5% for beef from a beef herd. In a study of diets in the EU, food transport was 6% of the emissions, while meat, dairy and eggs were 83%. The exception is food flown in by air, such as some fresh berries and asparagus out of season.
Nobody has to change everything at once. Try one or two of these and see what sticks: a meat-free day or two a week, chicken or beans instead of beef now and then, a little less cheese, more of what is in season, and less food in the bin. Cooking the right amount and eating leftovers is one of the easiest wins there is.
A tree does not cancel out a steak, and we would never say it does. But planting trees is a good thing to do next to smaller steps in the kitchen. Every tree we plant becomes part of a new forest on former grassland, a home for birds and insects that keeps growing for decades.
Every tree becomes part of a forest that did not exist before.
We look after the young forest as it grows.
Updates at every step and a yearly impact report.
One tree costs CA$8.
It goes on our leaderboard, or stays hidden if you prefer.
We plant in the next season and report on how it grows.
Per kilogram, beef from a beef herd: about 99 kg of CO2e on average, followed by lamb at about 40 kg. Dark chocolate, coffee and cheese are also high per kilogram, though we eat them in small amounts.
Rice grown in flooded fields releases methane from the wet soil. On average it comes to about 4.5 kg of CO2e per kilogram, against about 1.6 kg for wheat and rye.
No. A meal's emissions happen now, while a tree stores carbon slowly over decades. We see planting as a contribution to new forest, next to small changes in what we eat, not as a way to cancel them out.
