Is the Food you eat Sustainable?

When most people think of environmentally friendly choices they can make they go to reusable water bottles and grocery bags, recycling, driving less, and maybe planting a tree on Earth day or switching to paperless billing.  But in my experience people don’t put a whole lot of thought into making sustainable food choices.  And the food we eat has a huge impact on the environment.

If you, like me, decided that you want to focus this New Years on sustainability then the first place you should go to is your food.  Everybody’s gotta eat–but not everybody eats sustainably.

• First thing you can do to have a big impact?  Go vegan. Food produces about 17% of the total emissions of each household annually, and the agriculture sector contributes more to greenhouse gas emissions than transportation.   A vegan diet produces 1.5 tons of greenhouse gas emissions annually which is less than half what the diet of a “meat lover” produces on average.  If you can’t stomach the idea of going vegan–consider going vegetarian or at the very least giving up red meat–all of these things have a sizable impact on your carbon footprint.  Even if you don’t want to go vegan entirely–consider eating vegan for breakfast and lunch, or eating vegan a few days a week–every step you take has an impact.
• Make your own Meals:  Cooking for yourself at home is not only healthier and cheaper but more environmentally friendly.  If you are cooking with “whole foods” like fruits, vegetables, grains, legumes, etc. then chances are you are also cutting back on your packaging as many of these items do not automatically come wrapped in plastic.  If you cook at home rather than eating at fast food restaurants or getting takeout then you are also cutting down on plastic cutlery, plastic bags, Styrofoam, and cardboard packaging that all that food comes with.
• Eat Seasonally:  Now obviously if you don’t live in California or Florida it is not feasible to base your entire diet around seasonal produce–but you can make an effort to gravitate towards these items while you are shopping and meal planning.  Food grown locally doesn’t have to be shipped as far, is often picked when it is more nutritious, and it usually tastes better.  Here is a convenient tool you can use to find which produce is in season in your area.  For early January in Washington State that means I should be incorporating foods like potatoes, brussel sprouts, chard, and mushrooms into my diet.
• Compost:  This is something that I have yet to do as I live in an apartment and I think my roommate would kill me if I suggested we keep a box of worms in our apartment.  But if you live in a house in a city that provides yard waste/composting bins then you should absolutely participate!  Food waste makes up more of the garbage sent to landfills than plastic or paper and when it breaks down in landfill conditions it produces methane and carbon dioxide. In addition to food scraps, most bins also allow you to compost things like paper towels, pizza boxes, shredded paper, uncoated paper plates and cups, coffee grounds, coffee filters, teabags, etc.
• Plan Your Meals:  According to sustainabletable.org the average family of four wastes about a quarter of the food they buy due mainly to food spoilage.  I am so guilty of this one–so I am going to focus this year on only buying what I need and making sure I use every bit of it!  There are so many affordable, vegan, meal prep videos on youtube like this one, and this one, that you simply have to follow to cut down on food cost and waste.
• Don’t Throw Away your Bruised Produce:  Follow cookscraps on instagram, facebook, or watch episodes of Scraps on tv for tons of recipe ideas on using up food scraps and bruised produce–in the U.S. we have a thing against “ugly produce” and we throw away things that aren’t in perfect condition–when in actuality it’s still usually usable.