Study Outlines Optimal Healthy Eating Strategies For People & The Planet

The recommended diet is rich in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, legumes, and nuts, and is low in red meat, sugar, and highly processed foods. A diet within these guidelines could feed 10 billion people by the year 2050 without jeopardizing the health of the environment, the EAT-Lancet report stated. To make these changes happen, agricultural production, land governance, supply chain efficiencies, food environments, and energy transitions should all be considered. 

To better understand the current issues, let's review last year's EAT-Lancet report: 

"Providing a growing global population with healthy diets from sustainable food systems is an immediate challenge," the report said. 

In terms of calories, food production has kept up with population growth. However, 820 million people are still inadequately nourished due to lack of economic resources or access to healthful foods. Because of this, even more people are consuming low-quality diets. These diets contribute to deficiencies in micronutrients, which can lead to obesity, heart disease, stroke, and diabetes, as well as an increased risk of death, the authors wrote.

Implementing the recommended diet—and making it last—will require even broader research. "If we really want to enact this change, we need to look beyond the technological advances that will contribute to food system transformation," lead researcher of the Nature Food article Christophe Béné, Ph.D., says. "There is a whole series of tricky and challenging changes that come along with it." 

Healthier diets tend to be more expensive than less nourishing diets and therefore may not be attainable for most of the population. In fact, one study estimates 1.6 billion people would not be able to afford3 the EAT-Lancet reference diet. 

Additionally, the costs of transforming the current food system, including reducing food waste and altering current food production techniques, are unknown. 

In order to reduce the rates of obesity, undernutrition, and other diet-related health risks, researchers say the current industrial food system should be completely altered to prioritize production of healthy foods.

Inexpensive but healthy plant-based foods, such as beans, lentils, and millet, are considered "poor man's food," according to the study. For middle-income countries, consuming pork or beef is seen as a sign of economic success. Because of the deep-rooted cultural beliefs and stereotypes associated with certain foods, consumer choice will be the main determinant in transforming the food system. 

"Unhealthy norms emerge all the time, as foods high in fat, sugar and salt become more widely available and marketed at lower prices throughout the world," the study says. "Guiding cultural norms towards sustainability may also be challenging, more so because of the infinite diversity of diets from place to place, and the weak or incomplete evidence base on which to encourage these changes."

The EAT-Lancet diet recommends reducing red meat consumption by 50% to promote human and environmental health. However, the Nature Food study says animal-based proteins have shown improvements in the health of certain populations—primarily women and children in poor, rural areas. This suggests the diet should be adapted to meet certain cultural contexts.

"Beyond this specific example, the food transformation debate also needs to consider issues of social justice while averting promoting the message that changes involve only high-income countries," the study says. Examples of social justice issues in the food industry include poor working conditions, child labor, and slavery. 

Educating citizens and decision-makers on these various issues is critical to creating change within the four previous sectors. These issues should be prioritized along with poverty, migration, security, natural disasters, and pandemics, the study writes.