RT Journal Article
T1 Co-benefits of the EAT-Lancet diet for environmental protection in the framework of the Spanish dietary pattern
A1 Cambeses Franco, Cristina
A1 Moreira Vilar, María Teresa
A1 González García, Sara
A1 Feijoo Costa, Gumersindo
K1 Water footprint
K1 Carbon footprint
K1 Sustainable healthy diet
K1 Spanish eating habits
K1 Dietary recommendations
AB The immediate need to build resilient food systems with lower greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and protection of water resources is a global challenge. To address this, the EAT-Lancet Commission described the global reference diet with principles of nutritional quality and environmental sustainability. With this in mind, the carbon and water footprints of the current Spanish dietary pattern have been compared with the EAT-Lancet global dietary recommendations, taking into account deviations in food intake. To provide additional context, differences between the average Spanish dietary pattern and dietary guidelines applied in other countries in Europe (Italy, the Netherlands and the Mediterranean region) and America have also been analyzed and discussed from a sustainability approach. We found that the EAT-Lancet diet requires less water resources (3056 L·person−1·day−1) and lower level of GHG emissions (2.13 kgCO2eq·person−1·day−1) in comparison with the Spanish dietary pattern (3732 L·person−1·day−1 and 3.62 kgCO2eq·person−1·day−1, respectively). Starch-based products and oils and fats were identified as largest contributors to both environmental indicators in the EAT-Lancet diet. On the other hand, meat and dairy were the environmental hotspots in the Spanish dietary pattern. Comparison with other food-based dietary patterns also raises environmental concerns about the high meat consumption in Spain. Overall, this analysis suggests that reducing the consumption of beef meat and dairy to a level in line with the global environmental targets set by the EAT-Lancet Commission would ensure a shift in Spanish dietary habits towards more environmentally sustainable food consumption patterns
PB Elsevier
YR 2022
FD 2022
LK http://hdl.handle.net/10347/29073
UL http://hdl.handle.net/10347/29073
LA eng
NO Science of The Total Environment 836 (2022) 155683
NO C.C.-F. would like to thank the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities for financial support (Grant reference FPU 19/06648). C.C-F, S.G.-G., G.F. and M.T.M. belong to the Galician Competitive Research Group (GRC ED431C 2017/29) and to the Cross-disciplinary Research in Environmental Technologies (CRETUS Research Center, ED431E 2018/01). All these programs are co-funded by FEDER (EU)
DS Minerva
RD 24 abr 2026