Date/Time
Date(s) - 19/08/
3:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Location
Climagination + Sustainable Futures
Categories
A discussion about future diets in the world and their implications for climate change and sustainability.
A state-of-the-art advanced computer model (GCAM- global change assessment model) of global energy, economy, land use and environment was used to determine the impact of various future global diet scenarios on land use and climate change. In the future, if global diets begin to resemble the current western diet (with about 1/3 of the calories from animal products) the world will run out of arable land before the end of the century. On the other hand, if global diets move toward an average Indian diet (with about 10% animal products) we would be able to feed the world and still leave land for nature as well. This means that as the world’s citizens become wealthier and demand more meat, dairy and poultry, something will have to change, because the current western diet is likely not viable nor economical.