How to Save the Environment with Your Diet

Green food: it isn’t just salad anymore. You want a healthy diet for yourself, but did you realize you’re also impacting the planet with how and what you eat? Whole food, organic food and raw food can all play an important part in preventing climate change, saving fish and rainforests, reducing pollution and conserving energy for future generations. The following steps outline how you can reduce your carbon footprint with your diet:

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

The Enviro-Diet

1. Reduce your meat consumption: Meat, and beef in particular, is the most resource-intensive food you can eat, and eating less of it can greatly reduce your individual impact on the environment. Meat production requires a lot of water, land and potentially harmful ingredients such as hormones and antibiotics, and leads to pollution of soil, air and water. For comparison, a pound of beef requires around 12,000 gallons of water to produce, while a pound of potatoes only requires 60 gallons. If you’re a meat eater, try switching from beef to chicken or, better still, a wisely-chosen fish (production of some fish varieties is harmful to the environment while others greatly improve environmental conditions). Substitute meaty servings with beans, tofu and nuts starting with one meal per week. If you must eat animal products, buy the organic varieties; they cost a little more but are much better for you, the animals and the earth.

2. Eat organic foods: Organic food isn’t just better for your body; it’s also healthier for the land, water, air, wildlife and the workers who produce it. Nearly everything also comes organic: vegetables, fruits, grains, beverages, dairy, eggs and meat. If you can only find or afford some organic produce, chose strategically; not all fruits and vegetables are equal. For example, strawberries, sweet bell peppers, apples, celery and spinach require and retain higher pesticide levels, whereas pineapple, corn, onions, sweet potatoes and broccoli are better.

3. Buy locally-produced foods: Buying local foods that are in-season is good for the environment for many reasons. Food travels on average 1,500 miles to get to your table. Buying from local sellers cuts back on emissions, fuel consumption and unnecessary traffic. Locally-produced food is generally fresher, uses less packaging and offers a wider selection. Buying anything produced locally supports your local economy and saves businesses money on packing, processing, refrigeration, marketing and shipping. The best source for locally-produced food are farmers markets or community-supported agriculture (CSA) subscription programs (where you get a box of produce every week – some deliver to your home or workplace). If you don’t have a farmers market or local food co-op in your town, you may be able to start one. Buy large quantities of locally-produced foods when they are in season and dry and can them for the rest of the year.

4. Buy fair-trade-certified foods: If you must buy imported food, check for fair-trade certification. It ensures proper wages and working conditions for the people who harvest and handle your food. TransFair, the only fair trade certifier in the US, also includes environmental standards in its certification process, protecting watersheds and virgin forests, helping to prevent erosion, promoting natural soil fertility and water conservation, and prohibiting GMOs and many synthetic chemicals. TransFair claims that their standards are the most rigorous in the industry, second only to USDA organic standards.

5. Reduce or eliminate food packaging: Try to find foods with minimal packaging (most of which is petroleum-based plastic) and try bringing your own containers and buying in bulk. Pick brands that use bio-based plastic packing. When you must buy food in a new container, reuse the packaging you take home. Recycle packaging you can’t reuse or have reused to death.

6. Reduce or eliminate waste: Plan your meals carefully to cut back on waste. If the dish will spoil quickly, avoid making more than your household can eat. Cook meals that will freeze, and store them in serving-size containers; you can take the frozen meals to your office and heat them up/defrost them in the microwave. If you’ve still got extra, share it with friends and neighbors. If there’s a lot left over, give it to folks who have fallen on hard times like the homeless.

7. Treat trash responsibly: Feeding yourself and your family impacts the environment at every stage of the process: where your food comes from and then where the scraps go after you’ve eaten. Composting leftovers lessens the impact on the landfill, generates great soil for your garden, and keeps your kitchen wastebasket from smelling. You don’t even need a lot of space: people who live in apartments or just don’t have a yard can do it too. Once your trash has turned to rich soil, use it in your (potted) garden or take it to your nearest public park. Consider a composting toilet! Composting, along with reducing, reusing and recycling, will greatly reduce the amount of trash you produce.

8. Grow a vegetable garden: You don’t need much space to grow food–just a few flower pots or window boxes. Fresh-grown herbs and greens are delicious, and anyone who’s ever tasted a home-grown tomato knows that the store-bought variety doesn’t hold a candle to its taste-sensation home-grown cousin. Important questions to look up or ask about at your local nursery are how much light and soil a plant needs (relative to what you can offer it) and what the plant’s tolerance for cold weather is (you can grow a lot of things indoors in a sunny room even during freezing winters). Various gadgets like hydroponics and aeroponics make it possible to grown more in less space. Growing your own food reduces environmental impacts of transportation and chemicals (like pesticides).

9. Reduce your cooking fuel use: The raw-food movement has swept the nation, and many people swear they feel better eating raw. Regardless of the health advantages, preparing raw food consumes less energy, and, because raw food is usually fresh by definition, it is likely not to have traveled as far as processed food to get to your table. Try using a solar oven. They can cook a wide variety of dishes and require only fuel from our local stellar nuclear reactor (the sun, of course!). They are simple to design and build–if you’re handy at all you can probably make one for yourself.

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[kendallpage]

on 4/18/2009 Hi LilaI like your "green" thoughts on food and nutrition. I wrote an article on the health-benefits of certain foods with regards to staying youthful looking. It goes to prove our health starts with our nutritional selections.Best regards,Kendall Page

[billyboberoo]

on 2/8/2009 In fact, I'd appreciate it if you would consider editing your article to reflect this. I'd be happy to explain the many, many advantages of grass fed beef, just email me at [e-mail]. Thanks!

[billyboberoo]

on 2/8/2009 I'm sorry to see you include step 1. While you're right that conventional, grain-fed beef is terrible for the environment, grass fed beef is both healthier and actually very environmentally beneficial.