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Shifting to a plant-rich food system represents 'spectacular pay-off' as climate benefits per dollar far outstrip those on offer from renewables and EV projects, a new study claims
Investing in the development of plant-rich food systems could offer more than five-times the emissions cuts provided by the same investment in renewable energy, and four times the reduction on offer from electric vehicles (EVs).
That is the striking conclusion of a new report published today at the start of New York Climate Week by the Tilt Collective and tech firm Systemiq. The joint analysis also calculated that an initial investment of between $250m and $500m in advancing a plant-rich food system could ultimately catalyse $7bn of public and private finance and create multiplier impacts and new market opportunities.
The study claims emissions savings from plant-rich food production and diets far outpace those on offer from implementing more sustainable production techniques for livestock farming. For example, fresh figures show that investments in plant-rich consumption and production yield 2.5 times the average emissions reductions per $1bn invested than improvements in livestock and crop production, such as methane inhibitors or regenerative agriculture.
"Shifting to a plant-rich food system represents a spectacular pay-off as a climate investment - the outsized climate benefits are clear," said Tilt Collective CEO, Sarah Lake. "While we of course need investments in other sectors and food solutions as well, the data is undeniable that investments in plant-rich food systems, and shifting consumption and production patterns, offers exponentially more emissions reductions for the money spent.
"But investment to date is miniscule, with only two per cent of the total funding met today. Greater investment in plant-rich food systems stands to catalyse enormous climate benefits, and be a win-win for nature, human health, and animals."
According to the report, investment in a plant-rich food system can also deliver wider benefits that decarbonisation efforts in other sectors struggle to match. For example, switching to more plant rich diets has the potential to save 1,100 square kilometres of water, equivalent to current freshwater withdrawals from the US and China, and deliver $3.4tr in annual health savings by 2050.
Moreover, while the current food system uses around 3.8 billion hectares of land, and is currently expected to expand to more than four billion hectares by 2050, a plant-rich food system could release at least 1.6 billion hectares of land by mid-century for carbon storage or increased food production.
With fewer livestock, land could also be spared that would help reduce the rate of biodiversity loss by 40 per cent and save between two and four gigatonnes of carbon by 2050, the report calculated.
"While thousands of people gather at New York Climate Week, advancing a plant-rich food system remains ominously absent from the conversation," said Lake. "Yet the data is clear - a plant-rich food system is the only way to mutually ensure planetary, human, and animal health.
"To unlock this transition, we need early-stage investments by philanthropies that can catalyse funding and interest from other financial sources."
The launch of Tilt Collective and its research comes just days after a UK-based study claimed that although all activities within the food system are subject to short-term shocks because of climate change, food production faces the biggest impacts both domestically and overseas.
The Impact of Climate Change on the UK Food System report from the Food Systems Transformation Group at the University of Oxford's Environmental Change Institute and the School for Business and Society at the University of York, warns food product price increases are likely in the lone term due to increased in variability in supply chain resilience.
The report also details how food system infrastructure such as distribution, storage, processing, and retail sites are all at risk of increased climate impacts.
"The UK climate change policy landscape has become increasingly complex with multiple interconnecting programmes in adaptation, net zero, food, and environmental land management schemes," the report states. "Taken together, all policies are aspirational and aim to positively drive transformational change for food system actors, but the near-term transition costs and experiences for stakeholders particularly in food production, processing, and consumption may be negative."
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