What sustains food consumption as countries get richer?

Food production accounts for the majority of land and water use on the planet in addition to being a major contributor to anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. Trends in food consumption are unsustainable, particularly given that the Western diet, characterised by long supply chains and globalised environmental impacts, is progressively being adopted by developing world countries as their economies advance. Economic growth is normally accompanied by higher per capita food intakes, including increases in per capita meat consumption (Tilman and Clark 2014) – yet animal products are associated with a higher environmental footprint than many plant foods. The aim of this study is to quantify the extent to which economic growth has altered diets and to compare the relative changes in environmental and health impacts in response to increased wealth. We carry out correlations for 1990-2008 for national GDP, human development index (HDI), body mass index (BMI), biomass footprint (a component of the material footprint introduced in Wiedmann et al., 2013, which includes different crops and grazed biomass estimated through the use of a multi-region input-output model), and dietary composition data (from food balance sheets). We subsequently compare groups of countries at different stages of economic and dietary development. By identifying examples of countries that appear to show a degree of ‘decoupling’ between food-related resource use and GDP growth, we seek to pinpoint the dietary patterns responsible for this trend. Our study is a first attempt to analyse dietary trends and environmental impacts over time using the biomass footprint and BMI. The study reveals a high degree of correlation between per capita biomass footprint and per capita GDP which appears to have become stronger in recent years, indicating an increased association between wealth and use of biomass. On the other hand, the correlation between BMI and GDP appears to be getting weaker in recent years, reflecting the global effects of a transition away from traditional diets to unhealthier, westernised diets. The wider environmental and health impacts of this 'nutrition transition' are worthy of further investigation. REFERENCES Tilman, D. and M. Clark. 2014. Global diets link environmental sustainability and human health. Nature 515: 518-522. Wiedmann, T. O., H. Schandl, M. Lenzen, D. Moran, S. Suh, J. West, and K. Kanemoto. 2013. The material footprint of nations. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: 201220362.