Plant-based diets are widely considered healthier and better for the environment than meat-based diets, but not all plant-based diets are created equal. Healthy whole plant-based foods like fruits and vegetables are better for us and the environment than unhealthy plant-based foods like refined grains and sugary drinks.
Consuming the latter can not only lead to weight gain and metabolic syndrome, but agricultural production also requires more farmland and fertilizer, according to researchers at the Harvard TH Chan School of Health and Brigham and Women’s Hospital.
While red and processed meats had, unsurprisingly, the greatest environmental impacts of all the food groups in the study, growing certain common crops produced more greenhouse gases while at the same time requiring more water, farmland and fertilizers. . 🇧🇷
“The differences between plant-based diets were surprising because they are often portrayed as universally healthy and good for the environment, but there is more nuance than that,” explains Aviva Musicus, a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Harvard Chan School Nutrition. 🇧🇷 who was the author of studying 🇧🇷
“To be clear, we are not claiming that less healthy plant-based diets are worse for the environment than animal-based diets. However, our findings show that plant-based diets can have different impacts on health and the environment,” says Musicus.
Not all plant-based diets are created equal.
It has long been known that different types of plant-based diets have various health effects, and diets richer in whole grains, fruits, vegetables, nuts, legumes, tea and coffee are associated with reduced risk of chronic diseases such as cardiovascular and type 2 diabetes. At the same time, however, plant-based diets high in refined grains, potatoes, sweets, processed fruit juices and sugary drinks are associated with an increased risk of chronic disease.
The new study now indicates that these two different plant-based diets also have markedly different environmental impacts. Scientists learned this after analyzing the food intakes of more than 65,000 participants and examining their diets’ associations with health outcomes and environmental impacts.
The researchers ranked the participants’ diets based on various dietary indices, with refined grains, sugary drinks, fruit juices, potatoes, and pastries/desserts scoring higher in the unhealthy category, while those in the healthy category scored higher in fruits, vegetables, grains. , nuts, legumes, vegetable oils and tea/coffee.
“Participants who ate healthy plant-based diets had a lower risk of cardiovascular disease, and those diets had less Greenhouse gas emissions and use of agricultural land, irrigation water and nitrogen fertilizers than diets with more unhealthy plant and animal foods”, explain the scientists.
“Participants who ate unhealthy plant-based diets experienced an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, and their diets required more farmland and fertilizer than diets rich in healthy plant and animal foods,” they write.
While these findings are not new to people familiar with nutrition science, they did help reinforce the findings of previous studies showing that heavily animal-based diets have greater adverse environmental impacts than plant-based diets.
Concussion
The conclusion of this new study is that, for the sake of our health and the environment, it is not enough to simply switch from an animal-based diet to a plant-based one; instead, we should also select a healthy plant-based diet.
“As human health ultimately depends on the health of the planet, future dietary guidelines must include a differentiated consideration of environmental sustainability and recognize that not all plant-based diets confer the same health and environmental benefits.” , emphasizes Daniel Wang, assistant professor in the Department of Nutrition at the Harvard Chan School, who co-authored the study.
By Daniel T. Cruz. Article in English
