Continuing with Green That Life’s debunking, myth-busting themes, let’s look at healthy, plant-based foods you might think are planet friendly but aren’t.
General Guidelines For Eating Planet Friendly Foods
Healthy and Plant-Based Isn’t Always Planet Friendly
The first thing to recognize is that people-healthy isn’t always synonymous with planet friendly. It’s true that a healthy, plant-based diet is more climate-friendly than one dominated by meat, but these are broad categories and within each category, some foods impact the climate more than others.
To be sure, there are many other foods with high carbon footprints. This list is focused on popular and healthy plant-based foods that, due to their demand and cultivation process, you’d be surprised to learn are not as climate-friendly as they seem.
Organic Isn’t Always Planet Friendly
It’s also true that (certified) organic foods are generally healthier for us, but not necessarily for the planet. Depending on the food product, organic farms may require more natural resources and be located far from the consumer, making the carbon footprint of these products relatively higher due to transportation needs and preservation in the form of refrigeration.
For instance, the carbon footprint of an organically grown banana, grown thousands of miles from its end market, is likely higher than the carbon footprint of locally sourced, seasonal foods — some would claim higher even than the carbon footprint of livestock raised using regenerative agricultural practices (though the jury is still out on this assertion).
A Matter of Degrees
When you think of it, everything has an environmental impact. The goal is to minimize that impact on our lifestyle choices. This list is not meant to throw you into a tizzy about your food selections, nor is it a decree banning avocado toast or tofu stir-fry from your diet. What this list is meant to do is paint a clearer picture of those foods that have higher environmental footprints, so you consume less of them.
General Tips for Planet Friendly Eating
Consume in moderation. A rule of thumb for foods with high carbon footprints is to consume them in moderation (or infrequently), particularly when they’re sourced from far away and/or are out of season. If it’s wildly popular, it’s a food that probably has a higher climate impact.
Check certifications. Purchase food products that have been certified by a reputable accreditation agency, such as Fair Trade or Rainforest Alliance certified. For a list of accredited agencies, including food-related ones, see Green That Life’s post on greenwashing.
Go local and seasonal. The carbon footprint of locally acquired, seasonal foods is comparatively smaller than foods sourced from far distances. The latter group requires excessive refrigeration, artificial preservation, and various modes of fossil fuel-based transport, particularly when they’re highly perishable and/or out of season. By shopping local, you’re also more likely to support local businesses — always a good thing.
Don’t forget about food waste. Counteract the environmental footprint of your food choices by “recycling,” or composting, your food waste, a chief contributor to greenhouse gases.
A note about seafood. Unsustainable seafood deserves its own post since, contrary to popular belief, not all seafood is sustainable.
For more details and additional tips on how to eat planet friendly, see Green That Life’s post on How to Fight Climate Change With Climate-Friendly Food Choices.
Asparagus
Imagine you’re headed into the grocery store on a cold, gray February day. As you enter the produce aisle, there, tucked among the cabbage, squash, and potatoes is a bountiful display of bright, green asparagus. Have you ever wondered how they got there? After all, asparagus is a vegetable that’s typically planted in winter and picked when the first shoots pop through the soil in the spring.
Unless you live in Peru or Mexico, eating asparagus in February means it was grown on a farm thousands of miles from your dinner table. Asparagus is also a delicate, temperamental plant. It’s not going to hang around on a ship for weeks without quickly becoming woody and losing its palatability. Instead, most asparagus is flown to its final destination. Indeed, a higher proportion of asparagus is air-freighted than other fruits and vegetables.
Add the trucking – most likely in refrigerated trucks – from the remote asparagus farm, and you’ll see how the greenhouse gas emissions from just the transportation portion of asparagus production add up. One study comparing the emissions of locally-grown and imported asparagus shows a carbon footprint for the imported of over 18 times that of the locally-grown variety.
The More Planet Friendly Approach
What can you do? Wait till asparagus is in season and buy it from a locally-grown source — or try your hand at growing asparagus. Still hankering for asparagus in January? There’s always pickled and canned asparagus!
Avocados
Do a quick search and you’ll find thousands of avocado recipes to satisfy any avocado craving. It’s not just that avocado is delicious, it’s also achieved a level of stardom rivaling Beyoncé. Anointed by a younger (at least to me) generation, the avocado has become the darling of health and plant-based food, worthy of Instagram artistry and Goop-sanctioned cult status. Avocado consumption continues to grow, setting record highs in the US with no sign of a downturn.
All this avocado-eating, however, has an adverse environmental impact. Since the US lifted its ban on the import of Mexican avocados in 1994, the market has been flooded with relatively inexpensive Mexican avocados and consumption more than doubled in just 10 years. The US is now the main importer of Mexican avocados. All this means that most avocados travel thousands of miles to arrive in American supermarkets and restaurants.
In addition, the fruit (yes, it’s a fruit) is finicky, demanding inordinate quantities of water and a narrow set of acceptable growth conditions for it to thrive. In the mad rush to satisfy humanity’s insatiable appetite for avocado, Mexican agribusinesses have scrambled to create suitable growing conditions for the sensitive avocado. The result has been extensive deforestation, biodiversity loss, and soil degradation in avocado farming regions.
All of this adds up to a hefty carbon footprint for the avocado. One study by Carbon Footprint Ltd. asserts that, due to the emissions generated from growing and transporting mass quantities of this “green gold,” a small pack of two avocados has an emissions footprint almost twice the size of one kilo (or approximately two pounds) of bananas.
The More Planet Friendly Approach
Unless you live in California, it’s likely those avocados sitting in the produce aisle traveled long distances to arrive there. Try easing your avocado addiction by pledging to reduce how often you eat the fruit. When you do purchase them, make sure you only buy as much as you’ll eat, and that they’re certified by accredited organizations such as Fair Trade, Equal Exchange, or Earth University.
Almonds
Almonds rival avocados in their cult status, particularly because of Americans’ love of almond milk, the market leader in plant-based milk products. The problem is that almonds need a lot of water and land–as much as 1.3 million gallons per year for one acre of trees.
With 80% of the world’s almonds farmed in California, a region that suffers from debilitating, climate-induced droughts, almond production has strained natural resources. Adding to the high water footprint is almond production’s excessive use of harmful pesticides that have contributed to the decline in honeybee populations.
The More Planet Friendly Approach
As with all carbon-intensive foods, consume almonds in moderation and supplement your almond cravings with other more eco-friendly nuts. When you do purchase almonds, choose those that are certified bee-friendly. Kind Healthy Snacks, for example, has announced that it will source its almonds exclusively from bee-friendly farms, while Haagan-Dazs ice cream has received the Xerces Bee Better certification so you can enjoy your almond ice cream, guilt-free!
Bananas
Americans love bananas — so much so that the average American consumes 13.4 pounds of the fruit annually (although some estimates are as high as 27 pounds), making it this country’s most popular fresh fruit. Even better: bananas are cheap, readily available, and they’re good for you. The only wrinkle is that banana production is not good for the planet.
The main problem lies with how the banana gets from the plantation to your home. Despite the fruit’s popularity in this country, banana production in the US is extremely limited. The only two states that have a substantive banana production presence are Hawaii and Florida and their export markets are tiny.
Instead, the vast majority of bananas consumed by Americans are imported, and American is the top importer of bananas in the world. Bananas are sourced from Latin America, the Caribbean, and even as far away as Africa and Southeast Asia. All those miles traveled add up to a very carbon-intensive product. Indeed, the carbon footprint of transporting – via truck, ship, plane – in refrigerated containers is significant relative to plant-based foods grown locally.
It’s not just all that traveling that puts bananas in the not-so-eco-friendly category. To meet the demand for bananas in this country and across the globe, banana production is centered primarily on large-scale plantations of one type of banana, the enormously popular Cavendish. These monoculture crops render them highly prone to disease and pest infestation. The solution? You guessed it, excessive quantities of pesticides and insecticides — more so than any other tropical fruit due to its thick peel. Add to all of this child labor exploitation and unfair trading practices and you can see why the banana isn’t as human or planet friendly as it seems.
The More Planet Friendly Approach
Enjoy bananas — just not as frequently — and supplement with locally grown, seasonal fruits. When you do purchase bananas, ensure they’re grown under environmentally and humane conditions. Look for bananas with Fair Trade, Equal Exchange, Earth University, or Rainforest Alliance certifications.
Soybeans
Switching from dairy to soy milk seems like the smart thing to do. Soy milk is plant-based (eco thumbs up), filled with nutrients (health thumbs up), and vegetarian (cruelty-free thumbs up). Then there’s tofu, edamame, and soy sauce, all popular soy-based foods.
There’s another species that likes soybeans: cows. Pigs too. In fact, 70% of global soybean production is fed to livestock. To satisfy the appetites of hungry cows, pigs and other livestock that humans consume with extraordinary abandon, enormous tracts of land must be cleared of trees, vegetation, and wildlife to make way for sprawling soy plantations that guzzle up excessive quantities of water. These plantations are located primarily in places (you guessed it) far from their import markets, like the rainforests of Brazil.
Wait, you say, I’m a vegan and I’m not a cow — my tofu diet is relatively small compared to those cows (and other livestock). True, but the climate is affected, regardless of who or what is consuming soybeans, and the reason so many cows are eating soybeans is that humans are eating so many cows!
Can you spot a trend? You’re right: just like the others on this list, soybean is a food that’s in high demand, exploits natural resources, and is grown in distant locales from its main market. Generally, the foods that meet these criteria — even plant-based ones — will have a greater impact on the environment and climate. The impact is further intensified if the product is delicate (like asparagus), requires special growing conditions (like avocado), or needs refrigerated transportation (most of the foods on this list).
The More Planet Friendly Approach
A varied diet is generally more environmentally friendly than one devoted exclusively to a few foods. So instead of only drinking soy milk, mix it up and add oat milk. You can also help reduce soybean production indirectly by eating less meat-based foods, particularly industrially farmed meat.
