Food system transformation in support of nature – Chatham research report

• to change dietary patterns to reduce food demand and encourage more plant-based diets.  Focusing only on, “growing ever more food” is detrimental to human health, biodiversity, and climate change. Focus to be in growing the right food in the right amounts and making the food system efficient by people consuming healthy diets which are sustainably produced and without waste.
• to protect and set aside land for nature, whether through re-establishing native ecosystems on spared farmland or integrating pockets of natural habitat into farmland. Demand is not “fixed” and a simple function of the number of people i.e. we don’t need to grow ever more to “feed the world’s growing population” and to drive our consumption-based economies. We need to empower and enable people to eat healthily and sustainably.
• to shift to more sustainable farming. Changing demand (and its incentives) is a key route to reduce the pressure on land and enable both land-for-nature and nature-friendly farming i.e. continuing to focus on promoting the production and consumption of calorie-rich diets will increase the rewards for both intensification and land conversion, at the expense of biodiversity.

• Demand is a key lever that unlocks different options for farming practices and sparing land for nature (i.e. driving demand for economic growth drives intensification and makes it more difficult to both preserve natural land and farm sustainably)
• Food is key for tackling biodiversity, climate and health
• We need to link local action and international processes better (e.g. consumption-based accounting of impacts)

The full report is available here: https://www.chathamhouse.org/2021/02/food-system-impacts-biodiversity-loss