Policies & Actions
42 Policies and Actions to Orient Food Systems Towards Healthier Diets for All
Below are policies and actions with potential to get food systems working for healthier diets for all. It includes actions which can directly shift food systems towards increasing the availability, affordability, appeal/acceptability of high quality, safe, nutritious foods in food environments, and away from nutrient-poor refined foods, products high in sugars, fats, and/or salt (e.g. fried foods sold by street vendors) and pre-packaged “ultra-processed” snacks.
The scope of potential action in food systems is large. Food systems include a huge amount of activity related to producing, processing, distributing, preparing and consuming food. The actions here represent a wide scope of possible food system solutions across production, supply chain, food environments and consumers. To set boundaries, and to emphasise how actions can have direct impact on healthy diets, actions were limited to those with a clear pathway to impact on availability, affordability, appeal/acceptability and safety. For this reason, actions on broader principles, governance and political processes were out of scope. For more detail on how the actions were identified, read our methods.
Agricultural Actions
Action
Deliver agricultural extension programmes, infrastructure and education to support farmers to grow and market nutritious foods.Impact
Increase availability and affordability of nutritious foods to local populations.Action
(Re)design agricultural development programmes intended to increase food producers’ income to also focus on producing, and accessing markets for, nutritious crops and providing nutrition education.Impact
Increase availability and affordability of nutritious foods to local populations.Action
Provide women with agricultural assets, training and support to increase agriculture productivity and output, and access to markets to sell nutritious foods.Impact
Increase availability and affordability of nutritious foods to local populations.Action
Provide low-income households, including women, with support for animal-husbandry and training for animal rearing, safety management and processing along with nutrition education.Impact
Increase availability, affordability and appeal of animal-source foods to producer households.Action
Support the production and consumption of nutritious indigenous crops through agrobiodiverse cropping systems, agricultural extension, breeding programmes, subsidies, land tenure rights, regulatory protection, market development and public awareness.Impact
Increase availability and appeal of nutritious foods to producer households and all other populations.Action
Deliver (peri-)urban agriculture programmes which provide land and other inputs, support local market development and deliver training and nutrition education.Impact
Increase availability, access, affordability and appeal of nutritious foods to urban populations.Action
Provide inputs and training to develop and maintain home gardens along with nutrition education.Impact
Increase availability, access, affordability and appeal of nutritious foods to populations with access to home gardens (i.e., cultivated plots around or close to people’s homes).International Trade Actions
Action
Design trade policies to prioritise the supply of nutritious foods over foods manufactured high in fats, sugars and salt and their ingredient, taking account of the benefits of local and international supply chains in different contexts, the protection smallholder farmers, and the availability of complementary policies.Impact
Increase availability and affordability of nutritious foods and reduce availability and affordability of foods high in fats, sugars and salt and increase to all populations.Research, Processing and Technology Actions
Action
Prioritise high-nutrient density when breeding crops in conventional crop breeding programmes and when selecting crops to grow.Impact
Increase availability of micronutrients in foods already available to all populations.Action
Implement biofortification programmes including breeding, support for adoption and market development and public awareness campaigns.Impact
Increase availability of micronutrients in foods already available to all populations.Action
Develop innovative postharvest storage technologies, packaging and processing techniques for nutritious foods to reduce nutrient losses, remove anti-nutrients, prevent contamination and reduce food losses.Impact
Increase availability, appeal and safety of nutritious foods throughout the year to all populations.Action
Develop new processed products that extend the shelf life of nutritious foods, make them more convenient for consumers to prepare, and reduce food and nutrient losses.Impact
Increase availability, affordability and appeal of nutritious foods throughout the year to all populations.Action
Implement mandatory large-scale food fortification programmes.Impact
Increase availability of micronutrients in staple foods already available to all populations.Action
Reformulate processed food to reduce fats, sugars and salt.Impact
Reduce availability of fats, sugars and salt in foods already available to all populations.Action
Research and develop alternative proteins sources and share the research in the public domain.Impact
Increase availability, affordability and appeal of alternative micronutrient-rich protein sources and reduce appeal of red meat to high red-meat consumers.Supply Chain Infrastructure Actions
Action
Build and improve roads, transportation, storage, cold chain and logistical distribution infrastructure to enable the delivery of safe, perishable nutritious foods to urban and rural markets.Impact
Increase availability, affordability and safety of nutritious foods in markets serving local populations.Action
Support the development of e-commerce platforms to help producers create markets for nutritious foods and improve access for populations with limited mobility or in underserved areas.Impact
Increase access to nutritious foods to under-served populations.Action
Maintain and upgrade markets selling nutritious foods to low-income communities and ensure they have access to infrastructure to enhance food safety and reduce foods losses.Impact
Increase availability, affordability, access and safety of nutritious foods in markets serving low-income populations.Action
Empower smallholder farmers and small farm businesses to access markets for nutritious foods by establishing farm associations, cooperatives and food hubs, developing mechanisms for collective bargaining and increasing access to price information.Impact
Increase availability of nutritious foods in markets serving local populations.Action
Develop infrastructure to reduce loss and waste of nutritious foods and increase its redistribution.Impact
Increase availability nutritious foods to low-income and all populations.Action
Mandate training programmes for food producers and retailers on storage, processing and packaging to reduce spoilage and contamination of nutritious foods.Impact
Increase availability and safety of nutritious foods to all populations.Financial Actions
Action
Redirect agriculture subsidies from staple crops to increasing production of nutritious foods.Impact
Increase availability and affordability of nutritious foods and reduce availability and affordability of refined staples and ingredients used in manufactured foods high in fats, sugars and salt to all populations.Action
Provide nutritious foods and meals at lower prices at point-of-purchase by subsidising public distribution programmes, state-managed stores, public restaurants, and other forms of subsidy programmes.Impact
Increase affordability and access to nutritious foods to populations with access to the programmes.Action
Focus cash transfer, voucher and food delivery programmes on increasing the availability, affordability and appeal of nutritious foods and limiting the appeal of foods high in fats, sugars and salt.Impact
Increase availability, affordability and appeal of nutritious foods and reduce the affordability and appeal of foods high in fats, sugars and salt to low-income populations with access to the programmes.Action
Implement taxes to decrease affordability and incentivise reformulation of sugary drinks and foods high in fats, sugars and salt food.Impact
Decrease affordability of sugary drinks and foods high in fats, sugars and salt to all populations.Public Institution Actions
Action
Implement comprehensive school food programmes, incorporating food and meals, nutrition standards, nutrition education, school gardens, food personnel training, food skills and literacy.Impact
Increase availability, affordability and access of nutritious foods and reduce access to foods high in fats, sugars and salt to school-aged children.Action
Adopt a public food procurement policy that applies nutritional guidelines to food procured for public institutions and prioritises purchasing from smallholders, local, family and/or sustainable food producers.Impact
Increase availability, affordability and access of nutritious foods and reduce access to foods high in fats, sugars and salt to people served by public institutions.Business Incentives
Action
Provide investment funds and technical support for start-ups and small-and medium-sized food processing business to produce, market and promote nutritious foods targeted at low-income consumers.Impact
Increase availability, affordability and appeal of nutritious foods to low-income populations.Action
Use financial incentives and planning regulations to drive the establishment of new supermarkets, fresh food markets, shops and street vendors in underserved communities.Impact
Increase availability and access to nutritious foods to underserved populations.Action
Provide incentives to fast food outlets, street food vendors and food service trucks to place nutritious options more prominently or in place of foods high in fats, sugar, salt, reformulate their recipes and promote only nutritious foods.Impact
Increase availability and appeal of nutritious foods and reduce availability and appeal of foods high in fat, sugar and salt to local populations.Action
Provide technical assistance, equipment, cost-sharing etc. to businesses to provide nutritious foods to their employees at lower prices.Impact
Increase availability, affordability and access to nutritious foods to adults in workplaces.Action
Develop independent accountability mechanisms to monitor and publicly report on business progress towards increasing the availability, access, affordability and appeal of nutritious foods and decreasing it for foods high in fats, sugars and salt.Impact
Increase availability, access, affordability and appeal of nutritious foods and decrease for foods high in fats, sugars and salt to all populations.Regulations and Laws
Action
Set mandatory limits on trans fats, sugar, salt/sodium and/or saturated fat in packaged foods.Impact
Reduce availability of foods high in fats, sugars and salt to all populations.Action
Require nutrition labelling on packages/menus to indicate if foods are high in calories, fats, sugars and/or salt and/or in positive nutrients.Impact
Reduce appeal and availability of foods high in fat, sugar and salt and increases appeal of nutritious foods to all populations.Action
Restrict all forms of marketing, advertising and in-store promotions of HFSS foods, particularly to children.Impact
Reduce appeal foods high in fat, sugar and salt to children.Action
Use zoning laws to restrict numbers of “fast food” outlets and vendors in select geographic areas.Impact
Reduce availability and access of foods high in fats, sugar and salt to local populations.Action
Establish and enforce safety regulations, surveillance mechanisms and protocols throughout the supply chain for nutritious foods, taking into consideration the importance of access to affordable nutritious foods among low-income populations through the informal sector.Impact
Increase safety of nutritious foods to all populations.Education and Public Awareness Actions
Action
Deliver culturally-appropriate nutrition education, food literacy and skills training to children and adults through schools, health services, agricultural extension, social protection schemes and community settings.Impact
Increase appeal of nutritious foods and reduce appeal of foods high in fats, sugars and salt to populations served by the education programmes.Action
Provide dietary counselling to women during antenatal care and pregnancy, including awareness of benefits of nutritious food and risks of foods high in fats, sugars and salt.Impact
Increase appeal of nutritious foods and reduce appeal of foods high in fats, sugars and salt to pregnant women served by the counselling programmes.Action
Launch engaging and compelling mass media and behaviour change communication campaigns about foods and diets.Impact
Increase appeal of nutritious foods and reduce appeal of foods high in fats, sugars and salt to all populations.Action
Promote traditional food cultures associated with good nutrition by supporting and protecting traditional foods, providing information about traditional dishes and public awareness campaigns.Impact
Increase appeal of nutritious foods to all populations.National Guidelines
Action
Align all food systems policies and programmes with food-based dietary guidelines and widely communicate the guidelines to the general public.Impact
Increase availability, affordability and appeal of nutritious foods, and reduce availability, affordability and appeal of foods high in fat, sugar and salt to all populations.
45 Actions to Orient Food Systems Towards Environmental Sustainability
Below are 45 actions which can be taken to re-orient food systems towards environmental sustainability. The actions include those with potential to reduce the negative environmental impact of food systems, improve the positive impact, or both, across five environmental dimensions: GHG emissions, chemical pollution, freshwater resources, biodiversity, and soil health. For each action there is a clear and direct pathway to impact on one or more of these five environmental dimensions. Each action is accompanied by an assessment of trade-offs — defined as negative effects across any dimension — that could result from implementing the action, and of potential co-benefits for nutrition alongside environmental outcomes. We organized the actions into five groups, based on their domain: actions to reorient land use in agriculture, actions to improve the environmental impact of agriculture and farming, actions to improve the sustainability of wild fisheries and aquaculture, actions to reduce food loss and waste, and actions to reorient diets and overall food demand. There is no hierarchy to how groups or actions are presented, but closely related actions are displayed in proximity within groups.
The potential for action is large because food systems stretch across several domains of human activity — from land use to consumer diets — impacting the environment at each point along the way. Therefore, the actions are broad in scope and would operate across different scales. For example, actions to reorient land use in agriculture aim to drive macro-level changes in how land is used for food production across the globe, through a combination of public and private action. Some of the actions to reorient diets and overall food demand instead take a more micro-level approach, and aim to incentivise people to transition to more sustainable diets by combining regulatory interventions with improved access to information on the environmental impacts of certain foods.
While illustrating the potential for substantial improvements in the sustainability of food systems, we also use the list as an opportunity to show that almost all actions, at least 42 out of 45, could potentially generate trade-offs across several dimensions. Not to be taken as a deterministic assessment of what would certainly happen if a specific action is implemented, the trade-offs in our list provide a reminder to policymakers that successful efforts to make food systems more environmentally sustainable could negatively impact certain stakeholders. But many of the actions could also generate positive additional impacts: in the list, alongside trade-offs, we included potential co-benefits between environmental and dietary goals, to show how improving the sustainability of food systems could also lead to better diets. We only included potential co-benefits for which we were able to develop a clear pathway to impact. The co-benefits show that synergies will likely not emerge spontaneously: policymakers and stakeholders will largely need to explicitly aim to incorporate both environmental and nutritional outcomes from the start when designing a policy, or combine multiple policies. By combining the actions, co-benefits, and trade-offs, we make a strong case for applying broad thinking and a flexible approach to improving food systems, showing that the potential consequences of achieving change matter as much as the goals that are driving it.
Actions to reorient land-use in agriculture
1
Provide subsidies to farmers and landholders for restoring degraded or unproductive croplands and grazing lands to natural habitats and ecosystems, such as through set-asides, by rewilding forests and grasslands, or by re-wetting peatlands
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased food prices, as land is removed from food production for restoration efforts (Searchinger et al., 2019)
- Reduced access to resources - such as timber, wild honey, etc. - and lands for local and indigenous populations (Bossio et al., 2021)
- Increased inequality, if subsidies mostly reward land-owning elites while inadequately compensating other members of the local communities Chomba et al., 2016)
2
Designate and enforce the boundaries of forests, peatlands and grasslands through strong monitoring and policing, establishing penalties for transgressors and using independent judicial bodies and watchdog organizations
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Reduced income of the rural poors, especially those who depend on clearing new lands for their livelihood (Davis, Lipper, & Winters, 2021)
- Reduced income and or increased workload for women in contexts where they are primarily responsible for foraging in forests, procuring foods and other resources that can be consumed domestically or sold to generate additional income (Pross, Han, Kim, & Vigil, 2021)
3
Phase out meat and milk production subsidies to remove incentives for farmers to increase production, to reduce the amount of land used for meat/dairy production
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased prices, which In populations that do not have access to a balanced diet could potentially lead, for example, to increased levels of stunting in children (Adesogan, Havelaar, McKune, Eilittä, & Dahl, 2020)
- Reduction in herds, which can lead to lower income and employment opportunity for farmers (Chandel, Lal, & Kumari, 2019)
- Negative impact on employment in meat and dairy sectors (Balié, J. 2020)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
In countries with populations that display high levels of meat/dairy consumption, phasing out existing subsidies could increase the prices of meat and milk, making them less affordable. This could potentially lead to lower consumption of meat and dairy products
4
Develop investment, funding and accounting policies or tools (suchas True Cost Accounting) within financial institutions that encourage conservation and rewilding by financing businesses that incorporate environmental outcomes into agriculture while withholding financing from companies driving land conversion
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased food prices, as land is removed from food production (Searchinger et al., 2019)
- Increased negative environmental impacts, if land conversion shifts through market leakage to other countries that do not adopt these policies/ tools, and damages even more fragile ecosystems (Searchinger et al., 2019)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Financial institutions explicitly link financing and credit to both environmental and dietary considerations, which could potentially increase the availability and affordability of micronutrients and healthier foods
5
Institute taxes that support the production and purchase of deforestation-free products such as higher taxes on food products made with deforestation-linked commodities or removing taxes on forest-positive products
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased food prices, which could have a higher impact on people on lower incomes, who spend a larger share of their earnings on purchasing food (Balié, 2020)
- Increased risk to the livelihoods of rural poor people, especially those who depend on clearing new lands for their income (Davis, Lipper, & Winters, 2021)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Governments/authorities introduce taxes that target companies that drive deforestation, directly or indirectly, and that sell less healthy foods to consumers - especially if produced on newly converted lands. This could incentivise the targeted companies to raise prices, change their offering, change production practices, or reformulate products to make them less unhealthy, potentially making certain less healthy foods less available and affordable
6
Develop accountability, traceability, and transparency mechanisms to monitor and publicly report on businesses across major commodity supply
chains (such as palm oil, beef, soy, cocoa, coffee, etc) that may be driving landscape conversion of intact lands and wilderness areas for agricultural production.
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased risk to user privacy and data ownership, if newly available technologies for supply chain transparency are scaled too quickly (Köhler & Pizzol, 2020)
- Increased costs and complexity for producers, which can potentially lead to the exclusion of smallholders from formal markets (Adams & Tanos, 2021)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Stakeholders develop mechanisms to collect and disseminate information on the impact a food business has on land conversion but also on its contribution to improving people's diets. In response to thenewly available information, consumers could shift their demand and buy products that have a lower environmental footprint and that are less harmful to diets, potentially making more nutritious foods more available, affordable and appealing, while doing the reverse for less nutritious foods
7
Develop industry-wide standards, company policies, disclosure requirements and verification methods among agribusinesses and buyers along the supply chain to prevent future agricultural land conversion of remaining intact lands and wilderness areas
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased risk to the livelihoods of rural poor people, especially those who depend on clearing new lands for their income (Davis, Lipper, & Winters, 2021)
Actions to improve the environmental impact of agriculture and farming
8
Pay farmers for delivering public environmental goods such as increasing soil carbon sequestration or using watershed protection strategies to reduce pollution from fertilizers and manure
Environmental Dimensions
- Chemical pollution
- Soil healthGHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased competition for water and other resources with crops, if farmers introduce non-native trees as monocultures with the aim of providing ecosystem services (Bossio et al., 2021)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Governments/authorities redirect agriculture subsidies and use them to pay farmers to provide ecosystem services and grow more nutritious foods. If the overall nutritional yield increases, this could make more nutritious foods more available and affordable
9
Integrate low-carbon and renewable energy sources into all new government-led agriculture investment programmes, promoting technologies such as zero-energy cooling chambers, manure digesters, and solar- and wind- powered irrigation systems or water pumps, to reduce direct on-farm GHG emissions
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased risk of job losses in fossil fuel and related industries (International Council for Science, (ICSU), 2017)
10
Tax GHG emissions from agricultural inputs, technologies, and production methods (e.g., fertilizer production, machinery) to incentivize the adoption of innovations and practices that reduce emissions (e.g., renewable energy sources) and to drive a shift in production towards less GHG-intensive foods
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Decreased yield and increased prices, which could lead to higher food insecurity (von Braun, Afsana, Fresco, & Hassan, 2021)
- Increased pollution in areas in which taxes on GHG emissions are not implemented, if production relocates there through market leakage (von Braun, Afsana, Fresco, & Hassan, 2021)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Governments/authorities introduce taxes that target food products associated with high GHG emissions and poor nutritional content. The new taxes make it more expensive for agricultural businesses to maintain their GHG emission levels and to produce less healthy foods, which could incentivise them to increase prices, produce/grow healthier foods, or reformulate foods so that they are healthier, potentially making less healthy foods such as HFSS less affordable and less available
11
Adopt agriculture practices that improve soil quality and structure such as zero-till arable farming, cover cropping and mulching, manure recycling, crop rotations, rotational livestock grazing, and maintaining crop residues, to increase carbon sequestration, nutrient fixation and cycling, and to reduce soil erosion
Environmental Dimensions
- Soil health
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Decreased productivity in the livestock sector if using mulch to protect soils from erosion results in less crop residues made available as fodder (Affholder, Bessou, Lairez, & Feschet, 2019; AFSA, 2016)
- Increased risk to the health of farmers and field workers if zero-till arable farming practices are accompanied by an increase either in herbicide use or manual labour to remove weeds through means other than tillage (Wekesah, Mutua, & Izugbara, 2019)
- Increased labour burden for women if zero-till arable farming practices result in a strong shift of labour from tasks associated with male labour (tillage) to tasks associated with female labour (hand weeding) (Giller, Witter, Corbeels, & Tittonell, 2009)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Farmers implement practices to improve soil quality and structure, some of which involve choosing which crops/foods to grow. Farmers prioritise crops that maximise both nutrient density/quality and positive contribution to soil quality/structure, which could potentially make micronutrients more available
12
Incorporate a diversity of trees and hedges within farms to provide habitats for biodiversity, support the delivery of ecosystems services, and to reduce overall GHG emissions through increased carbon capture
Environmental Dimensions
- Biodiversity
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased food prices, if land is removed from food production (Searchinger et al., 2019; Shukla et al., 2019)
- Increased water scarcity and erosion, if trees are incorporated in grassland or pastures Bossio et al., 2021)
- Increased competition for resources (water, light, nutrients) between trees/ hedges and crops, and increased pest pressure (Bossio et al., 2021)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Farmers introduce a diversity of trees and hedges along the margins of their fields, to increase the provision of natural habitats for wild species. Farmers manage to do this without decreasing overall yield, either through productivity increases or by choosing unused or degraded land to host these new trees/ hedges. Farmers prioritize planting edible species that are indigenous/locally adapted and provide more diverse and nutritious foods, which could make more nutritious and healthy foods more available and affordable
13
Adopt practices to increase water use efficiency in irrigated production systems, such as drip-fed precision irrigation, rainwater harvesting and storage, water capture and recycling, lowering evapotranspiration (for example through mulching), and selecting less water-intensive or more locally adapted crops, to reduce freshwater consumption
Environmental Dimension
- Freshwater resources
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased incidence of waterborne diseases, including malaria, if irrigation is brought to areas that do not have access to it yet by storing and reusing rainwater without adopting preventative measures (International Council for Science, (ICSU),
- 2017)
14
Tax non-point source agricultural pollution of waterways either through ambient taxes to be paid by all potential polluters in a region, or taxes on polluting material such as fertilisers,to reduce water pollution from Nitrogen and Phosphorous leakage
Environmental Dimensions
- Freshwater resources
- Chemical pollution
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased costs of inputs and goods, which could potentially lead to a reduction of economic activity in the area (Kyei & Hassan, 2019)
- Increased inequality, as unless redistributive policies are implemented, taxes on polluting products/activities could weigh disproportionally on poor households if these consume a larger share of high-pollution products (Kyei, Clement Kweku & Hassan, 2021)
15
Adopt manure management practicesin livestock production that reduce water contamination such as keeping manure away from areas with high groundwater, investing in riparian planting and fencing off waterways from cattle to reduce water contamination from manure
Environmental Dimensions
- Freshwater resources
- Chemical pollution
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Lower yields, if riparian planting is introduced in cultivated areas - such as in mixed crops-livestock systems - by removing land from food production (Witing et al., 2022)
16
Adopt agriculture practices that reduce environmental damage from synthetic fertilisers such as crop rotation, cover cropping, using bio-fertilisers, using organic manure and compost, nutrient recycling, using fertilisers and plant species that secrete nitrification inhibitors, and precision fertiliser application technology, to increase soil fertility while reducing Nitrous Oxide emissions and water pollution
Environmental Dimensions
- Biodiversity
- Soil Health
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Lower yields, if less fertilizer is used without efficiently replacing it with nutrients from alternative sources - especially in contexts where fertilizers are already under-utilized (Davis, Lipper, & Winters,
- 2021)
- Increased GHG emissions, if reducing the need for synthetic fertilizer lowers food prices and generates additional demand for further land conversion (Herrero et al., 2021)
17
Adopt agriculture practices that reduce environmental damage from synthetic pesticides such as reducing their prophylactic use, using integrated pest management and natural predators, introducing bio-protectants, and precision pesticide application technology, to support the delivery of ecosystem services from biodiversity and to enhance soil biodiversity
Environmental Dimensions
- Biodiversity
- Soil Health
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Lower yields, if less pesticide is applied without implementing appropriate alternative pest-control strategies (Cheze et al., 2020)
18
Adopt livestock management practices or technologies that reduce environmental damage from meat/dairy production such as alternative feeds that reduce land used for feed production, feed additives that can reduce Methane and Nitrous Oxide emissions, rotational grazing that reduces soil erosion, or silvopasture that provides natural habitats for biodiversity
Environmental Dimensions
- GHG emissions
- Soil health
- Biodiversity
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased risk to animal welfare, which could result from implementing some of the tactics available to reduce methane production in livestock systems (Shukla et al., 2019; Llonch, Haskell, Dewhurst, & Turner, 2017)
- Increased costs and uncertainty as most of the alternative feeds that could be used to substitute crop-based feeds can be more expensive, not economically feasible, nor easily upscalable in most systems (Shukla et al., 2019)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Newly developed feeds are widely adopted in livestock production. These feeds are less land-intensive than soy, and free up land. If this happens in combination with a transition of subsidies away from staple crops and towards more nutritious alternatives, farmers could be incentivised to grow more nutritious foods destined for human consumption, potentially making micronutrients and more nutritious foods more affordable and available
19
Adopt livestock management practices that increase productivity such as providing more nutrient-dense feed, better veterinary care, and raising improved or locally adapted animal breeds, to reduce the amount of land used for meat/dairy production and decrease Methane and Nitrous Oxide emissions
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased GHG emissions and freshwater use, if following productivity increases farmers are encouraged to expand their operations and farm more animals (Antle & Valdivia, 2021; von Braun, Afsana, Fresco, & Hassan, 2021)
- Negative impact on farmers who rely on the multifunctionality of livestock and benefit from owning larger herds, if productivity increases are obtained by rearing fewer animals of improved breeds. In many contexts, owning livestock serves important social and cultural roles, which are often strongly linked with herd size (Paul et al., 2020)
- Increased risk for the long-term income of farmers, if they transition to non-native improved breeds which could display lower fertility, higher mortality, higher sensitivity to climate conditions, and require higher costs for disease prevention and care compared to native breeds (Paul et al., 2020)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Livestock producers, especially those who rear animals for their own substenance, and/or who serve populations with very low levels of consumption of animal-source foods, increase their productivity. This could lower price and potentially make animal-source foods more affordable and available to populations with very low levels of animal-source foods consumption
20
Adopt rice production practices that reduce methane emissions such as breeding new varieties that emit less methane, reducing or interrupting periods of flooding, expanding dry seeding, using a single midseason water drawdown or adding irrigation water only when needed, alternating wetting and drying practices, integrating rice farming in polycultures (such as in rice-duck-fish systems), to reduce GHG emissions
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increase dNitrous Oxidee missions, which could negate or even reverse the positive overall effect of reducing Methane emissions (Searchinger et al., 2019)
- Reduced profitability for farmers who have access to free water resources (for example where water use is subsidised), if they implement water-saving practices for which they would sustain the cost but obtain no economic benefit (Searchinger et al., 2019)
- Lower yields generated by applying water-saving techniques to rice farms - particularly in the US (Searchinger et al., 2019)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Scientists and farmers breed new rice varieties that directly or indirectly lead to less methane emissions while also maximising nutritional content, which could potentially increase the availability of micronutrients
21
Incentivize farmers to share knowledge, tools, and equipment to support the transition towards desirable agricultural practices by adopting practices such
as facilitating knowledge exchange, instituting public seed banks for crop rotations and cover cropping, or sharing zero-till machinery or mechanical weeders, to improve soil health and reduce GHG emissions and chemical pollution
Environmental Dimensions
- GHG emissions
- Chemical pollution
- Soil health
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased risk of spreading diseases across herds by sharing tools and equipment among livestock farmers (Tälle et al., 2019)
- Reduced employment opportunities for farmworkers, especially women, if farmers share tools or machinery which could replace practices such as manual weeding (Beuchelt & Badstue, 201 3)
22
Invest in R&D and innovation in areas that would increase agricultural productivity while delivering on specific environmental targets suchas regenerative agronomic practices and bio-fertilizers that could enhance soil health, or Internet of Things (IoT) technologies and water/nutrient recycling infrastructure that could increase precision and efficiency of input use, to reduce freshwater use and chemical pollution
Environmental Dimensions
- Freshwater resources
- Chemical pollution
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased prices, driven by initial investments needed to adopt new technologies (El Bilali & Allahyari, 2018)
- Increased cybersecurity risks (IoT solutions or data platforms are vulnerable to breakdown, abuse and misuse) and increased risk of disruption caused by power outages in highly technology-driven farms (Misra et al., 2022)
- Increased power concentration, if data is accumulated by small groups of large companies which already dominate the agribusiness sector, especially in contexts of unequal data ownership in which farmers don't own the data generated by their operations (El Bilali & Allahyari, 2018)
- Increased risk of excluding smaller producers who lack access to the resources needed to make the initial investments, and/or those stakeholders who are computer illiterate or less familiar with new technologies (El Bilali & Allahyari, 2018)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Governments and private businesses invest inR&D to increase agricultural productivity, funding innovation that links nutritional benefits with positive environmental outcomes, such as crops that have a higher nutritional content and require less water. This could increase the availability of micronutrients
Actions to improve the sustainability of wild fisheries and aquaculture
23
Adopt strategies to ensure that fish stocks reach and maintain sustainable levels, such as closing off breeding areas, avoiding harvest during important breeding seasons, or placing key habitats under direct governmental control, to reduce overfishing and protect biodiversity
Environmental Dimension
- Biodiversity
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Reduced yields, at least initially, which could lead to financial losses to fishers in the near to medium term (Searchinger et al., 2019)
- Increased risk to the livelihoods of poor coastal communities that rely on fishing for sustenance, and for whom fishing plays a large cultural role (Searchinger et al., 2019)
- Increased market concentration, if setting total allowable catches or granting catch shares leads to industry consolidation - which could drive the marginalization of small-scale fishers (Searchinger et al., 2019)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Improved fisheries management ensure that fishing can stabilize at maximum sustainable levels. Overall yield and productivity in the long term increase because fish stocks do not collapse as a consequence of overfishing, which could make fish more widely available and affordable
24
Adopt strategies to limit the overexploitation of wild fisheries such as establishing access rights, setting total allowable catches, introducing gear restrictions and seasonal limits, to protect biodiversity
Environmental Dimension
- Biodiversity
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Reduced yields, at least initially, which could lead to financial losses to fishers in the near to medium term (Searchinger et al., 2019)
- Increased risk to the livelihoods of poor coastal communities that rely on fishing for sustenance, and for whom fishing plays a large cultural role (Searchinger et al., 2019)
- Increased market concentration, if setting total allowable catches or granting catch shares leads to industry consolidation - which could drive the marginalization of small-scale fishers (Searchinger et al., 2019)
25
Redirect capacity-enhancing subsidies that incentivize overfishing (such as fuel subsidies) towards technologies that maintain sustainable yield levels such as fleet control infrastructure, port improvements and new sensing, tracking, mapping, simulation, and ledger systems, to protect biodiversity
Environmental Dimension
- Biodiversity
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Reduced profitability of entire fleets or fishing areas, especially in the context of high-seas fishing, which could lead to the loss of economic activity (Sala, Enric, et al., 2018)
- Increased barriers to growth for developing countries, who without being able to deploy subsidies could have limited options available to develop fisheries sectors (International Council for Science, (ICSU), 2017)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Improved fisheries management ensure that fishing can stabilize at maximum sustainable levels. Overall yield and productivity in the long term increase because fish stocks do not collapse as a consequence of overfishing, which could make fish more widely available and affordable
26
Adopt aquaculture management practices that reduce environmental damage from fish farming such as using settling ponds, adopting alternative feeds to substitute crop-based feeds and fishmeal, converting aquaculture ponds to integrated aquaculture- agriculture operations, and improving fish health, to reduce GHG emissions and increase carbon sequestration
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased health risk for consumers, if integrating multiple species within a single aquaculture operation intensifies pathogen exposure Ahmed, Bunting, Glaser, Flaherty, & Diana, 2017)
27
Adopt aquaculture practices to increase productivity such as better health diagnostics, improved breeding techniques, better sanitation, improving feed conversion rates and using dietary supplements and vaccines to reduce overfishing for fishmeal and land use for crop-based feed production
Environmental Dimensions
- Biodiversity
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased water acidification, water eutrophication, and water pollution (Henriksson, Belton, Jahan, & Rico, 2018)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Aquaculture operators adopt practices to increase productivity, which could lead to higher production and lower prices, potentially making fish more available and affordable
28
Adopt aquaculture practices to restore degraded aquatic environments such as expanding the cultivation of bivalves or seaweed to increase water filtration and uptake of excess nutrients, or adding seaweed to aquaculture operations, to reduce ocean acidification and preserve biodiversity
Environmental Dimension
- Biodiversity
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased risk of genetic contamination between farmed and wild species of seaweed, and increased prevalence of pathogens and diseases carried by non-indigenous microorganisms which can proliferate in seaweed farms (Buschmann et al., 2017)
Actions to reduce food loss and waste (FLW)
29
Reduce food losses across the supply chain by improving harvesting techniques and on-farm and warehouse storage, developing cold chain infrastructure and packaging, or processing foods into products with
a long shelf-life using traditional methods (such as canning, pickling, drying, etc.)
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased costs for farmers, generated by implementing new technical solutions, for example improved harvesting techniques or new on-farm storage facilities (Shukla et al., 2019)
- Increased food loss waste across the downstream supply chain, through cascading effects that start with production output increasing - due to reduced food loss at the farm level. This could make more food available at each subsequent step along the chain, increasing the total amount wasted, at least initially (Sethi et al., 2020)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Producers and processors adopt practices and technologies to reduce food loss from the farm up to the retail point, potentially increasing the availability and affordability of more nutritious perishable foods
30
Invest in waste management infrastructure and recycling strategies that can separate and redistribute organic food waste for alternative uses such as composting for use by local farmers or converting to animal feeds or energy sources
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased GHG emissions, if recycling organic food waste as animal feed lowers the price of feed, which could lead to increased livestock production/ consumption (Herrero et al., 2021)
- Lower yields, if using compost as fertilizer is less effective compared to mineral fertilizers; this could lead to reduced income for farmers (Svensson, Odlare, & Pell, 2004)
- Lower profitability for farmers, if incentivising waste recovery and building waste infrastructure increases the economic value of waste, leading to increased competition among its various uses. This could potentiall make organic food waste to be used as manure more expensive and scarce Herrero et al., 2021)
31
Adopt practices to better matchfood supply and demand, such as developing early forecasting systems, optimizing inventory management and procurement, or establishing new farm- to-fork virtual marketplaces, to reduce food loss and waste
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased risk of excluding stakeholders who are less familiar with or do not have access to modern technology (Patel, Dora, Hahladakis, & lacovidou, 2021)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Food businesses develop practices, infrastructure, markets and technologies to better match demand with supply. Less food is lost or wasted along the supply chain, and because it's easier for producersto match their supply with demand, they could havea greater incentive to grow and sell more nutritious perishable items - if these are more profitable - rather than staple crops or other commodities. This could make perishable more nutritious foods more available and affordable
32
Deliver education and awareness programs to farmers (such as ag extension services, demonstration sites, training courses) on improved storage tactics and technologies, to reduce food losses
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased food loss waste across the downstream supply chain, through cascading effects that start with production increasing - due to reduced food loss at the farm level. This could make more food available at each subsequent step along the chain, increasing the total amount wasted - at least initially (Sethi et al., 2020)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Producers and processors adopt practices and technologies to reduce food loss from the farm up to the retail point, potentially increasing the availability and affordability of more nutritious perishable foods
33
Launch public awareness and communication campaigns about food waste to promote improved planning of purchases, understanding of ‘best before’ and ‘use by’ labels, storage practices, food preparation techniques, and knowledge of how to use leftovers, to reduce food waste
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Governments/authorities design and launch mass public communication campaigns aimed at reducing food waste at the consumer level. The campaigns teach people how to reduce their food waste and how to incorporate more nutritious perishable items into their diets, potentially making them more accessible
34
Incentivize food businesses to redistribute food surplus to food banks and those affected by food poverty by offering tax breaks for redistribution and clarifying liabilities in case the end consumers are harmed by the donated food
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased health risk, if the food being redistributed is of poor nutritional quality - for example if generated by fast food operations - and it is consumed by the same people with high frequency (Patel, Dora, Hahladakis, & lacovidou, 2021)
- Negative impact on the dignity of those who receive the donated food, which could also facilitate the loss of cultural preferences and personal tastes Patel, Dora, Hahladakis, & lacovidou, 2021)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Governments/authorities introduce incentives to make it more convenient for businesses to redistribute unused food to food banks and to those affected by food poverty. This could incentivise food businesses to improve their capacity to collect and redistribute perishable foods used across their operations that cannot be sold/reused but that are safe to consume, potentially making more nutritious perishable foods more available, accessible and affordable
35
Incentivize companies to measure food loss and waste and implement food loss and waste policies through demonstrating possible cost savings, strengthening company reporting and disclosure to investors, or reinforcing third-party monitoring
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased costs for businesses which could translate in higher prices for consumers (Balié, J. 2020)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Businesses, including but not limited to food businesses that directly serve consumers, improve their ability to track and reduce their food waste. They learn from success cases in their industry, and report their results to external parties who can monitortheir efforts. As a result, food waste could decrease, potentially making more nutritious perishable foods more available
36
Reduce portion sizes in food outletsto simultaneously reduce market demand for excess food and reduce food waste at point-of-service by adopting practices such as offering smaller portion sizes at lower prices, or eliminating cafeteria-style trays
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Food outlets reduce incentives for consumers to purchase more food than they need, to reduce food waste, while also providing them with clear and comprehensive nutritional information/training. This can potentially make healthier foods more accessible and available
Actions to reorient diets and overall demand
37
Adopt public food procurement guidelines that create a market for sustainably produced foods suchas purchasing from producers who implement practices that regenerate soils and reduce fertilizer/pesticide use, to increase soil health and reduce chemical pollution, and purchasing from local urban and peri-urban producers to shorten supply chains and reduce transport-related GHG emissions
Environmental Dimensions
- GHG emissions
- Soil health
- Chemical pollution
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Lower yields, if reducing the use of synthetic fertilizer is not compensated with input of nutrients from alternative sources, especially in contexts where fertilizers are already under-utilized (Davis, Lipper, & Winters, 2021)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Authorities introduce new guidelines for public food procurement that, among other goals, incentivise purchasing from local urban and peri-urban producers. This increases the demand for locally produced foods, potentially including more nutritious and perishable items such as fruit and vegetables. This additional demand could stimulate the growth of new producers and markets able to supply urban and peri-urban populations with more nutritious perishable foods, potentially making these more available and affordable
38
Institute a border tax on food imports that have a high environmental cost, particularly carbon emissions, to discourage their consumption and reduce overall GHG emissions
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased malnutrition for certain population groups, if a tax on GHG emissions levied at the consumer level reduces food consumption (Henderson, B., Verma, M., Tabeau, A., & van Meijl, H. 2019)
- Reduced income of producers and farmers, especially smaller ones located in developing countries who could not have the resources needed to reduce their production-related emissions (Henderson, Verma, Tabeau, & van Meijl, 2019)
- Increased overall GHG emissions, if consumption shifts through market leakage to countries that do not apply the tax and overall consumption increases (Henderson, Verma, Tabeau, & van Meijl, 2019)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Governments/authorities introduce border taxes on food imports that have a high environmental costs and that are more unhealthy or less nutritious, driving up their prices and potentially making them less affordable and available
39
Launch public awareness and communication campaigns to reduce the demand for animal-source foods - particularly red meat - in populations that already display high levels of consumption
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased inequalities in access to information among citizens with differing levels of education; this could reinforce the advantages of more educated citizens, who are better equipped to access the information made available through the communication campaigns (Weiss & Tschirhart, 1994)
- Excessive focus on individual behavioural change as the main driver of positive change - as opposed to structural interventions (Weiss & Tschirhart, 1994)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
In countries with populations that display high levels of animal-source foods consumption, large public communication campaigns inform consumers about the adverse environmental impacts of producing animal-source foods at the current scale, reducing their appeal. This could potentially lead to lower consumption of meat and dairy products
40
Establish labelling and certification of meat and other protein sources based on their GHG emissions and other environmental factors, to reduce the demand for animal sourced foods
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Income loss for small-scale producers, if they lack the resources needed to comply with the labelling requirements; this could mean losing access to markets where the labelling system is enforced (Hadjimichael & Hegland, 2016)
- Increased market concentration, if the introduction of eco-labelling systems advantages only larger players with sufficient resources who can achieve and maintain the requirements needed for certification; this could lead to the formation of oligopolies and monopolies (Hadjimichael & Hegland, 2016)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
In countries with populations that display high levels of animal-source foods consumption, introducing clearly designed labels which inform consumers about the environmental and dietary impact of meat and other protein sources could potentially lead to lower consumption of meat and dairy products and higher consumption of alternatives such as pulses
41
Among populations that currently consume more than recommended daily amounts of animal-source foods, introduce retail taxes – prioritizing red meat and dairy – and remove taxes
on or subsidize alternatives (such as legumes) to encourage smaller animal- source foods portion sizes and reduce animal-source foods overconsumption, while encouraging a switch to protein sources with lower environmental impacts
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased inequality, if introducing taxes on foods at the retail level has an overall regressive effect and weighs disproportionally on the poorer segments of the population, who must dedicate a larger share of their incomes to purchasing food (Seiders & Petty, 2004
- Increased risk to food security in at-risk population groups, if consumption taxes reduce food consumption (Sethi et al., 2020)
- Increasing prices of certain foods through targeted taxation can reduce the revenue obtained by producer countries who export those items, as consumption in importing countries falls (Sethi et al., 2020)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
In countries with populations that display high levels of animal-source food consumption, governments/ authorities introduce retail taxes on animal-source food and remove taxes on or subsidize alternative protein sources that have a lower environmental footprint and are highly nutritious, potentially leading to lower consumption of meat and other animal-source food, and higher consumption of alternatives such as pulses
42
Adopt public food procurement guidelines to reduce purchases of animal-source foods - particularly red meat - in favour of other sources of proteins, to drive down the costs of alternative proteins and reduce the consumption of animal-source foods
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased risk to health and wellbeing for population groups who do not have access to balanced diets and need to consume more animal-source foods, not less (Davis, Lipper, & Winters, 2021)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
In countries with populations that display high levels of animal-source food consumption, new public food procurement guidelines call for purchasing less red meat and more alternative protein sources that are highly nutritious and have a lower environmental footprint, potentially leading to lower consumption of meat and other animal-source foods and higher consumption of alternatives such as pulses
43
Among populations that currently consume more than recommended daily amounts of animal-sourcefoods, limit the amount spent on advertising and marketing that promote overconsumption and redirect budgets towards increasing the desirability
of plant-based foods and educating consumers on appropriate portion sizes
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
In countries with populations that display high levels of animal-source food consumption, Governments/ authorities deploy regulations and incentives to ensure the private sector redirects funding for marketing away from animal-source food and towards alternative protein sources. This could increase the appeal of highly nutritious and more environmentally sustainable protein sources, for example pulses, and potentially lead to lower consumption of meat and other animal-source foods
44
Invest in research and developmenton alternative protein sources such as plant-based proteins, insects, microbial or cultured proteins, to increase the pace of development and decrease costs to consumers
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Increased negative environmental impact, if the scaling up of cultured meat generates a higher environmental footprint than conventionally produced meat (Onwezen, Bowman, Reinders, & Dagevos, 2021)
- Increased deforestation, if incentivising alternative proteins reduces demand for and production of soybean (as feed for cattle); as soybean is also used to produce oil, reducing its production could potentially increase demand for alternatives such as palm oil, which can be a driver of deforestation (Herrero et al., 2021)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
Governments/authorities invest in the development and scaling of non-animal based protein sources which are highly nutritious and have a lower environmental footprint, potentially making nutritious alternative non-animal based protein sources more available and affordable
45
Reformulate products that use animal ingredients with plant-based alternatives (such as incorporating vegetable fat into butter)
Environmental Dimension
- GHG emissions
What potential trade-offs could this action generate?
- Higher costs for producers, which could translate in higher prices for consumers (Buttriss, 2013)
How could this action generate potential co-benefits with diets and nutrition?
In countries with populations that display high levels of animal source food consumption, governments/ authorities mandate that companies reformulate certain processed foods so that they contain less animal-based ingredients and are more healthy
or more nutritious, potentially leading to lower consumption of meat and other animal-source foods and increased availability of micronutrients