1354. Healthy, Sustainable, and Just Food Systems

The first EAT-Lancet Commission report was published in 2019, advocating a planetary health diet (PHD) that emphasizes the consumption of primarily plant-based foods. The EAT-Lancet Commission's latest analysis, recently published, adds an analysis of the social foundations of a just food system and incorporates new data and perspectives to provide a global concept of equity in food systems.

The report emphasizes that PHD is a framework within which diverse and culturally appropriate diets can exist, and that recent evidence supports a strong association with improved health, significant reductions in all-cause mortality, and significant declines in the incidence of major diet-related chronic diseases. However, for PHDs to be successful, they must carefully consider cultural context and promote culturally appropriate and sustainable dietary traditions.

The report also quantified the contribution of food systems to nine planetary boundaries on a global scale. These food system boundaries confirm that food is the largest contributor to planetary boundary transgressions, causing five out of six boundary transgressions. Food systems have a significant impact on the climate and ocean acidification boundaries. Unsustainable land-use change, particularly deforestation, remains a major driver of biodiversity loss and climate change, highlighting the need to zero out its impacts on all remaining healthy ecosystems. Food systems account for nearly all nitrogen and phosphorus boundary exceedances, highlighting the need for nutrient management, efficient nutrient redistribution, and improved circular systems. The extensive use of novel materials (from plastics to pesticides) in food production, processing, and packaging remains a major concern, yet research on this topic is surprisingly limited.

The report's justice assessment also reveals significant inequalities in access to healthy diets, decent work conditions, and healthy environments, disproportionately affecting marginalized groups in low-income communities. The report proposes the infrastructure that enables these rights to be realized, emphasizing access, affordability, and demand generation for healthy diets. However, nearly half the world's population falls below these infrastructure levels, undermining the ability to realize this fundamental human right. At the same time, the diets of the majority of the world (approximately 6.9 billion people) are threatening to exceed the planet's limits. The phenomenon of unhealthy overconsumption destabilizing Earth's systems highlights the importance of viewing healthy diets not simply as a human right, but as a shared responsibility.

(Reference)
Rockström, Johan et al. The EAT–Lancet Commission on healthy, sustainable, and just food systems, The Lancet, https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(25)01201-2

Contributor: IIYAMA Miyuki, Information Program