1553. Food System Transformation and Climate Action Could Reduce Future Planetary Boundary Transgressions

A study published in The Lancet Planetary Health assessed how food systems could contribute to future transgressions of planetary boundaries at both global and local scales. The results suggest that transforming food systems—through dietary change, higher agricultural productivity, and halving food loss and waste—combined with climate change mitigation, could reduce multiple environmental pressures simultaneously.

The planetary boundary framework identifies critical Earth system processes, including climate change, biosphere integrity, land-system change, freshwater change, and biogeochemical flows of nitrogen and phosphorus. Food systems are among the major drivers of these boundary transgressions, making changes in both food production and consumption essential for sustainability.

Using the Integrated Model to Assess the Global Environment (IMAGE), the study compared three scenarios to 2050: a business-as-usual pathway (BAU), a food system-transformation pathway (EL2), and a combined food system-transformation and climate mitigation pathway (ELM).

The food system-transformation scenario assumed a shift towards the Planetary Health Diet, higher agricultural productivity and nutrient-use efficiency, and a 50% reduction in food loss and waste.

The study found that dietary change produced the largest reductions in the land-system change and biosphere integrity domains, contributing 70% and 69% of the improvements, respectively. Measures focused on agricultural productivity were especially important for reducing phosphorus-related biogeochemical flow transgressions, accounting for 92% of the improvement.

When climate change mitigation was added, further improvements were observed in freshwater change, climate change, and aerosol loading.

Mitigation measures accounted for much of the improvement in blue water, referring here to streamflow and surface- or groundwater-related freshwater change (62%), and green water, referring to soil moisture available to vegetation and crops (82%), as well as climate change (67%) and aerosol loading (75%).

At the global scale, the study found no major trade-offs between food system transformation and climate mitigation. However, local-scale analysis revealed that regional differences and trade-offs can remain hidden in global assessments. Under business-as-usual, grid cells with six or more local boundary transgressions were projected to account for 6.1% of total land area by 2050, compared with 4.5% under food system transformation and 3.1% under the combined food and climate mitigation scenario.

The findings underscore the importance of combining food system transformation with climate action to reduce future environmental risks. They also highlight the need for multiscale assessments that connect global and local indicators in order to identify regional hotspots and policy trade-offs that may not be visible at the global level.

Reference
Luchtenbelt, H., Doelman, J. C., Biemans, H., Bos, A., Beusen, A., Daioglou, V., Marques, A., Scherrenberg, M., Schulte-Uebbing, L., te Wierik, S., van Zeist, W.-J., Stehfest, E., & van Vuuren, D. (2026). Food system contributions to future planetary boundary transgressions: a multiscale modelling assessment of scenarios. The Lancet Planetary Health. Published online. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101492
Contributor: Miyuki IIYAMA, Strategic Coordination Office