This paper looks at public awareness of the environmental impacts of meat and attitudes to reducing meat consumption. The study, carried out in Scotland, was based on focus group discussions and individual interviews and tried to understand the cultural and social values associated with eating meat. It found a lack of awareness of the association between meat consumption and climate change, and suggested that individual dietary change will be difficult to achieve without addressing these values and beliefs.

In this paper researchers recommend taking a broader "systems" approach to food policy in order to tackle public health issues as far-ranging as climate change and antibiotic use in food animal production. Three examples are given of a food systems approach to food policy: farm-to-school programs, incorporating sustainability into the Dietary Guidelines for Americans and antibiotic use in food animal production.

This paper by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future (CLF) suggests that as much as 47 percent of the edible U.S. seafood supply is lost each year.  The paper shows that the majority of the waste is produced mainly at the consumer stage. The waste issue adds another layer of pressure on fish stocks and the global seafood supply that are already seriously threatened by overfishing, climate change, pollution, habitat destruction and the use of fish for other purposes besides human consumption.

It has been announced that the U.S. will not be incorporating sustainability into the new Dietary Guidelines for Americans (which are updated every five years). According to a blog-post written by Sylvia Mathews Burwell, Secretary of Health and Human Services  (HHS Secretary) and Tom Vilsack, Department of Agriculture USDA Secretary, the US government does “not believe that the 2015 DGAs are the appropriate vehicle for this important policy conversation about sustainability.” The two argue that although the final recommendations are still being drafted, the final guidelines should remain within the mandate in the 1990 National Nutrition Monitoring and Related Research Act (NNMRRA);  to provide “nutritional and dietary information and guidelines”… “based on the preponderance of the scientific and medical knowledge.”

This second annual nutrition report by IFPRI is a comprehensive summary and scorecard on both global and country level progress on all forms of nutrition. It covers nutrition status and program coverage—as well as underlying determinants such as food security; water, sanitation, and hygiene; resource allocations; and institutional and policy changes—globally (for 193 countries).  The 2015 edition highlights the critical relationship between climate change and nutrition and the pivotal role business can play.

FCRN has previously highlighted the new Swedish dietary guidelines in a blog-post, “Environmental concerns now in Sweden’s newly launched dietary guidelines” by the Swedish researcher and FCRN collaborator Elin Röös, where she also talks to representatives from the Swedish Food Agency about the challenges involved in writing the new guidelines. This report is now available in full in English. 

This Bloomberg article and video interview discusses the new recommendations published to inform the development of the 2015 US dietary guidelines.

An article in Beverage Daily covers the recent FCRN-Chatham House (EAT-funded) report “Policies and actions to shift eating patterns: What works.” The article highlights a key conclusion of the report: