There has been a lot of discussion about the health and environmental benefits and risks of animal-source foods (which include meat, fish, eggs and dairy). This paper examined the current evidence on these benefits and risks, finding that these impacts vary massively depending on local context and population development.

This report from Eating Better assesses the meat and dairy sourcing policies of 10 supermarkets in the UK against the “Sourcing Better” framework. It finds that progress is uneven across different impact categories, and that there are no commitments to raise fewer animals or reduce the amount of meat and dairy sold. Broadly, the report finds that retailers are more active in aiming for responsible antibiotic use, good animal welfare and no deforestation, and less active in areas including local pollution, water use, soil health and using less land for feed.

Focusing on Norway, this book outlines how social attitudes to meat and animal farming have changed over the past 150 years. It argues that consumers have become increasingly disconnected from knowledge of how the meat they eat has been produced

This report by the Dutch think tank Questionmark examines how Swedish supermarkets encourage the consumption of meat, notably by multi-buy discounts where customers only receive a discount if they buy multiple items. Furthermore, the types of meat that are promoted by the four biggest supermarkets are very rarely (in only 3% of meat promotions) rated “green” (i.e. most sustainable) by the Swedish WWF meat guide (see also the TABLE blog The Swedish Meat Guide – multidisciplinary research that reached society).

Shifting to the low-meat EAT-Lancet diet across Europe could reduce overall demand for many crops and hence provide resilience against disruptions to food supply, notably those caused by the Russia-Ukraine conflict, according to this paper. The shift could also provide environmental co-benefits through increased carbon sequestration and reduced blue water use and greenhouse gas emissions.

This paper analyses the narratives linking meat and the environment that were found in 116 articles from eight online news outlets in the UK during 2019. It found that anti-meat narratives are most common: 54% of articles had anti-meat-consumption sentiments, while only 5% were mostly in favour of meat consumption or against a shift to plant-based diets; the remaining articles were neutral or contained mixed arguments. Sentiment varied by farming type: less than 10% of articles were against meat in general; 28% were against industrial farming but favoured more sustainable methods; and the remainder were neutral or balanced, with no articles being generally in favour of the meat industry. The eight news outlets studied were the BBC, the Guardian, MailOnline, Sky News, the Sun, the Mirror, LAD Bible and BuzzFeed.

This report from the OECD Trade and Agriculture Directorate assesses the opportunities and challenges of three alternatives to meat: plant-based (marketed as nearly equivalent to meat), insects and cultured meat. Its modelling results suggest that a shift from meat towards meat alternatives in high and upper middle income countries could lower global land use and greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture and land use; it would also lower global prices of meats, soybeans and cereals, producing benefits for consumers but putting economic pressure on farmers.

This paper by researchers at Oxford’s Livestock, Environment and People (LEAP) programme studies how meat and health are represented in eight UK news websites. It finds a variety of both pro- and anti-meat narratives, with 50.8% of articles assessed having a neutral stance towards meat, 29.7% being anti-meat and 19.5% being pro-meat.