In this blog Jessica Paddock and Alan Warde outline a feminist vision of how we might change our eating habits in order to meet our food climate mitigation requirements. 

In September 2016, France banned the use of non-biodegradable plastic cups and cutlery, as from 2020. The ban was proposed by Europe Écologie, Les Verts, France’s green party.

Ongoing discussions on agriculture within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), will culminate this year at the COP22 climate negotiations in Marrakech, following a long process since their initiation in Durban in 2011. The talks in Marrakech follow the signing of the Paris Agreement in 2015 which, in its preamble, explicitly refers to safeguarding food security. Also, the vast majority of countries’ Intended Nationally Determined Contributions submissions (i.e. climate pledges) prioritise agriculture as a sector for adaptation and mitigation action.

Strong demand for vegetable oil has led to a boom in the Indonesian and Malaysian palm oil industries since 1990. Typically planted in extremely large monoculture plantations, the crop has been implicated in biodiversity loss and human rights issues.

Recent research has shown that some foods have a considerably higher emissions-footprints than do others and that changes in average dietary consumption patterns towards lower-emissions foods, has potential as a climate change mitigation measure.

Alternative cropping systems such as organic or conservation agriculture are often expected to lead to enhanced soil carbon storage as compared with conventional systems, and therefore to hold potential to contribute to climate change mitigation via carbon sequestration.

This report by Agile-ox, a project based at the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford, 'Sharing the co-benefits of local action on climate change' aims to promote discussion and provide practical ideas, case studies and a checklist about how local action can help contribute to a fair and fast transition to a low carbon economy in a way that benefits residents, reduces social divides and builds broad public support for action.

This study warns that converting Africa's tropical forests into monoculture palm plantations will cause a significant spike in carbon emissions and highlights that regulation can assist in achieving net-zero carbon while meeting production goals.

The neotropical macaw palm (Acrocomia aculeata) is increasingly promoted for large-scale cultivation as a sustainable biomass feedstock in Latin America. This paper warns however that a crucial proportion of areas predicted to be suitable for cultivation are located in areas of high conservational value. The paper also points to climate change scenarios which predict a substantial reduction of suitable areas in coming years.