Environmental Nutrition at LLUSPH

Environmental Nutrition is currently the focus of an interdisciplinary academic research group at the School of Public Health, Loma Linda University. The information on our website is relevant to students, researchers, not for profit organizations and other interested groups.

What is environmental nutrition?

Environmental Nutrition emerged from a recognition that the complex interactions within the food system related to health and environment need to be considered simultaneously. Environmental Nutrition goes beyond the scope of current discussions on sustainable diets and systematically considers the interrelationships within food systems to necessarily incorporate a complete understanding. Nourishing a growing population while balancing what the Earth can provide and absorb is increasingly recognized as a major global challenge.  The conventional food system threatens our health and overall well-being with increased air and water pollution, toxic chemical exposure, antibiotic-resistant bacteria, soil erosion, climate change inducing greenhouse gas emissions, and loss of biodiversity. Widely held consensus among medical and public health professionals finds that today’s typical ‘diet of affluence’ contributes to a range of costly health problems, including obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cognitive decline and dementia, other neurodegenerative disorders, and various kinds of cancer.  Environmental nutrition, therefore, is a useful tool for critically analyzing the wide-reaching environmental, social, and health impacts of industrial agriculture.

What are sustainable diets?

By definition, a ‘sustainable’ diet should use resources without exhausting or destroying them, and hence should be able to be sustained in the long term. This includes staying within the Earth’s biophysical capacity, i.e. what the planet can sustain in terms of resource provision and absorption of wastes, including greenhouse gas emissions. The growing body of research on sustainable diets has been recognized by a variety of international bodies including the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO). The FAO define sustainable diets as “those diets with low environmental impacts which contribute to food and nutrition security and to healthy life for present and future generations. Sustainable diets are protective and respectful of biodiversity and ecosystems, culturally acceptable, accessible, economically fair and affordable; nutritionally adequate, safe and healthy; while optimizing natural and human resources.” The food system is currently a major contributor to severe environmental problems, such as biodiversity loss and climate change. This contribution is envisaged to increase, given the global shift in food consumption patterns towards the ‘western’ palette of high animal products. Addressing consumption patterns, food waste and resource intensive methods of agricultural production are considered crucial for enabling wide scale adoption of sustainable diets.

GQ – The Easiest Way to Fight Climate Change Might Be to Eat More Beans. Antarctica is melting; summer temperatures are rising; coral reefs are dying; and all your non-trump-supporting friends are probably freaking out about the increasingly terrifying reality that is climate change. Read more

Huffington Post- The Vegan Argument. Can we say whether or not a well balanced, vegan diet is BEST for human health? I will tell you the answer momentarily, but first- reasons for posing the question now. Read more

Vice – Study Says Beans Actually Make Us Less Gassy than Meat. Thanks to researchers at Loma Linda University, we can now really put our proteins in perspective and deal with this stark reality: if Americans were to sub beans in for beef, the US would “immediately” reach 50 to 75 of its reduced greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) targets for 2020. Read more

Popular Science- Replacing beef with beans could save the planet, because people farts are better than cow farts. There’s an old childhood ditty about eating beans that starts off “beans, beans, they’re good for your heart,” and ends with a snicker-inducing line about their other well-known effects — (rhymes with “heart”). Read more

Fast Company – Eating Beans Could Be A Magical Solution To Climate Change. There is a cause of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that nobody likes to talk about, and it is cow farts. In a single day, a lone cow can fill a 55-gallon bag with methane-laden gas–methane being a GHG as much as 30 times more damaging than carbon dioxide–and at least 1.5 billion cows roam the planet. The meat and dairy industry accounts for as much as 15% of global emissions. Read more

• Fusion – If we all ate beans instead of meat there’d actually be some huge gas reductions
• NUVO Magazine – The Magical Fruit
• ExtraCrispy.com – Eating More Bean Will Lead to Fewer Farts, Says Study
• ScienceDaily.com – Eating beans instead of beef would sharply reduce greenhouse gasses
• PopularMechanics.com – The Cure for Climate Change Might Be on Your Plate

• Loma Linda Researchers Propose New Field of Public Health: Environmental Nutrition
• Eat less meat for a longer, greener life – Meat Free Monday
• Vegan Diet Is the Most Sustainable
• Study says global consumption of meat needs to fall
• Environmental footprint of vegan and vegetarian diets 30% lower than non-vegetarian diets say researchers ‘We have to drastically cut consumption of meat and dairy’
• A Vegetarian Diet can Increase Longevity, Help Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions
• Feeding the planet in 2050 – with or without animal products?
• For want of a T-bone steak the Biosphere was lost 

• Vegetarian diets produce fewer greenhouse gases and increase longevity, say new studies. Science Daily
• Vegetarian Diet Extends Lifespan, Cuts Greenhouse Emissions: Study
• Vegetarian diets lead to cleaner environment, longer lives
• Vegetarian Diet Increases Longevity And Is Good For The Environment, Study Finds
• Plant-Based Diets Produce Fewer Greenhouse Gases, Increase Longevity
• Going green – the benefits of meatless eating
• Vegetarians live 20% longer, according to massive study
• Do I have to be vegan to combat climate change?