More than 150 countries and key stakeholders came together yesterday to commit to transforming food systems, combatting biodiversity loss and tackling global hunger. The first ever United Nations Food Systems Summit (FSS) brought together world leaders, members of civil society, youth activists, and representatives from indigenous populations along with donors, academics, and members of the private sector […]
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A SUN Movement Call to Action for Nutrition ahead of the UN Food Systems Summit 2021
A multi-sectoral and multi-stakeholder approach to nutrition must be front and centre in food systems transformations *Originally published on the Scaling Up Nutrition Movement website.* The United Nations Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) in September was called for by the UN Secretary General in recognition that current food systems are failing people and the planet alike. […]
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Message of solidarity with the people of Afghanistan
At the Scaling Up Nutrition Civil Society Network we are deeply concerned with the news from Afghanistan and the worrying reports of severe hunger crisis due to extreme drought. Even before the Taliban advancement, Afghanistan had one of the world’s highest rates of stunting in children under-5 years old; 40.9% are stunted and 9.5% are […]
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World Breastfeeding Week: Kyrgyzstan are on a mission to protect breastfeeding
In 2019, the Ministry of Health in Kyrgyzstan created a working group to revise the Law “On the Protection of Breastfeeding”, the working group included representatives of CSA SUN Kyrgyzstan, who contributed to the development of proposals for the draft of the Law. In the same year, UNICEF arranged a visit from David Clark, a […]
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World Breastfeeding Week: SUN CSA Cambodia investigators violators of the code
In Cambodia, the code for producers of breast milk substitutes was put in place in 2005. However, for the next decade there was little to no enforcement and when surveyed, only 27% of officials actually knew the details of the code. Despite widespread violations, there was no reporting and no enforcement recognition in place. To combat these […]
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World Breastfeeding Week 2021: Zimbabwe changes Parliament for the better
With more women parliamentarians than ever before, it is crucial that facilities are available for women to adequately nourish their child during its first 1000 days. In Zimbabwe, Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Health and Child Care chairperson Dr Ruth Labode said “We now have more young female legislators in Parliament who have children and are breastfeeding.” It […]
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The SUN Civil Society Network launches its new 5-year strategy!
Why do we need a new CSN strategy? The Civil Society Network 3.0 strategy (2021-2025) constitutes an essential guide to rally all civil society members’ collective efforts behind a strong mission and vision. The CSN 3.0 strategy was designed for the Network by the Network, in alignment with the overall SUN Movement 3.0 strategy. As such, the […]
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SABER, SER, HACER: Encuentro de Interaprendizaje reunió líderes del Movimiento SUN de Latinoamérica y El Caribe
El Primer Encuentro de Interaprendizaje “Escuchando la voz de la sociedad civil en Latinoamérica y el Caribe”, de las alianzas de la sociedad civil que forman parte del Scaling Up Nutrition (Movimiento SUN), celebrado en diciembre 2020 y enero 2021, permitió que líderes de más de 10 países compartieran sus experiencias exitosas en la lucha […]
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KNOW IT, BE IT, DO IT: Learning exchange brought together leaders of the SUN Movement of Latin America and the Caribbean
The First learning exchange “Listening to the Voice of Civil Society in Latin America and the Caribbean”, of the civil society alliances that are part of the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN Movement), held in December 2020 and January 2021, allowed leaders from more than 10 countries to share their successful experiences in the fight against […]
ReadClimate Change and Nutrition: The Reciprocal Impact
The SUN (Scaling Up Nutrition) Movement is made up of the most important and influential figures in the nutrition world. We are all focussed, dedicated, and driven by the idea of a world free from malnutrition in all its forms. The conversation about poverty and malnutrition has moved on since Bono and Bob Geldof wanted to ‘Feed the World’ and […]
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The SUN (Scaling Up Nutrition) Movement is made up of the most important and influential figures in the nutrition world. We are all focussed, dedicated, and driven by the idea of a world free from malnutrition in all its forms. The conversation about poverty and malnutrition has moved on since Bono and Bob Geldof wanted to ‘Feed the World’ and this is no longer a case of more food, fewer problems. We talk about healthy and nutritious food, eating the right food, buying the right food. We talk about creating sustainable and equitable food systems that will create fair and lasting change. And more recently we have talked about the intersections between nutrition about the climate crisis, and the damage caused to food systems by drought and flooding. It’s quite right that we should discuss climate change hand in hand with nutrition. The links are clear, and the effects of recent climate related disasters have posed a distinct threat to food security, particularly in the developing world. In 2019, we saw cyclones and flooding across East Africa and parts of Asia. Drought in the Horn of Africa left 11.7 million people severely food insecure1 last summer. And Australia and the US have seen crop destruction from brutal wildfires. All these phenomena are thought to be the result of rising temperatures and rising sea levels.
But this impact does not go only one way. The exponential growth in the meat and dairy industry is a leading cause of climate change. According to the FAO, the meat industry’s emissions are roughly equivalent to all the driving and flying of every car, truck, and plane in the world.2 So why, as a global nutrition movement, are we not talking about this more?
When we look at the amount of carbon human activity is emitting into the air, agriculture, alongside forestry, accounts for about a quarter of greenhouse gas emissions.3 The meat and dairy industries by themselves cause huge amounts of carbon emissions, but animal agriculture is also responsible for 91% of the destruction of the rainforest.4 These industries are destroying essential parts of earth’s ecological balance to grow food, which is then transported across the world and fed to animals who become food for us to eat. This way of creating and consuming food is not only damaging but ineffective. We have done nothing to remove the discrepancy between those with the most and those with the least, and now we are causing more damage by consuming our food in this way.
It is true that as a Movement we focus on countries and individuals who do not necessarily participate in these food systems. The big companies largely responsible for deforestation and emissions on a catastrophic scale are more often those sitting in rich and developed nations. A plant-based diet is often not an option for people struggling to incorporate more food groups into their diet and nor should it be. Small holdings and local, free-range farming are not the reason meat and dairy tops the list of industries contributing to climate change. But we can’t deny that a major cause of this climate crisis is our food system.
No, I’m not suggesting everyone eat exclusively plant-based immediately. I’m not asking everyone to rush out tonight for a box of tofu and a carton of oat milk. But on World Vegan Day, I feel that we have a duty to talk about how we could change our nutrition for a more sustainable and equitable future. This is particularly the case for those of us who work in cities such as London, Geneva, and Washington DC, where our choices of food are bountiful, and we are privileged to choose.
We are entering the third phase of SUN in 2021, and with the upcoming Climate and Food Systems Summits, now is the time for the Movement to think more deeply about the impact of nutrition on climate change, rather than just the other way around.
[1] http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/197623/icode/
[2] https://reliefweb.int/report/ethiopia/horn-africa-region-drought-snapshot-june-2019
