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Our diet has a major impact on the amount of land needed to produce all that food. Marije Hoff and Hugo J. de Boer of Utrecht ľ¹Ï¸£ÀûÓ°ÊÓ developed an online calculation method to determine the virtual land use of various diets based on ten questions. Their results were recently published in the journal Sustainability.

More than a third of the world's ice-free land surface is used for agriculture. That is why the food we eat has a major impact on global water, nutrient and carbon cycles. Land use is influenced by the number of people on the planet, how food is produced and by dietary preferences. Indeed, some products, such as meat and dairy products, require relatively more land than others. However, until now little information has been readily available for consumers to become more aware of the land use of their particular diet.

Focus on animal products

Hoff and De Boer have developed a calculator that asks the user ten questions about their eating habits. Since animal products in particular determine the amount of land needed to produce food, the calculator focuses on this. Users indicate how often per week they eat beef, pork, poultry, lamb, fish, milk, cheese or eggs. This is combined with information about how much the user eats compared to others and what the main staple crop is (root crops, such as potatoes, or cereals). The calculator then indicates what percentage of available land area would be needed to grow food if the entire world population followed the same diet.

Large differences between countries

The calculator is tested on 23 national diets and the results show strong agreement with previous research data. There are large differences between different countries: if everyone would eat like the average North American, almost one hundred per cent of the available land area would be needed for food production, while an Indian diet requires only sixteen per cent. Four different characteristic diets were also taken into account, namely an omnivorous, a flexitarian, a vegetarian and a vegan diet. Here, too, the results of the calculator fit in well with the existing literature and show that land use does indeed decrease when the consumption of animal products is lower.

Want to fill in the calculator yourself? Go to  (preferably on a desk or laptop) and click on 'Run'.

Publication

Marije Hoff, Hugo J. de Boer, ‘’,&²Ô²ú²õ±è;Sustainability.