How One Can Align Their Dietary Needs With The Environment

There are several ways to learn to eat smart for yourself and our planet. Here’s how one can align their dietary needs with the environment.

They say that you are what you eat, but in India, this is absolutely true. Our planet’s largest democracy is the 5th largest economy by GDP, the third largest in purchasing power parity, and boasts the third largest startup ecosystem globally with over 26,000 startups between 2017-2019. But above all, India remains an agrarian economy, with 70% of our rural households relying on agriculture for their income. In 2021, India was second only to China in gross agricultural production value.

Despite these superlatives, our country faces an enormous challenge ahead. The UN estimates that from 1998 2017, India suffered climate-related losses of $80 billion. The average farmer owes up to 60% of their income in debt and nearly 40% of the food that they produce does not reach our tables due to loss in production, processing, or distribution. Meanwhile, 3.3 million children in India are malnourished, with a 91% rise in severely malnourished children from 2020-2021 and less than 50% of the population has access to safely managed drinking water. At the same time, a recent study found that in a sample of about 1 lakh Indians, 27% had pre- or existing diabetes, 35% exhibited hypertension, and 29% had generalized obesity.

How did we get here? How can a country with the second-highest food production in the world leave its farmers in debt? How can 29% of us be obese while our children are malnourished? The answer lies at the start of this article.

What’s the solution?

Go to your kitchen. What do you find there? For the average Indian household, there will likely be a large portion of cereals, some processed food, and fewer fruits, vegetables, legumes, meat, fish or eggs. The richest 5% of Indian households consume 20% more calories than the EAT-Lancet reference diet recommendations, while the poorest households consume half of these calories. Cereal consumption is significantly higher than the recommended amounts, while fruits, vegetables, legumes, and proteins are significantly lower. An average Indian household also consumes more calories from processed foods than fresh.We all know that we need to improve our diets for our health, but the problem is deeper than this. How much of the food in your kitchen was produced within 100 km of your home? How much of it was produced in a sustainable manner, with limited or no chemical inputs in its production, processing, or distribution?

Ways to align with the environment

We are what we eat. Due to dwindling returns, many of our smallholder farmers no longer grow subsistence crops that their own families require for nutrition. Many of these farmers also do not grow the crops best fit for their local ecologies due to market-driven pricing and subsidies for other crops like rice and wheat. Locally-produced and regionally-specific legumes, millets, fruits and vegetables are not only better for your diet, but they drive demand to produce more nutritious food that is better for the local ecology and reduces the carbon footprint. Our native millets can provide up to 5% more protein and 49% more iron while releasing 13% less greenhouse gases than rice. Apples from New Zealand cost 190% more energy than a locally-produced guava. Moringa, another native fruit, not only helps with soil erosion and water purification, but every part of the plant is useful.

Conclusion

We believe “Eat what has crossed generations, not borders”. There are several ways to learn to eat smart for yourself and our planet. India’s rich culinary history is both a source of pride and a vast ecological wealth for the health and wellbeing of India’s lands and her people.

The article is contributed Shannon Olsson, Founder and Global Director, echo network.