Interventions for sourcing EAT-Lancet diets within national agricultural areas: A global analysis

Abstract

Trade has helped the global food system drastically reduce world hunger. However, it has also left nations vulnerable to food-trade shocks that can lead to local food shortages. National food resilience may be increased by exploring the feasibility of adapting healthy diets to local production and sourcing. The EAT-Lancet diet has been proposed as a healthy and environmentally friendly diet, but the feasibility of sourcing it nationally remains unknown. Using FAOSTAT production data and EAT-Lancet Commission guidelines, we create a unique EAT-Lancet diet for each nation. We compare the agricultural land required for each country to supply this diet to their available agricultural land. For nations that did not have sufficient agricultural land, interventions to reduce land use were elaborated by adjusting production and consumption efficiencies of all modeled diets, revealing that 95% of the global population live in countries with a potential pathway toward food self-sufficiency.