Current food consumption patterns have a substantial impact on our environment and are thus considered unsustainable. In the context of global warming and a rising world population, shifting from meat towards more plant-based products holds potential to reduce the environmental impact of our food consumption. Replacing meat in the diet, however, requires compensation through other products that are able to provide the important nutrients present in meat (protein, iron, zinc and vitamin B12). This study applies linear programming techniques with the aim to compose meat replacers, with equivalent nutritional value to meat (using chicken and beef as a reference), minimizing the environmental impact with regards to climate change, land use, water use and fossil fuel depletion. A life cycle approach was used to quantify the environmental impacts. Particular attention was given to protein quality and the relative quantities of essential amino acids. The results show that soy is a preferred ingredient due to its favorable amino acid profile. Among the different scenarios investigated, the vegan replacers, with reductions of up to 87%, have the largest potential for impact reduction for all indicators except water use. Insect-based replacers have the largest potential for water use reduction (up to 47%), but show relatively high fossil fuel depletion values. The smallest improvement potential is observed with regards to fossil fuel depletion, with some values even 45% higher than the values for meat. Furthermore, it is not possible to obtain equivalent nutritional values to beef without using fortifications.

The growing pig production sector is a large contributor of negative impacts to the environment and feed production is responsible for a large part of these impacts. Pig production systems, including feed compositions, are variable, resulting in variable potential environmental impacts. This study investigated the influence of different farm characteristics and feed compositions on the environmental impact of pig production in Flanders. A Life Cycle Assessment approach was followed, including data from 39 farms and monthly feed compositions in the year 2018. Even though feed production contributes significantly to the overall environmental impact of pig production, the results show that environmental impacts are more affected by variabilities in farm characteristics than by fluctuating feed compositions. A higher productivity, in terms of feed conversion efficiency and the number of pigs produced per sow, is generally related to lower environmental impacts. Another influencing factor is the type and amount of energy used. For feed consumption, high variabilities are observed for water use, mainly caused by varying levels of sugar cane molasses. Climate change impacts and variabilities are mainly caused by soy ingredients and their origin. Finally, amino acids show large contributions to the environmental impact of pig feed consumption. Our research highlights that future developments for reducing the environmental impact of pig production should target animal productivity, the type and amount of energy used and selection of protein sources in pig feed.

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