Summary1. Over the past decade, several foodborne disease outbreaks provoked widespread reforms to the fresh produce industry. Subsequent concerns about wildlife vectors and contaminated manures created pressure on growers to discontinue use of manure-based composts and remove nearby semi-natural vegetation. Despite widespread adoption, impacts of these practices on ecosystem services such as pest control have not been assessed. 2. We used a landscape-scale field experiment to quantify associations between compost applications, semi-natural vegetation, pest control services and lettuce yields on organic farms throughout California's Central Coast, a region experiencing food safety reforms. 3. We found that farms with surrounding semi-natural vegetation supported a diverse arthropod assemblage, whereas a herbivore-dominated assemblage occupied farms in simplified landscapes. Moreover, predatory arthropods consumed more herbivores at sites with more surrounding non-crop vegetation and reduced aphid pest infestations in lettuce. 4. Compost improved lettuce yields by increasing soil nutrients and organic matter, but affected neither pest control nor Escherichia coli prevalence. 5. Synthesis and applications. Food safety concerns are prompting practices that simplify farms and landscapes. Our results demonstrate that two practices -elimination of manurebased composts and removal of non-crop vegetation -are likely having negative impacts on arthropod biodiversity, pest control and soil quality. Critically, our findings and previous research suggest that compost can be applied safely and that habitat removal is likely ineffective at mitigating food safety risk. There is thus scope for co-managing fresh produce fields for food safety, ecosystem services, and biodiversity through applying appropriately treated composts and stopping habitat removal.

The food demands of the United States (US) impart significant environmental pressures. The high rate of consumption of beef has been shown to be the largest driver of food-borne greenhouse gas emissions, water use and land occupation in the US diet. The environmental benefits of substituting animal products with vegetal foods are well documented, but significant psychological barriers persist in reducing meat consumption. Here we use life cycle assessment to appraise the environmental performance of a novel vegetal protein source in the mean US diet where it replaces ground beef, and in vegetarian and vegan diets where it substitutes for legumes, tofu and other protein sources. We find that relative to the mean US diet, vegetarian and vegan diets significantly reduce per-capita food-borne greenhouse gas emission (32% and 67%, respectively), blue water use (70% and 75%, respectively) and land occupation (70% and 79%, respectively), primarily in the form of rangeland. The substitution of 10%, 25% and 50% of ground beef with plant-based burger (PBB) at the national scale results in substantial reductions in annual US dietary greenhouse gas emissions (4.55–45.42 Mt CO2 equivalents), water consumption (1.30–12.00 km3) and land occupation (22300–190100 km2). Despite PBB’s elevated environmental pressures compared to other vegetal protein sources, we demonstrate that minimal risk exists for the disservices of PBB substitution in non-meat diets to outweigh the benefits of ground-beef substitution in the omnivorous American diet. Demand for plant-based oils in PBB production has the potential to increase land use pressures in biodiversity hotspots, though these could be obviated through responsible land stewardship. Although the apparent environmental benefits of the PBB are contingent on actual uptake of the product, this study demonstrates the potential for non-traditional protein substitutes to play a role in a transition towards more sustainable consumption regimes in the US and potentially abroad.

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healy-thow, and eva wollenberg Highlights• To meet climate targets, a shift to low-emission diets that also support health and sustainability is necessary. • A high-impact target is to reduce red meat consumption by 50 percent by 2030 in high-and middle-income countries based on the 2019 EAT-Lancet diet. • Actions to reduce animal-based meat consumption (Table 9.1) could reduce dietary emissions by 3-8 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent per year. • Scaling up plant-based meat (PBM) will require viable products, low costs, effective public policy to catalyse change, and strong markets. • The priority actions are to facilitate consumer behavioural change for large segments of populations, promote policy targets and actions for reduced-meat diets in high-and middle-income countries, use public-private finance to improve alternative meat product nutrition and sustainability, and enhance affordable technology and business options.

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