Scenario Analysis of a Municipality’s Food Purchase to Simultaneously Improve Nutritional Quality and Lower Carbon Emission for Child-Care Centers

Lassen, Anne Dahl; Nordman, Matilda; Christensen, Lene Møller; Trolle, Ellen

doi:10.3390/su13105551

Cited by 6 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…Then data were compiled with nutritional composition data as well as climate impact data on the proxy food items. The method of data compiling is described in detail in a previous paper [28], focusing on scenario analysis of the City of Copenhagen's food purchase to improve nutritional quality and lower carbon emission for the food provided to child-care centres.…”

Section: Data Description and Compilationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Purchase data from smaller suppliers providing single food categories (e.g., fresh fish) were also retrieved, where purchase data from smaller suppliers offering a variety of food categories were excluded in order to simplify the calculation. Based on the total expenditure on food procurement in the municipality, the dataset was estimated to comprise 88% of the total food purchased and was judged to be reasonably representative of the full procurement on the food group level [28].…”

Section: Data Description and Compilationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Nutritional data were retrieved from The Danish Food Composition Database [27]. The data were updated with newer analyses and checked and updated for missing data, as described by Lassen et al [28] Climate impact data were provided from the World Resources Institute's Cool Food Pledge food purchasing tracking sheet [29] with a few modifications [28]. The sheet includes default weighted European average factors for GHGEs by food category from the whole agricultural supply chains as well as global-average factors for carbon opportunity costs (Metric 4) [29].…”

Section: Data Description and Compilationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The modelling was based on main food groups and subgroups as described by Lassen et al [28]. Food groups included starch-rich foods (potatoes, bread, pasta, rice, cereals and oat products), fruits and berries (including juice), vegetables (dark green and red-orange vegetables, green peas and other vegetables), plant-based protein-rich foods (pulses, nuts and seeds); meat and eggs (beef, lamb, pork, poultry and eggs), fish and seafood (subdivided into three climate impact categories), dairy products (milk and fermented milk according to fat content, cheese and other dairy products), animal-based and plant-based fats (butter, oils, fatty sauces and dressings), discretionary foods and beverages (sugar-rich foods, savoury snacks and sweetened beverages), and condiments and seasoning (spices and dips/sauces).…”

Section: Baseline and Diet Scenario Modellingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The Cool Food Pledge Calculator includes default weighted regional average data for GHGE [57] and thereby does not represent specific Danish values. Moreover, GHGE values from Metric 4 (global-average factors for carbon opportunity costs) may be overestimated compared with other estimates that include land-use change (LUC) [28]. Methods of estimating the LUC are still under discussion [58], and carbon opportunity costs based on the values from Searchinger et al 2018 are high compared to other values [59].…”

Section: Strengths and Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Guidance for Healthy and More Climate-Friendly Diets in Nursing Homes—Scenario Analysis Based on a Municipality’s Food Procurement

et al. 2021

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Reducing the climate impact of food provided for residents in nursing homes is challenging, as the diets for older, frail adults must be high in protein content and energy density while at the same time ensuring that the meals are palatable and recognizable. This study aimed at providing guidance on healthy and more climate-friendly diets for nursing homes in the City of Copenhagen. The goal was to decrease greenhouse gas emissions (GHGE) by at least 25% while at the same time providing nutritionally adequate and recognizable menus. First, food purchase data were compiled with datasets matching each food item to a proxy food item and then to databases containing GHGE and nutrient information. Secondly, two diet scenarios were modelled based on current procurement practices, i.e., an energy- and protein-dense diet and a standard protein-dense diet, and converted into guidelines for menu planning. The diets contained less total meat, especially beef, and significantly more pulses, nuts and seeds in order to increase protein content according to recommendations for older adults. Finally, a combined scenario was calculated to reflect the joint climate impact reduction. This kind of innovation in food procurement is required in order to achieve the necessary transition to a sustainable food system.

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Section: Data Description and Compilationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Data Description and Compilationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Data Description and Compilationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Baseline and Diet Scenario Modellingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Strengths and Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Guidance for Healthy and More Climate-Friendly Diets in Nursing Homes—Scenario Analysis Based on a Municipality’s Food Procurement

et al. 2021

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Tracking progress toward a climate-friendly public food service strategy: assessing nutritional quality and carbon footprint changes in childcare centers

Nordman,

Lassen,

Christensen

et al. 2024

Nutr J

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Background Public food procurement and catering are recognized as important leverage points in promoting sustainable and healthy dietary habits. This study aimed to analyze changes in nutritional quality and carbon footprint (CF) of food service in childcare centers in the City of Copenhagen from 2018 to 2022, following a new climate-friendly food strategy in 2019. The strategy has a target of decreasing the CF of municipal food service by 25% before 2025 compared to a 2018 baseline. Methods Key initiatives in the municipality’s strategy included creating guidelines for food-service providers to reduce their CF while ensuring meal nutritional quality and providing food professionals an advisory process to develop necessary competencies. In this quasi-experimental study, food procurement data from Copenhagen’s childcare centers (n = 356 [2022]) from 2018 and 2022 were combined with CF and nutrient composition data. Dietary CF and food and nutrient content were calculated per 10 MJ of energy and compared to guideline targets. Furthermore, data for 2022 were analyzed separately for institutions that had received an advisory process (n = 87) and those that had not yet (n = 269). Results On average, the CF of the food procurement decreased by 15%, mainly driven by a decrease in ruminant meat purchases (-37%). While the procurement of plant-based protein sources (pulses, nuts, seeds) increased by 25%, it was still considerably below targets. Nutrient content did not substantially change, and recommendations for calcium, iron, vitamin D, sodium, and total and saturated fat were not met in either measurement year. Institutions that had received an advisory process had a 14% lower CF in 2022 than institutions that had not. Conclusions With the observed 15% CF reduction, Copenhagen’s childcare centers are on track to reach the 25% reduction goal outlined in the municipality’s food strategy by 2025. Nutritional quality was largely unchanged, but further efforts to increase especially the consumption of plant-based protein sources, while simultaneously reducing meat and animal-based fat, and maintaining sufficient dairy consumption, are needed to improve nutritional quality and reach the target CF reduction in the coming years. Providing training for food professionals could play an important role in seeing the changes through.

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Exploring healthy and climate-friendly diets for Danish adults: an optimization study using quadratic programming

et al. 2023

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BackgroundA transition to healthy and sustainable diets has the potential to improve human and planetary health but diets need to meet requirements for nutritional adequacy, health, environmental targets, and be acceptable to consumers.ObjectiveThe objective of this study was to derive a nutritionally adequate and healthy diet that has the least deviation possible from the average observed diet of Danish adults while aiming for a greenhouse gas emission (GHGE) reduction of 31%, corresponding to the GHGE level of the Danish plant-rich diet, which lays the foundation for the current healthy and sustainable food-based dietary guidelines (FBDGs) in Denmark.MethodsWith an objective function minimizing the departure from the average observed diet of Danish adults, four diet optimizations were run using quadratic programming, with different combinations of diet constraints: (1) nutrients only (Nutri), (2) nutrients and health-based targets for food amounts (NutriHealth), (3) GHGE only (GHGE), and finally, (4) combined nutrient, health and GHGE constraints (NutriHealthGHGE).ResultsThe GHGE of the four optimized diets were 3.93 kg CO2-eq (Nutri), 3.77 kg CO2-eq (NutriHealth) and 3.01 kg CO2-eq (GHGE and NutriHealthGHGE), compared to 4.37 kg CO2-eq in the observed diet. The proportion of energy from animal-based foods was 21%–25% in the optimized diets compared to 34% in the observed diet and 18% in the Danish plant-rich diet. Moreover, compared to the average Danish diet, the NutriHealthGHGE diet contained more grains and starches (44 E% vs. 28 E%), nuts (+230%), fatty fish (+89%), eggs (+47%); less cheese (−73%), animal-based fats (−76%), total meat (−42%); and very limited amounts of ruminant meat, soft drinks, and alcoholic beverages (all-90%), while the amounts of legumes and seeds were unchanged. On average, the mathematically optimized NutriHealthGHGE diet showed a smaller deviation from the average Danish diet compared to the Danish plant-rich diet (38% vs. 169%, respectively).ConclusionThe final optimized diet presented in this study represents an alternative way of composing a nutritionally adequate and healthy diet that has the same estimated GHGE as a diet consistent with the climate-friendly FBDGs in Denmark. As this optimized diet may be more acceptable for some consumers, it might help to facilitate the transition toward more healthy and sustainable diets in the Danish population.

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Scenario Analysis of a Municipality’s Food Purchase to Simultaneously Improve Nutritional Quality and Lower Carbon Emission for Child-Care Centers

Cited by 6 publications

References 38 publications

Guidance for Healthy and More Climate-Friendly Diets in Nursing Homes—Scenario Analysis Based on a Municipality’s Food Procurement

Guidance for Healthy and More Climate-Friendly Diets in Nursing Homes—Scenario Analysis Based on a Municipality’s Food Procurement

Tracking progress toward a climate-friendly public food service strategy: assessing nutritional quality and carbon footprint changes in childcare centers

Exploring healthy and climate-friendly diets for Danish adults: an optimization study using quadratic programming

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