A commission of global experts made a surprising discovery regarding the connection between heat-trapping pollution and farming practices. 

According to a report from The Lancet (via phys.org), a team of researchers from Cornell led the modeling section of a significant global report on the link between sustainable food practices and pollution. 

They found that food systems have the greatest negative impact on five of nine critical global processes that regulate Earth's stability and resilience. The study also found that more than half of the world's population struggles to access healthy diets, and that shifting diets could help prevent 15 million premature deaths each year. 

The richest 30 percent of people account for 70 percent of the world's food-related environmental impacts, including food waste and loss, as well as the environmental impact of widespread non-sustainable farming practices. 

"Collaborations like EAT-Lancet are vital to imagining and advancing a more sustainable future," said Mario Herrero, professor of global development in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS) and a Cornell Atkinson Scholar. "Playing a leadership role in this international network allows Cornell researchers to both contribute to and learn from the diverse expertise driving food systems transformation." 

The study proposed eight possible solutions, including ways to reduce food loss and waste, sustainable agricultural practices, protecting traditional diets, and stopping the conversion of healthy ecosystems into agricultural land. 

It shows that changes to the way humans eat can have a profound environmental impact, but cautions that without substantial changes to the way food is produced, we'll continue to struggle to reduce the environmental impact. 

The research team hopes that their work will help shape policy and contribute to a better, brighter, and more sustainable future, in which farming's massive environmental impact is substantially reduced. 

"But if dietary change is not accompanied by improvements such as increased agricultural productivity and reduced food loss, it won't get us environmentally sustainable food systems," Daniel Mason-D'Croz, senior research associate in CALS and lead for the modeling team, said. "Future work will now need to focus on developing roadmaps for achieving more sustainable futures."

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