Adoption of plant-based diets across Europe can improve food resilience against the Russia-Ukraine conflict

The Russia-Ukraine war has disrupted global food supply chains and driven food prices up in many parts of the world. This study applies a spatially explicit modelling approach to estimate the resilience and environmental co-benefits of a transition towards the EAT-Lancet's planetary health diets across Europe. Crises related to extreme weather events, COVID-19 and the Russia-Ukraine conflict have revealed serious problems in global food (inter)dependency. Here we demonstrate that a transition towards the EAT-Lancet's planetary health diet in the European Union and the United Kingdom alone would almost compensate for all production deficits from Russia and Ukraine while yielding improvements in blue water use (4.1 Gm(3) yr(-1)), greenhouse gas emissions (0.22 GtCO(2)e yr(-1)) and carbon sequestration (17.4 GtCO(2)e).

Automated summary

The Russia-Ukraine war has disrupted global food supply chains and driven up food prices worldwide. This study shows that implementing the EAT-Lancet's planetary health diets in the European Union and the United Kingdom alone can compensate for production deficits from Russia and Ukraine, while also improving water use, greenhouse gas emissions, and carbon sequestration.