We all want to save money, be healthy and not destroy this planet any more than we already have. We all would agree with that, right?
Even in our massively polarized (or at least the news frames it that way) modern world it must be safe to say that we all want a diet that is the cheapest, the healthiest and the most sustainable.
To be sure this is a complex planet with people living vastly different lives and in vastly different environments. However, this study did a very nice job of juggling as many variables as it could while still boiling it down to some clear winners when it comes to cheap, healthy and sustainable diets.
Specifically a study conducted by Oxford University entitled, "The global and regional costs of healthy and sustainable dietary patterns: a modelling study" which was published in The Lancet.
The study, compared the cost of seven sustainable diets to the current typical diet in 150 countries, using food prices from the World Bank’s International Comparison Program and found that vegetarian and vegan dietary patterns were generally the most affordable, and pescatarian diets were least affordable.
This may not be a surprise to people who eat a predominantly whole food plant-based diet. This is an incredibly sustainable diet that gets the bulk of calories from starches i.e. potatoes, rice, sweet potatoes, beans and legumes. These are not expensive foods and they are nutritional complete and delicious to eat.
If you eat highly processed (even plant-based i.e. beyond burgers) you are looking at not particularly healthy nor cheap foods. Best to stick to what you can grow in a garden and if you have a garden well then you might even be able to shrink that food bill even lower.
Watch the video below to note that exception to this rule of plant-based diets, which we need to work on, because ideally we can live in a fairer world and a healthier one too.
So a win-win-win! You can be healthy, save money and help do your part to help the planet.
@gaiaguy Which diet is the healthiest, cheapest and sustainable? https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2021-11-11-sustainable-eating-cheaper-and-healthier-oxford-study
♬ original sound - gaiaguy