With the arrival of autumn and its accompanying colder weather, now is the perfect time to ‘nest’ a little by enjoying time at home and reviewing your actions and achievements from the past year.
One area you could reflect on is your eating habits. Why not dig out the recipe books and see what’s in season for some great meal ideas for family and friends? It’s the ideal time to look at changing your diet and food shopping habits for the benefit of the environment too.
Did you know that the process of cultivating, growing, harvesting and transporting food causes almost a third of the world’s carbon emissions? By making small changes to your own diet, combined with other people’s efforts too, you can achieve big carbon reductions and help to slow down the rate of climate change.
Cool Food, launched as a partnership between PECT, Cornwall Food Foundation and Al’Terre Breizh, aims to take a bite out of climate change by encouraging people to make small changes to their food habits.
One way in which you can do this is to pledge online at www.coolfood.net to opt for more meat and fish-free meals. In terms of the food we eat, consuming meat and fish has the biggest impact on our environment. If you swap out one meal a day to make it vegetarian this could save more than 2kg of carbon per day – the equivalent environmental impact of a TV being used continuously for 12 hours.
In addition to the 2kg of carbon a day veggie challenge, you can also pledge to make your own meals, introduce dairy-free days, reduce food waste, cut your tea and coffee intake, swap soft drinks for water, and buy local, seasonal and organic.
At the heart of Cool Food is an online tool, designed to recommend and capture commitments to change food habits. The tool helps users to identify and record the financial and environmental benefits of their changes to help motivate long-term positive behaviour change.
You can reduce your carbon footprint in three easy steps: choose your commitments, measure the impact, and connect with the Cool Food community to get support, hints and tips to help you reach your target. Plus there’s some great recipe ideas online to help you on your way!
Funded by Interreg of the European Regional Development Fund to promote cross border co-operation, Cool Food has devised simple commitments which will help people understand the impact of their food, drink, and shopping choices on the planet.
- Challenge: 7 vegetarian meals per week
- Choose local, seasonal and organic vegetables
- Chop your meat portions in half
- Don’t waste bread
- Have coffee-free days
- Have dairy-free days
- Have tea-free days
- Introduce vegetarian meals
- Make your own meals
- Reduce your food waste
- Swap soft drinks for water