Good for You, Good for Our Earth

Take some time today, to watch the Urban Rush EarthDay show that includes Vancouver’s Mayor Robertson , ‘Carbon Nation’ Director Peter Byck, David Suzuki Foundation’s “Queen of Green” Lindsay Coulter and yours truly, speaking about my favorite Vancouver local green food producers.

Often when you hear about the Dirty Dozen, it relates to the top 12 fruits or vegetables that have high pestiside residue. The David Suzuki Foundation has just come out with a new dirty dozen list, pertaining to personal care products. These products contain industrial chemicals including carcinogens, pesticides, reproductive toxins, endocrine disruptors, plasticizers, degreasers, and surfactants. The products not only affect your health directly, they affect us indirectly when they wash away our dirt.. the chemicals also wash down the drain, making there way into our food (fish) and water systems!

Check out your favorite  RD on the Urban Rush ‘Earth Day’ episode today. I will be talking about local nutritious “low food footprint” choices. Tune into Urban Rush at 5PM, 7PM, 11PM and noon or on line tomorrow

So you thought the best thing you could do to reduce your output of CO2 emissions was to ride your bike? Well, that’s a great start; however, if you really want to reduce the amount of CO2 we produce, you need to start with what you put in your mouth.  When you account for all the emissions from seed, to plate, to landfill, the food we eat accounts for as much as 31% of the planet’s greenhouse gas emissions. That’s a gigantic Food Footprint!

Top choices that are ‘Good for You & Good for Our Earth’

1. Eat less red meat and dairy
Research shows that a diet high in red meat increases the risk of colorectal cancer. The raising of livestock for human consumption is also responsible for 18% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. On average, red meat is around 150% more greenhouse-gas intensive than chicken or fish.

When eating red meat and dairy:
⇒    Buy organic, local or grass-fed meat and dairy whenever possible and choose the leanest meat and trim any visible fat before cooking
⇒    Limit the amount of red meat you eat each week to 3 servings. A serving is 85 grams (3 ounces) when cooked – this is smaller than   a   deck of cards
⇒    Choose  low or fat-free dairy products

2. Reduce your intake of processed and packaged foods

The majority of processed foods are filled with additives, high in sugar, fat, salt, and stripped of nutrients. Processed meats have a high level of sodium nitrate (salt), considered by many to be carcinogenic (causes cancer). Not only that, packaged food is extremely resource intense. Snack foods, most juices, even veggie burgers (prepared, boxed, frozen and transported) often consume much more energy through processing and packaging than non-packaged foods.

3. Pass on the air miles

Often we think ‘Eating Local’ is the best thing we can do for the environment. In reality 80 per cent of the energy used to get food from the farm to the table occurs during food production. Transportation accounts for 10% -15 %. The best thing about eating local is actually the quality of the food and supporting your local economy. Even when the highest post-harvest handling standards are met, foods grown far away spend significant time on the road, and therefore, have more time to lose nutrients before reaching the marketplace.  When shopping for foods that perish quickly, look for sustainable locally grown foods — your body and the earth will thank you for it.

4.  Say NO to supersize

The more food you pile on your plate, the more likely you are to eat it. Ordering larger portion sizes often causes over-consumption of food, and this can have a negative impact on weight. In addition, every time a person takes more then he or she can eat, what is left on the plate causes our landfills to also grow in size. As this wasted food rots in landfills, it generates methane gas that contributes to global warming. Worldwide, 1/2 of the food produced is wasted. Wasted food is wasted energy. Warm your heart, not the earth. Eat whole food and think twice before asking for that second helping.

Compared to farmed salmon, wild salmon is more nutritious and carries fewer toxins that can accumulate in humans. Watch the CTV interview to get the full story