The critical role of dietary change and waste reduction in food system emissions mitigation

Food systems are a growing source of global emissions. Demand-side strategies could play a critical role in their mitigation. We evaluate how dietary change and waste reduction could reduce food system emissions across the supply chain, under well-below 2°C, near 2°C, and no carbon price mitigation levels. Ambitious dietary change and waste reduction ambition could reduce end-of-century temperature by up to 0.3°C and advance peak temperature year by 5-15 years in the well-below 2°C and near 2°C scenarios, thus reducing overshoot and enhancing the likelihood of meeting long-term temperature goals. Food demand strategies can compensate for weak or delayed actions in non-food sectors, with the potential for substantial near-term reductions. Achieving ambitious food system transformation will require substantial but differentiated action across regions of all income levels—high-income regions will need to transform their diets drastically, while the key objective in low/lower-middle income regions will be avoiding increasing livestock intake from current levels.