Approved in 2020, the European Green Deal concretizes a set of policy initiatives carried out by the European Commission with the overall objective to make the EU climate neutral in 2050. Climate change and environmental degradation are an existential threat to Europe and the world. To overcome this, the European Green Deal will transform the EU into a modern, resource-efficient and competitive economy.
At the heart of this challenge, the EU’s Farm to Fork Strategy (F2F) aims to make food systems fair, healthy, and environmentally friendly. We all know that our food system must be reinvented in a more sustainable way. According to the European commission, nearly one-third of global GHG emissions come from the food system. And, according to experts, more than half of total food emissions (58%) come from animal products.
Still a lot to do in Europe
According to the Special Eurobarometer 501, only 19% of Europeans changed their diet to more sustainable food in 2019 (Germany 24%, Spain 13%, Greece 12%, Portugal 11%, Malta 8%). In the latest Food Sustainability Index of Barilla Centre for Food and Nutrition Foundation, Turkey ranked 58th among 67 countries in terms of food sustainability, Malta 54th, Greece 43rd, Portugal 21st, Spain 19th, and Germany 16th. Price, lack of information and the challenge of identifying sustainable food options are among the main perceived barriers to sustainable eating. Sustdiet projet was built to overcome those barriers, it aims to raise awareness, provide information, and guide people through a diet more sustainable.
Sustdiet as a part of F2F strategy and the SDGs commitments
By helping athletes and active people to change their habits towards a more sustainable diet and disseminating information about the multiple ways existing to reduce their own food impact, the Sustdiet project contributes to one of the targets of the European Green Deal’s “Farm to Fork” strategy (F2F) and to the Sustainable Development Goals commitments (especially 2, 12 & 13).
By promoting sustainable food consumption and facilitating the shift to healthy, sustainable diets, the project will support the integration of sustainability in the nutrition/diet of professional and non-professional athletes in Germany, Greece, Malta, Portugal, Spain and Turkey. Due to the project’s transnational dimension, stakeholders at EU level will also be informed and impacted through the partners’ own networks.
Dietary guidelines will help address the common challenge of unsustainable food consumption patterns across the partner countries, but also in the EU in general. Available in English and all partner countries languages, those guidelines, as well as other deliverables (training programme, tools, recommendations booklet…) will be easily accessible through this website to everyone, in all EU member states.
