The Carbon Footprint of Food

2min Snip

00:00

Play full episode

Summary

Transcript

Episode notes

In reality, the distance your food has traveled to reach you often makes a really, really small part of the carbon footprint of the food that you're eating. When we look at the differences in carbon footprint of foods, we are between the highest and lowest. We're talking about 10 to 50 times as much. So being an Israel, if I were to eat tofu imported from Australia, just to pick a place very far away, would have a much lower carbon footprint than my neighbor's cow.

Having completed several degrees in environmental science, Hannah Ritchie nearly left the field out of helplessness and frustration, worried she would never make a real difference. Today, she's a passionate advocate for changing climate messaging, replacing what she believes are paralyzing--and often false--claims with empowering arguments that people can embrace. Listen as the head of research at Our World in Data talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about food emissions, low-carbon technologies, and what the data shows about what matters (and what matters much less) when it comes to climate change.