Tel-Hai Magazine 2023-2024

for each participant by analyzing dietary assessment and association with the Mediterranean diet (MED) and the EAT-Lancet reference diet, which repre sent healthy diets derived from sustain able food systems. Dietary assessment was performed using the 116-item Food Frequency Questionnaire (FFQ) that was developed for the Israeli population, and which includes environmental coeffi cients for environmental footprints. The subjects of the study included a diverse group of Israeli adults, 525 men and women aged 20-66 years. This sam ple represents the diverse subpopulations of Israeli society considering both cultur al factors and modern dietary trends, such as vegans and vegetarians, rural and urban residents, Jewish and Arab partic ipants, secular and religious. Questionnaires, surveys and interviews were conducted to collect information such as demographics, lifestyle factors (physical activity, smoking status), self-re ported weight status, quality of life and general health information, dietary in formation, eating habits, and MED and EAT-Lancet Diet adherence - scores were calculated to see if and how closely participants followed these diets. Measuring the environmental footprint on water, land, and greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) The environmental loads were calcu lated based on the “footprint family indi cators”. These indicators track and mea sure the environmental impact of human consumption patterns on natural re sources. In this study, the indicators were analyzed regarding land, water, and car bon footprints per unit of food and agri cultural products. The analysis of the water demand for each of the food items included in the research was performed using a database on virtual water. The land footprint in cluded the agricultural land area (m2) required for growing a unit (kg) of a commodity consumed in Israel. The car

bon footprint of each commodity was calculated by incorporating carbon diox ide, nitrous oxide, and methane emis sions along the commodity chain for one ton of food consumed in Israel. The environmental load values were integrated together into the FFQ to cal culate water, land and carbon footprints for the questionnaire. Results Participants of the study were educated (82% had academic education) and physically active, and only 13% were smokers. Higher SHED scores were as sociated with older age, women, higher education, non-smokers, normal weight, flexitarians, and vegetarian/vegans. The same trends were observed for MED and EAT-Lancet scores. The contribution of food groups to the different environmental footprints differ across factors (Figure 1). The main con tributor to water use was fruit (40%), fol lowed by vegetables (12%) and dairy (11%). The main contributor to land use was meat (30% for beef and 14% for poultry), and the main contributor to

GHG emissions was dairy products (26%), followed by meat (14%) and veg etables (14%). Next, the environmental factors were calculated according to adherence to MED and EAT-Lancet dietary patterns and according to tertiles of the SHED scores. Higher adherence to the MED and EAT-Lancet reference diets, and the SHED index, were associated with lower land use, GHG emissions, and higher water use. Figure 3 shows the mean contribution to the environmental footprints by food groups for different dietary patterns. At each adherence level of the dietary scores, there was a similar ranking of the food groups to that in Figure 1. The main contributor to GHG emissions was dairy products, followed by meat. The main contributor to land use was meat, and the main contributor to water use was fruit intake at each adherence level. Discussion The need to assess both human health and the environmental footprint of diets has been widely acknowledged.

Figure 1

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