Why Plant-Based Foods Are Vastly More Climate-Friendly Than Local Meat

The data is clear: cutting meat — not choosing local — is key to lowering your impact.

Photo credits: Tommao Wang & Jordan Madrid

The idea that eating locally is an effective way to reduce food-related emissions is a persistent — and deeply misleading — myth.

While buying local can cut transportation emissions, these make up only a tiny fraction of food’s overall impact. Far more important factors, like land use, deforestation, and methane emissions, completely overshadow food miles.

Local vs. plant-based — the climate winner is clear

The available evidence leaves no room for doubt:

“Think that eating local will help save the planet? Think again. Most emissions come from food production, not transportation.” (The Guardian, 2023)

“Local meat is generally more carbon intensive than plant-based food shipped around the world.” (Forbes, 2023)

“You want to reduce the carbon footprint of your food? Focus on what you eat, not whether your food is local.” (Our World in Data, 2020)

“Food transport accounted for only 6% of emissions, but the production of dairy, meat, and eggs accounted for 83%.” (Big Think, 2024)

The following diagram compares the greenhouse gas emissions of different types of food across various aspects of the supply chain, clearly showing that transportation has a negligible impact, while factors like animal farming and land use dominate — making plant-based foods far more climate-friendly than animal products:

Greenhouse gas emissions from most plant-based products are as much as 10-50 times lower than most animal-based products. According to environmentalist George Monbiot, you could “fly bananas six times around the world before they have the same impact as locally sourced beef.”

University of Oxford researcher Hannah Ritchie says: “People get the message that ‘eating locally’ matters a lot. That’s appealing to many because it sounds and feels right. But when we step back to look at the data, it’s not effective at all. In fact, it runs the risk of backfiring and making things worse. If people switch from imported plant-based foods to local beef, their carbon footprint will rise.”

The other costs ‘local’ can’t fix

Relying on local sourcing of animal products as a sustainability strategy doesn’t just fail to meaningfully address greenhouse gas emissions — it also ignores the vast destruction caused by animal agriculture in other areas:

Animal suffering

99 percent of U.S. farmed animals live on factory farms, where they endure extreme confinement, mutilation, and violent slaughter — regardless of whether the farm is down the road or thousands of miles away. Even on so-called “high welfare” farms, animals often suffer under conditions that are far from humane.

Other devastating impacts

Animal agriculture is also the world’s leading cause of antibiotic resistance, soil degradation, eutrophication, biodiversity loss, rainforest destruction, the most serious threat to our oceans, the single most risky human activity for pandemics, the largest user of land, a global threat to food security, and by far the largest emitter of poisonous ammonia, nitrous oxide, and methane.

Eating local does nothing to address these issues.

Conclusion

In a time when we need real change, not symbolic gestures, clinging to the idea of “local meat” as a sustainable choice is a dangerous distraction. The evidence is clear: prioritizing plant-based foods — whether local or imported — is the only meaningful way to reduce our footprint and align our diets with both environmental and ethical responsibility. We can’t afford to let feel-good myths stand in the way of real solutions.

The fact that even long transport distances barely impact the overall footprint of animal products highlights just how inherently resource-intensive they are. Animals are an incredibly inefficient food source — a reality with devastating consequences for the planet, public health, and future generations.

Moreover, in a society where nearly everyone claims to oppose animal cruelty, we must not forget that cows, chickens, and pigs are sentient beings who deserve not to be harmed or exploited without necessity. As Pam Ahern famously said: “If we could live happy and healthy lives without harming others, why wouldn't we?”

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