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Written interview with Brent Loken
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Episode summary

How can shifting towards a planet-based diet reduce biodiversity loss? In our conversation with Brent Loken, Global Food Lead Scientist, at the WWF, we unpack the 2020 report Bending the curve: The restorative power of a planet-based diet, and dive into the complexity and tradeoffs between different diets, and human and environmental health. We talk about different responsibilities of nations across the world, whether eating meat is really a problem, and why we shouldn't be betting on a single solution for transforming food systems.

[ Transcript available ]

 

About Brent Loken

Brent Loken is the Global Food Lead Scientist for WWF. Previously, Brent worked for EAT, the science-based global platform for food system transformation, where he was a lead author on the EAT-Lancet report on Food, Planet, Health. Brent co-founded and helped lead a progressive international school and co-founded a conservation NGO that focused on protecting rainforests and biodiversity by empowering indigenous peoples.

His past research includes a variety of publications ranging from subjects on food and health to orangutan terrestriality and tropical forest governance. His current work includes a report on food consumption patterns in G20 countries and the potential for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, a series of papers that develop national level roadmaps on GHG mitigation potential from changes in food and agriculture, and an analysis on how sustainable logging in a tropical forest impacts biodiversity.

 

Background reading and resources

Bending the Curve: The Restorative Power of Planet-Based Diets (open-access report)

Feeding ten billion people is possible within four terrestrial planetary boundaries

Half of all urban journeys must be cycled or walked within 10 years, confirms UK government

 

Related TABLE resources

Grazed and Confused (report and video explainer)

What is a sustainable healthy diet? (report)

What is the land sparing-sharing continuum? (explainer)

 

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