Strength By Fitness
Health & Planet.
Welcome to another fact-based article from Strength by Fitness.
Plenty of people confuse the many metrics that power our health, fitness, and bodies, our environmental footprint, and the planetary damage we cause due to our lifestyles and daily choices.
And who can blame them. Homo sapiens modern-day life is a complicated web made up of a wide range of real-life data points. So I will keep it as simple as possible in this Strength By Fitness article.
The real issue with animal agriculture.
The real issue with healthy animal-based high-protein food choices is not about your individual health, nor is it about nutritional deficits. Assuming that you are in fact eating a healthy, nutritionally complete high-protein, high-satiety diet.
Something which can be incredibly easy to achieve. Just combine some whole animal-based high-protein foods with whole plant-based foods, such as fruit, berries, veggies, and leafy greens, and you will end up with nothing but great health outcomes and a really good, effortless nutritional intake.
A nutritional food habit that will positively reverberate across health, fitness, and body composition. So all good if that is your only consideration.
The multi-layered problem, however, is this.
Most omnivores do not eat in a nutritionally complete way. They just think they do, neither do the foods they eat provide a genuine high-protein intake, nor is it very high in satiety. This results in poor health, and fitness outcomes, and way too much food being consumed, so body composition also suffers, which leads to its own set of health issues.
So while it should be easy to consume enough protein in a nutritionally complete way, most omnivores fail even with that. The blame is not all about ultra processed foods and eating out far too often, but those energy rich, low satiety food options with a low micronutrient content that is what a lot of ultra processed foods are is part of the problem.
But, not even that is the real issue.
So here it comes.
“for omnivores, the second best thing they can do is have a mix of animal & plant-based high-protein intake with lots of whole plant-based foods.”
Coach Mike, Strength By Fitness
Sustainability.
Animal-based foods are on the one hand responsible for the majority of all food-related greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, which is just one of the seriously problematic metrics.
On top of that animal foods negatively affect all other environmental areas, in such a way that it can not be compensated for, no matter what the animal ag industry or its many lenient politicians believe or claim.
Facts are nice that way, they simply are what they are.
Examples of impossibly problematic metrics are land use and biodiversity loss, water usage, pollution across all planetary domains, forest destruction, wide-scale use of fertilizers, and way too much human food being used as animal industry feed to produce less nutrients than it uses up.
Resulting in the strange reality that the animal agricultural industry globally uses up way more nutrients that could have been used for human consumption than the nutrition they provide while stripping our planet of its natural resources in a pace it can not compensate for.
Planetary limits are an even bigger concern.
This situation is so bad that the environmental impacts of the animal-based food system exceed key planetary boundaries.
So, no, Strength By Fitness is not telling anyone that they can never consume animal foods, and I am not saying that it’s not nutritionally healthy to consume animal-based high-protein foods.
Because whole animal-based foods high in protein can be a nutritionally good choice, especially when paired up with enough whole plant-based foods. And yes, we have a lot of omnivore clients, because food preference is a very real thing.
Our mission is not to dictate food preferences but to help people become healthier and fitter, and when possible help them eat both healthier and more sustainable at the same time.
But not every client is going to completely cut out animal-based foods, which is ok because you can drastically improve the environmental impact of their food choices by including more whole plant-based foods and making better animal-based food choices. As such, when you combine fish, eggs and chicken with whole plant-based foods and some processed high-protein plant-based choices such as edamame products ( spaghetti anyone ), vegan mince, and soy milk you have a very healthy omnivore, with a really low planetary impact.
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29 nutrients across 24 food products.
However, this is not how the majority of humanity eats. As such the environmental aspect is a real threat and impossibly unsustainable on a scale that harms all human life and all animal and wild plant life on our planet.
In this comparison between plant-based foods and animal-based foods, processed and whole foods alike, 29 nutrients across 24 food products were considered.
Needless to say, protein was one important consideration.
Outcomes were analyzed for nutrition, health, environment, and cost.
The first image from the study lists a wide range of foods across a per-serving comparison of meat and milk alternatives across nutritional content, ( A ), health impact ( B ), environmental damage ( C ), and cost ( D ).
Environmental damage.
Replacing all calories from meat or dairy with plant-based foods reduced the average environmental impact by up to 40% when replacing meat and up to 16% when replacing dairy.
Which makes for an easy win for a protein-rich, high-satiety whole plant-based food approach.
Pay attention however, I am saying high in protein, because a lot of plant-based people consume way too little protein.
So while whole plant-based foods are great, try to think of it as high-protein in combination with whole-plant-based foods. In other words, make room for those protein supplements with your soy milk, or plant-based yogurt, or processed vegan mince, tofu, tempeh products, edamame pasta et cetera. If you are going all in on plant-based foods instead of combining some animal-based protein such as eggs and fish with some plant-based protein and lots of whole plant-based foods.
Now, I can hear some of you going “Why am I such a downer to talk about all these processed high-protein products”?
The reason is this.
It is extremely beneficial to consume around 2.0 grams of protein per kilo of body weight and day or more. Omnivores can get away with slightly less since they max out protein-related benefits already with 1.6g/kg/day, but we plant-based folks ( and older omnivores ) need slightly more protein due to lower absorption for both groups and lower amino acid levels in plant-based foods. For elderly there is also the issue of a slight increase in anabolic resistance ( you´r bodies inertia to exercise ) it is only marginally worse than a healthy fit 30 year old, but many small pebbles increases the importance of a higher-protein intake for the elderly and the plant-based, together with regular strength training, of course.
Protein have other use cases, however, for instance, the more protein we consume, the higher our satiety, this is something which benefits everyone since it makes it so much easier to eat within our natural energy balance, no matter if you are obese or already very fit.
One caveat. It will be pretty challenging for most plant-based people to get that much protein from nothing but whole plant-based foods, not to mention getting all the nutrients we need.
So for vegans and people that are 100% plant-based, consuming some protein supplements and some processed high-protein products are almost essential, and always extremely beneficial.
Comparing products and outcomes.
Among the listed meat alternatives in this study, the greatest reductions came when the meat and dairy replacements were soybeans and peas.
This produces a reduction across the field of roughly 40%.
GHG decreased by 42 to 43%, land usage was down by 50 to 52%, and water usage shrunk by: 38 to 39%.
All great numbers. Remember we are not talking about getting less nutrients or less protein. At Strength By Fitness, we are always talking about healthy, high-protein, high-satiety, nutritionally complete food habits.
So these numbers represent healthier food habits, not less healthy. Nutritionally rich foods that will provide nothing but great health and fitness outcomes across your entire life.
The power of whole plant-based foods.
Unprocessed plant-based foods were the best overall performers for replacing meat and dairy.
Out of a possible summary score of 100, soybeans, peas, and beans reached average scores of 93 to 97 as meat replacements. Soybeans performed the best for nutrition and costs.
While peas took the crown of best performer for mortality and GHG emissions.
Some visuals from our cited studies
My Coach reflection.
There aren’t many surprises in this study at all, it largely reflects what is well-established. But there are a couple of metrics that seem strange to me when we look at image number two right above, and one more image over in the cited study.
Oat milk and almond milk do incredibly well in this study and while they are good milk alternative choices I really don’t agree with the assessment that they are on par with soy milk for nutritional content. Just look at the above picture, seeing almond milk and oat milk neck and shoulder with soy milk is a surprise for me.
Not to mention that over in the study in one graph almond milk is ranked as having a higher nutritional improvement as the replacement to cow milk even when compared to soy milk, which I can not agree with seeing how almond milk contain less nutrients relative to soy milk. It is true that almond milk ranks higher in a couple of nutrients, calcium being one of them, but calcium is abundant in soy milk too, not to mention in plant-based foods in general. So the better plant-based milk choice in general for most people is soy milk.
Why am I saying this?
Oat milk, in general, provides way less nutrition compared to cow, almond, and soy milk, so they are all three clearly better choices than cow milk when we factor in the environmental destruction of the animal agricultural industry,
I can, however, not see how either oat or almond milk can end up neck and shoulder as far as nutritional choices go when compared to soy milk in this study ( or for that matter when compared to cow milk, they are better as a whole than cow milk, but not nutritionally speaking ).
Almond milk contains a lot less protein than soy milk, half the potassium, and only 1 third of the magnesium. Further, you will find less fiber in almond milk, and less carbohydrates too.
All in all, almond and oat milk ranks lower than soy milk on satiety in fact-based food apps such as Hava as well as in our own satiety range estimation.
So much so that I can not see how any study can conclude that oat or almond milk is nutritionally speaking close to soy milk.
I mean oat milk has hardly any nutrition to speak of and seriously lacks protein when you compare it to your general soy milk products that are widely available in stores.
This doesn’t make it a bad choice, you can consider both oat milk and almond milk a very good alternative to tap water with more nutrition, and if you do view it that way, as long as you get all the high-protein and nutrition you need from your other food choices both almond and oat milk can be the perfect choice for you.
Although I will argue that soy milk, black coffee and tap water are by far the three best beverages you could ever consume.
THE FOOTPRINT.
Only 18% of calories come from animal agriculture.
One liter of cow milk requires roughly 600+ liters of fresh water.
Compared to less than 30 liters of fresh water per liter of soy milk.
You need almost 9m2 of land for every Liter of cow milk that we produce worldwide.
Soy milk only requires 0.66m2, and this disparity in the required landmass between plant-based food and animal-based food products is a major driver of the ongoing climate & biodiversity crisis. Coupled with the difference in calories in vs out of cow & meat versus plant-based food choices and the math of animal-based meat and dairy becomes quite impossible.
Emissions for cow milk are triple those of soymilk.
Cow milk requires roughly 3kg of emissions per liter and for soymilk, the average comes out as less than 1kg per liter and this story play out the same every time we compare animal ag foods with plant-based foods.
But we are, of course, not only discussing milk alternatives here in our article. If we compare beef and peas this is what we see.
The carbon footprint of beef is significantly higher than that of peas.
Producing one kilogram of beef emits 60 kilograms of greenhouse gasses (CO2-equivalents), while peas emit just one kilogram per kilogram produced.
The disparity in emissions between these two foods is so substantial that even if the beef were produced locally and the peas were shipped from another country, that beef that you love to devour would still have a much larger carbon footprint, not to mention substantially higher natural resource drain.
To conclude.
I am not sure how this study can conclude that oat milk improve nutritional intake in a somewhat similar way to soy milk.
So there is either a mistake as far as nutritional completeness goes in this study for the plant-based milk products, or they found a very good nutritionally enhanced almond milk.
But that’s the only way I can see anyone concluding that oat or almond milk is a comparable nutritional choice to soy milk. It is true that almond milk is not that far behind soy milk, but from protein to iron, magnesium, potassium and phosphorus, soy milk is the better choice.
Still, tho, my remark put aside, the sum of it all remains the same as countless other up-to-date scientific studies and assessments.
Whole plant-based food choices coupled with a high-protein intake make for a very healthy choice that combines being a nutritionally complete, high-protein, high-satiety, and planet-friendly choice.
Much more so than going all in on animal-based foods.
What about the omnivores?
This means that for omnivores, the second best thing they can do is to have a mix of animal and plant-based high-protein intake together with lots of whole plant-based foods, while the best thing remains the same as always, going all in on a high-protein whole plant-based food approach due to the environmental impact of animal-based foods.
Omnivores are usually quite skeptical of claims like that. Even from fact-based coaches like myself, and that is ok. So, my response, as always is data, because that´s what good science is, fact-based numbers that help explain the way the world actually work.
As such, if you are a skeptical omnivore.
Take this to heart when you debate increasing the amount of whole plant-based foods you consume, only 18% of the world’s calories and 37% of the world’s protein come from livestock. So, how can we really, intellectually speaking defend a majority carnivore world ( or majority animal ag omnivore approach to foods )?
Having said that, if we disregard that aspect of our food life and only focus on health, fitness and body composition outcomes then there is virtually zero difference between a high-protein omnivore that consumes as much whole plant-based fruit, berries, veggies and leafy green as they want on a daily basis and a completely plant-based high-protein approach.
Cited study.
1. Multicriteria analysis of meat and milk alternatives from nutritional, health, environmental, and cost perspectives.
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2319010121
2. Our world in data, environment and food production.
Environmental Impacts of Food Production – Our World in Data
3. Local vs import, transportation hardly matters relative to what you eat. Our World in data.
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
4. Soy Milk & Almond Milk. Our World in data.
Dairy vs. plant-based milk: what are the environmental impacts? – Our World in Data
You can also read this article over at Medium if you are a paying Medium Member.
Do you need coaching help in order to create a healthier life? Strength By Fitness coaches people online and in person. This includes fitness, fat loss, nutrition, and health. Strength training, endurance, yoga, and combat classes.
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Our mountainous hike on our gym-free Saturday.
Saturday is one of our weekly gym-free recovery days. This means that we prioritize ‘us’ time, chilling, relaxing, recovering, eating healthy high-protein foods supplanted with plenty of whole plant-based foods, and doing nonexhaustive activities that are done for adventure, fun, family, relationship, calm, rejuvenating and quality of life time.
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