Why a Plant-Based Diet Can Save the Planet (an Infographic)

There are lots of reasons that a plant-based diet is a good idea: reduced incidence of lifestyle diseases like obesity, diabetes, and heart disease, and better health overall. Choosing to fill your plate with plant foods is also good for your budget, and meat and dairy are often the most expensive things on your plate. A vegan diet can also help improve your skin, reduce your blood sugar, a reduce your risk for diabetes.

But did you know that a plant-based diet can also make an enormous impact on your carbon footprint? Your carbon footprint, an estimate of your overall carbon use, includes everything from what and how you drive, to your electricity usage and consumer good production. These are all important things to consider, but when you see how much of an impact a plant-based diet can have, you might be shocked.

Not only does a plant-based diet reduce your carbon footprint, it helps improve local and global water systems, reduce species/biodiversity loss, improves soil conditions and reduces our exposure to both superbugs and decreases the abuse of antibiotics in animal food. Pretty amazing right?

But if you’re new the plant-based lifestyle, there are literally thousands of ways to make a small changes but a big difference) each day. You can start with a small change like Meatless Monday, or do a ‘Vegetarian before 6pm’ plan like food writer and author Mark Bittman. You could also challenge yourself to just try one new vegetarian meal each week, or spend time on vegan Pinterest pages being inspired by all the gorgeous food. Check out our sister sites Vibrant Wellness Journal and Eat Drink Better for hundreds of healthy recipes to get you started.