Agriculture and related land-use change (e.g., deforestation) account for nearly a quarter of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. As the world population approaches 10 billion by 2050, emissions from agriculture and land could grow to take up the majority of the “carbon budget” for limiting global warming to acceptable levels. Tackling the climate crisis requires not only reducing fossil fuel use but also changing how we grow and eat food.

Not all foods have equal impacts. Animal proteins—especially beef and lamb—are generally more resource-intensive to produce than plant-based foods, increasing pressure on forests, freshwater, and the climate. Helping more people shift away from meat-centered and toward more plant-forward diets can have tremendous climate and other environmental benefits. By choosing a Coolfood Meal, we can all help to build a better, more sustainable future.

Using a dish’s ingredients list, World Resources Institute (WRI) calculates a dish’s carbon footprint by analyzing the agricultural supply chain and land used to produce the meal. If the carbon footprint meets an established per-meal GHG emissions threshold and nutritional standards, the dish is approved as a Coolfood Meal.

Coolfood uses the definition of “main dish” from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which states products must satisfy the following criteria:

1. They should weigh at least 6 ounces (oz) (170 grams [g]) per labeled serving, and contain not less than 40 g of food(s) from at least two of the following food groups: bread/cereal/rice/pasta, fruits/vegetables, dairy, and meat/fish/eggs/beans/nuts.
2. They should not be sauces or other types of condiment or garnish.
3. They should be commonly understood by consumers to be a main dish, and not a snack/beverage/dessert.

WRI has established a maximum recommended daily carbon footprint for a person’s diet, which is 38 percent smaller than the average diet in Coolfood’s base year of 2015. This is in line with a level of change needed by 2030 to help avoid the worst impacts of climate change. This carbon footprint is then shared across meals in a day. A breakfast’s carbon footprint must be no more than 20 percent of the recommended daily carbon footprint of a person’s diet, and a lunch or dinner no more than 30 percent. In the U.S. and Canada, the maximum threshold for breakfasts is 3.5 kg CO₂e/portion and for lunches and dinners it is 5.71 kg CO₂e/portion. Further details can be found in WRI’s Coolfood Meals Technical Note.

Health is also an essential part of dietary sustainability. To screen out less healthy meals, WRI uses the Nutri-Score method, which is already used in several countries including France, Belgium, Switzerland, and Germany. The method accounts for four “unfavorable” components which are considered unhealthy when consumed in excess (calories, saturated fat, sugars, and sodium), and three “favorable” components (protein, fiber, and fruits / vegetables / pulses / nuts / oils). Dishes that score a D or E (on an A-B-C-D-E scale) are excluded and cannot be a Coolfood Meal. Further details can be found in WRI’s Coolfood Meal Technical Note.

Panera Bread is the first company with menu items to receive the Coolfood Meals certification on qualifying menu items. If your company would like to explore offering Coolfood Meals, please email us at coolfood@wri.org.

We use agricultural supply chain emission factors from a global life cycle meta-analysis by Poore and Nemecek (2018) and carbon opportunity cost emission factors from Searchinger et al. (2018). Additional detail on these data sets and calculation methods are available here, and the Coolfood Calculator is available here.

Life cycle assessments of food production commonly either do not account for emissions from land-use change (e.g., deforestation), or only account for very recent land-use change. However, all agricultural land use has an opportunity cost. Vast areas of forests have already been cleared for agriculture, and most pathways for stabilizing the climate require not only halting deforestation but also reforesting large areas of farmland, even as global food demand grows. “Carbon opportunity costs” is a metric that estimates the missed potential carbon sink if the land used to produce the food sourced by a food provider were instead able to return to its native vegetation such as forests—and this metric is also an estimate of the likely potential additional carbon losses to clear forests to produce another unit of that food. Shifting consumption toward plant-based foods, which have lower land requirements and lower carbon opportunity costs, can help prevent future deforestation as the population grows—a key reason why Project Drawdown ranks plant-rich diets among its most effective climate solutions. Further details can be found in WRI’s Coolfood Meals Technical Note.

You can still support the Coolfood Meals cause by becoming a Coolfood Meals Ambassador. Our Coolfood Meals Ambassador programme allows food manufacturers to feature their climate-friendly products in complete meals which can then be badged Coolfood Meals.

There is a small annual fee that supports the secretariat in aggregating food-related greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions data, advising members on strategy, communicating with and convening members, and external outreach.

The Pledge is a shared target, so accountability is collective.

No. All external GHG emissions reporting will be aggregated (unless you decide otherwise). If a member does not make progress during a given year, the Coolfood team will discuss how progress can be brought back on track.

Coolfood’s collective target is a 25 percent absolute reduction in food-related GHG emissions by 2030. However, some members expect to grow quickly, even while they shift to serving lower-emissions foods. Individual members should aim for at least a 25 percent absolute reduction in food-related GHG emissions or a 38 percent relative reduction in food-related GHG emissions per calorie. The Coolfood Calculator helps you track both trends (absolute and relative) year-over-year.

Members confidentially share food purchase data on an annual basis. Data is required on all animal-based foods, as well as plant proteins (which, collectively, tend to make up 80-90 percent of an entity’s food-related GHG emissions). Additional data is optional. Data collection should be done, though, in a consistent way each year.

Members receive an easy-to-use template to help with identifying and collecting the necessary food purchase data.

Our team enters into a simple agreement with each Coolfood member, which includes a confidentiality clause stating that individual members’ food purchase data (and associated emissions data) will be stored securely on WRI’s server. Only aggregated data is reported externally.

You will receive a report after you submit your food purchase data which shows annual GHG emissions by food type, as well as a relative emissions measure, trends year-over-year, and comparisons to aggregate group performance. You can see an example of the metrics calculated by downloading the Coolfood Calculator.

Although Coolfood’s goal is to reduce food-related GHG emissions, sustainability managers deal with many other important goals related to their food purchases, including social and ethical, economic and financial, and other non-climate-related environmental goals. Our technical note, “Tracking Progress Toward the Coolfood Pledge,” offers advice for navigating synergies and trade-offs across multiple goals.

We use agricultural supply chain emission factors from a global life cycle meta-analysis by Poore and Nemecek (2018) and carbon opportunity cost emission factors from Searchinger et al. (2018). Additional detail on these data sets and calculation methods are available here, and the Coolfood Calculator is available here.

Life cycle assessments of food production commonly either do not account for emissions from land-use change (e.g., deforestation), or only account for very recent land-use change. However, all agricultural land use has an opportunity cost. Vast areas of forests have already been cleared for agriculture, and most pathways for stabilizing the climate require not only halting deforestation but also reforesting large areas of farmland, even as global food demand grows. “Carbon opportunity costs” is a metric that estimates the missed potential carbon sink if the land used to produce the food sourced by a food provider were instead able to return to its native vegetation such as forests—and this metric is also an estimate of the likely potential additional carbon losses to clear forests to produce another unit of that food. Shifting consumption toward plant-based foods, which have lower land requirements and lower carbon opportunity costs, can help prevent future deforestation as the population grows—a key reason why Project Drawdown ranks plant-rich diets among its most effective climate solutions.