Super Eco

Photo credit: United Nations COP15

Climate-friendly sustainable food is disappointingly absent from COP15's official agenda, but it's definitely on the catering menu.

The Food-Climate Change Connection
First, what does food have to do with climate change? For starters, an estimated 10 percent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions stem from perfectly edible food that goes uneaten. Then there's big ag's insatiable appetite for fossil-fuel transportation, energy-sucking production and toxic soil runoff, all of which massively contribute to global warming (and thus drought, famine, etc.). Plus, nearly every morsel we eat is packaged in yet more waste (see my Best to Worst Takeout Container List here). And the list industrial food's eco ills trails on.

COP15's Sustainable Menu Standards
But let's get back to sampling COP15's mostly sustainable menu. According to United Nations officials, conference attendees are dining on "a guaranteed minimum 65 percent organic food" that's:

• Locally-sourced (locavore!)
• "Characterized by" low-energy consumption and environmentally-sound waste disposal (What exactly does "characterized by" mean?)
• Vegetarian and non-vegetarian
• and a few tasty bites more

Sustainably Eating-Out in Copenhagen
COP15-goers are encouraged to eat locally and "climate-friendly" outside of summit headquarters. To give them a nudge, the UN put together this convenient, directions-supplying "climate + restaurants" map. Establishments that made the cut had to meet the UN's (unfortunately short) list of sustainability requirements, including the use of:

• Local, in-season ingredients
• Less meat
• As little processed food as possible
• Production that minimizes food waste

Eat Sustainably in Your Corner of the Globe
Not in Copenhagen at the moment? How can you do your part to eat sustainably, wherever you are? Think globally, eat locally and:

• Buy, cook and eat only what you (and your family) will actually consume.
• Don't cook at all. Go raw.
• Buy organic, locavore foods that have low transportation/C02 footprints.
• Support your local food slow food economy, starting with your neighborhood farmer's market.
• Start your own kitchen garden and plant a row for the hungry.
• Ditch the red meat (and maybe all meat).
• Properly compost the food you don't eat.
• Say no to fast food.
• Use reusable utensils, dishes and napkins.

It's not completely clear whether COP15 caterers are composting leftover conference food. Are they reusing real metal utensils? Recycling plastic-, soy- or corn-based utensils? Are napkins and plates compostable or even edible?

Is COP15's fancy caviar fair-trade and sustainable? It better be. Like I said yesterday, the world is watching and just over a billion of us are starving.