The Best Eating Patterns For The Planet & Your Health, According … – mindbodygreen

If you’re thinking of trying the paleo diet, it’s important to know what foods are approved. You’ll also want to watch for foods that don’t meet the diet’s guidelines.

Some of the most popular Paleo foods include: berries, eggs, fish and grass-fed beef. These are good sources of protein and healthy fats.

The keto diet, which is high in fat and low in carbs, and the paleo diet, which is low in grains, processed foods, and refined sugar, had three to four times the carbon emissions of the vegan diet. This isn’t surprising when you consider that both keto and paleo tend to be more meat-forward and less legume-based eating patterns. The overall environmental impact of meat from ruminant animals (cows, sheep, goats) is about 100 times that of plant-based foods according to some estimates, due in part to the way these animals digest. And the legumes that both diets eschew have nitrogen-fixing qualities3 that make them beneficial for soil and ecosystem health.

While the health scores should be taken with a grain of salt—and they differed depending on the index used in some cases—it makes sense that a diet that is healthy for the planet tends to be pretty good for us, too.

“Climate change is arguably one of the most pressing problems of our time, and a lot of people are interested in moving to a plant-based diet,” Diego Rose, Ph.D., MPH, the senior author of the study, said in a statement. “Based on our results, that would reduce your footprint and be generally healthy. Our research also shows there’s a way to improve your health and footprint without giving up meat entirely.”

Source: mindbodygreen.com