Vegan and vegetarian food continues to grow in popularity in the UK.

A 2019 survey from the British Takeaway Campaign revealed that vegan options, like black bean burgers or vegan fried chicken, were the fastest growing favourites for Brits ordering in. And in 2018, market research found that over a quarter, 29%, of everyday meals being eaten in the UK contained no meat or fish.

The special report on climate change and land by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) describes plant-based diets as a major opportunity for mitigating and adapting to climate change ― and includes a policy recommendation to reduce meat consumption.

Research at Oxford University (Poore & Nemeçek 2018) found that reducing meat and dairy could be the ‘single biggest way’ to reduce our environmental impact on earth, lessening an individual’s carbon footprint from food by up to 73 per cent. 

An Attest survey commissioned by wagamama has also revealed eighty per cent of us acknowledge eating more plants is important to curbing climate change. However, many of those questioned said there remain obstacles to switching to a plant-based diet including not wanting to give up favourite meat dishes (36.1%), the taste is not as good (29.8%) and there’s not enough choice (26.4%).

A study of 40,000 farms in 119 countries published in the journal Science found that although livestock provide just 18% of the calories we eat globally, farming them uses 83% of all available farmland.