More than one in three western Swedes eat less meat

When it comes to food-related climate impacts, the meat is the food group that accounts for the largest emissions, according to the Swedish Board of Agriculture.

When SVT News in a Novus survey interviewed 1004 Swedes, 35 percent responded that today they eat less meat, precisely for the sake of the climate. Among the West Swedes who responded, the proportion was higher, 43 percent.

• 10 percent did not eat meat at all, 3 percent of them cited the climate as the cause.
• 47 percent said their meat consumption was unaffected.

Lisa Wensberg runs a lunch restaurant and serves lunch daily to many workers and truck drivers at Hisingen in Gothenburg.

She sees no decrease in demand for meat dishes, but other changes in what is going on.

- Something we noticed is that we buy vegetables more from, it goes to more of the salad buffet. I think people put more vegetables on the plate. I don't know if it has to do with the climate, but I know that people are demanding it and think it is good and want to test something new, says Lisa Wensberg.

In the clip you hear some of the lunch guests at Lisa Wensberg's restaurant about how their meat consumption looks.

Another question that is asked in the study is whether one would consider eating meat only one day a week, to reduce its climate impact. 48 per cent of the surveyed West Swedes could imagine that.

Among the lunch guests SVT Nyheter Väst met, many thought that in that case there were more important things to look at than what was on the plate. But there were also those who could imagine such a change.

- To me it would work really well. You are informed how much meat production emits and what kind of meat you eat, it is important, says Christer Pettersson.

This question is part of the project Sweden meets. To find out more, you can either answer the question or go to Sweden's website.