Does Mexico have the agricultural land resources to feed its population with a healthy and sustainable diet?

• Published in: Sustainable production and consumption 2022-11, Vol.34, p.371-384
• Main Authors: Ibarrola-Rivas, María-José, Unar-Munguia, Mishel, Kastner, Thomas, Nonhebel, Sanderine
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Agricultural land use; Food sovereignty; Food system; Healthy and sustainable diets; Mexico
• ISSN: 2352-5509; 2352-5509
• DOI: 10.1016/j.spc.2022.09.015

Reaching healthy and sustainable diets for all people with the world's limited resources is one of the biggest challenges of humanity. The Healthy Reference Diet (HRD) is a recent proposal by the Eat-Lancet Commission for addressing this problem. Mexico has a high burden of obesity and persistent malnutrition. Recent national policies have focused on different strategies to transform the food system which include designing new dietary guidelines using the HRD adapted for the Mexican context and supporting small farmers to reduce food imports. The aim of the paper is to explore whether Mexico has enough land resources to produce food for a healthy and sustainable diet for its population, with no international trade, and what changes are needed to reach this in terms of diets, the food system, and in land use. Four scenarios are explored for changing the food system to reduce agricultural land use. The results show that Mexico has enough agricultural land to produce food for all its population to ensure healthy and sustainable diets with the current food supply chain. A healthy and sustainable diet demands 20 % to 50 % less agricultural land, depending on the type of dietary recommendation, than the present average diet of the Mexican population. But changes are needed in the food system in terms of land use such as exchanging pasture for cropland and changing the type of crop production like reducing cropland for sugar cane and feed for livestock, and increasing cropland for legumes and nuts. Furthermore, reducing losses in the supply chain and increasing crop yields reduces considerably the demand of agricultural land. Further research is needed to explore the socioeconomic issues and policies for reaching these changes. The insights of this paper should be considered when designing policy strategies and recommendations to reach a sustainable food system.