More carrot, less stick: how meat-loving Danes were sold a plant-led world first
Scheme backed by €170m fund crucial to getting agreement from farmers, politicians and environmental groups“Plant-based foods are the future.” That is not a statement you would expect from a right-wing farming minister in a major meat-producing nation. Denmark produces more meat per capita than any other country in the world, with its 6 million people far outnumbered by its 30 million pigs, and it has a big dairy industry too. Yet this is how Jacob Jensen, from the Liberal party, introduced the nation’s world-first action plan for plant-based foods.“If we want to reduce the climate footprint within the agricultural sector, then we all have to eat more plant-based foods,” he said at the plan’s launch in October 2023, and since then the scheme has gone from strength to strength. Backed by a €170m government fund, it is now supporting plant-based food from farm to fork, from making tempeh from broad beans and a chicken substitute from fungi to on-site tastings at kebab and burger shops and the first vegan chef degree. Continue reading...
![More carrot, less stick: how meat-loving Danes were sold a plant-led world first](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/bc334e5d8143f05fc47e8399d4831540bdf983ef/0_224_6720_4032/master/6720.jpg?width=140&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=d779a14eeb43bb9d264d74f176cb7471#)
Scheme backed by €170m fund crucial to getting agreement from farmers, politicians and environmental groups
“Plant-based foods are the future.” That is not a statement you would expect from a right-wing farming minister in a major meat-producing nation. Denmark produces more meat per capita than any other country in the world, with its 6 million people far outnumbered by its 30 million pigs, and it has a big dairy industry too. Yet this is how Jacob Jensen, from the Liberal party, introduced the nation’s world-first action plan for plant-based foods.
“If we want to reduce the climate footprint within the agricultural sector, then we all have to eat more plant-based foods,” he said at the plan’s launch in October 2023, and since then the scheme has gone from strength to strength. Backed by a €170m government fund, it is now supporting plant-based food from farm to fork, from making tempeh from broad beans and a chicken substitute from fungi to on-site tastings at kebab and burger shops and the first vegan chef degree. Continue reading...