Everyone needs to eat, but there’s an increasing pressure on the consumer to make the right choices. A person’s food choice alone encompasses many underlying socio-scientific issues in relation to the climate crisis. There’s many aspects to explore within this topic but here are a few examples: transport emissions, methane emissions from livestock, excess land use in organic farming, vegan vs vegetarian decisions, food packaging, wasteful behaviour. Our wicked problem will focus on informing the consumer about how their decisions impact the climate and persuade them to change their eating habits to make them more sustainable.

Let us introduce our four authors:

I am Anouk and I study animal behaviour at Utrecht University. Next to having an unbeatable love for animals, I like to challenge myself to find new ways to save the planet. While animal behaviour and sustainability do not directly go hand in hand, I want to put animals on a silver platter rather than on my dinner plate. This is where the routes merge, vegetarianism/ veganism does not only save animals from horrid circumstances but also helps us cherish the planet we live on. Through this blog I’d like to share with you my passions and inform you about the effects of diets on sustainability.
contact details: a.e.e.verstraeten@students.uu.nl

I am Michelle, a Bioinformatics and Biocomplexity master student at the University of Utrecht. As I did my bachelor in Biomedical Sciences, I am interested in the combination of human health and informatics. Although this may not directly seem related to eating sustainably, sustainable dietary considerations can have a big impact on your health. I also focussed on sustainability and sustainable innovations during my bachelor programme, during which consumption and climate change was often an important topic of discussion. Aside from my academic field of study, I am personally invested in sustainable eating, as climate change is happening whether we like it or not. Personally, I try to take small steps to improve my climate footprint by eating mostly vegetarian and trying to avoid plastic packaging where possible. If you’d like to learn more about how these types of choices affect the climate, this blog is the perfect starting place.
Contact details: m.tendam@students.uu.nl

My name is Charlotte, I study Neuroscience and am a passionate vegan and cow-lover. I’m fascinated by the brain because I cannot believe that the complexities of the human mind can be reduced to an organ that weighs less than 2 kg. So why is it that, while so many people claim they would like to eat more sustainably, most of them fail? Through this blog, I will explore the neuroscience behind our food choices, and how we can use those control systems to follow a more sustainable diet.
Contact details: c.c.daemen@uu.nl

Hi there, my name is Jip, and I am a Molecular and Cellular Life Sciences master student at the University of Utrecht. This means that I learn about how organisms function, develop, and interact with their environment at cellular and molecular level. The complexity of life has always fascinated me, and is certainly something worth protecting. In the face of the global climate crisis it is easy to feel powerless, but with this blog I hope we can inform and inspire others to take action and contribute to a better future in the small ways that we can. By making more sustainable eating choices together, we can make a positive impact on our planet.
Contact details: j.manshande@students.uu.nl