Paris Olympics Turns Vegan: In Bid To Reduce Carbon Footprint Games Village Cuts Down Meat, Cheese, Dairy Products From Menu

Paris Olympics Turns Vegan: The Games Village will serve 13 million meals and snacks and over half of the meals' menu will be plant-based, in a bid to reduce carbon footprint.

Even though France is best known for its meat and dairy products, that will be served on a limited basis at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games which aims at reducing its carbon footprint. Athlete, staff as well as media personnel will be served what will majorly be a plant-based diet.

Notably, when the hosting rights of the Paris Games were awarded to Paris, among the key factors in the decision was environmental concerns.

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The reason being the French capital already had most of the sporting infrastructure in place with the only new venue developed for the Olympics being the Aquatics Centre at Saint-Denis which again happens to be a solar-powered hall, made from recycles and bio-based building material.

Paris Estimating Carbon Footprint Of 1.58 Million Metric Tons Of CO2

Despite Paris' best attempts, they are estimating a carbon footprint of 1.58 million metric tons of CO2. This happens to be remarkably less than that of the Covid-hit Tokyo Olympics (1.96 million metric tons of CO2). To put things into context, London 2012 had a CO2 emission of 3.4 million metric tons.

Even though there will be emphasis on taking trains and using public transport and bicycles wherever required, why the focus on food and animal protein, one may choose to wonder. This is because Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations has claimed that livestock farming which refers to the growing cattle for food, contributing to 15 per cent of global greenhouse emissions.

Olympic Games Village To Prepare 13 Million Meals And Snacks

Given the humongous nature of Olympics, the Games village is set to prepare 13 million meals and snacks from the beginning of the event till its conclusion. As per an International Olympic Committee (IOC) statement, more than half of the meals menu will be plant-based options in order to keep the CO2 released per meal limited to kilogram per meal- making it effectively half the average CO2 released per meal in the previous Olympics.

It is a massive step for France as veganism is not the preferred food choice, otherwise, in the country. It is in fact one of the country where meat consumption is highest but not only are they advocating for a 'Foliage Over Sasusage' approach but are also ensuring almost 80 per cent of the menu is cooked from local produce to reduce transport and yet again cub on the CO2 emissions.