As the government issues new dietary guidelines in the US, should entrepreneurs in the food business look for new opportunities?

The Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee is also looking into a “sustainability” diet for the first time. The idea of a sustainable diet involves eating less meat and dairy products and shifting toward a plant-based diet in order to cut down on greenhouse gas emissions and protect the environment.

The process of raising animals, transporting them, killing them, processing the meat, etc. requires high energy usage, thus increasing the emission of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. A study published in the journal Nature found that diets higher in refined sugars, refined fats, oils and meats increase such gases in the atmosphere, and also increase the incidence of diseases such as type II diabetes, heart disease and other chronic illnesses.  There would be no net increase in food production emissions if plant-based diets became the norm.   Former Preisdent Clinton and Vie Preisdent Al Gore are both on plant-based diets.

The House Appropriations Committee instructed Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and HHS Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell to make sure the committee does not “pursue an environmental agenda.”

“Some critics argue thatt, while obesity is a significant concern with regard to people’s private health, such coercive, ideological modification of private behavior unrelated to public health is outside the Constitutional power of the federal government.