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Plant-based meat alternatives: understanding the benefits and trade-offs for human and environmental health

European Journal of Clinical Nutrition volume 80, pages 445–448 (2026) Cite this article

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Healthy diets optimise human health and nutrition, and environmental health. To this end, there has been increasing adoption of plant-based dietary patterns. Plant-based diets encompass a spectrum of dietary patterns that vary in their content of animal products (vegan to omnivore diet with some animal products) and in their overall content of processed foods (whole, minimally processed to packaged, and ultra-processed). The plant-based component of these diets also varies considerably, ranging from those comprised entirely of whole foods to those comprised of entirely of ultra-processed plant-based products; from the traditional vegetarian diets of the African and the Indian sub-continent to the plant-based fusion menus offered at plant-forward restaurants. The ingredients comprising these diets could be fresh and locally sourced or pre-made and ready-to-eat.

Sustainability concerns also underpin the dietary transition from animal to plant protein and have been the impetus for the creation of plant-based meat alternatives (PBMA). PBMA are processed foods developed to replace animal-based products in typically animal-based dishes [1]. While PBMA have been around for some time across several food cultures, the increasing number of modern PBMA choices (highly processed analogues designed to mimic the sensory profile of animal meat and dairy) and their popularity necessitates reflection on their impact on nutrition, food safety, human health and food culture. Google Trends shows that in the last 5 years the search for “meat analogues” was 18 times more frequent than searches for “low-carbohydrate”, a trending diet pattern [2]. In this perspective piece we aim to reflect on two major questions: a) What are the nutritional, health and environmental trade-offs of increasing modern PBMA in our diets? b) What is the sociocultural significance of embracing PBMA? By PBMA, we refer to meat- and dairy-analogues constructed from plant sources (e.g., veggie grounds, chick’n strips, pre-made veggie burger patties, veggie dogs) but not lab cultured meat or insect-proteins or local lentil-based dishes.

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Funding

No financial assistance was received in support of the study.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Grup Alimentació, Nutrició, Desenvolupament i Salut Mental (ANUT-DSM), Institut de Recerca Biomèdica Catalunya Sud, Hospital Universitari Sant Joan de Reus, Reus, Spain

    Sangeetha Shyam

  2. Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Departament de Bioquímica i Biotecnologia, Reus, Spain

    Sangeetha Shyam

  3. Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red Fisiopatología de La Obesidad y Nutrición (CIBEROBN), Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Madrid, Spain

    Sangeetha Shyam

  4. Centre for Transformative Nutrition and Health, Institute of Research, Development and Innovation, IMU University, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

    Sangeetha Shyam

  5. Department of Nutritional Sciences, Temerty Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada

    Sabrina Ayoub-Charette, Meaghan E. Kavanagh & Tauseef Khan

  6. Toronto 3D Knowledge Synthesis and Clinical Trials Unit, Clinical Nutrition and Risk Factor Modification Centre, St. Michael’s Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada

    Sabrina Ayoub-Charette, Meaghan E. Kavanagh & Tauseef Khan

  7. Division of Human Nutrition and Health, Wageningen University, Wageningen, the Netherlands

    Neha Khandpur

  8. Department of Nutrition, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Neha Khandpur & Meaghan E. Kavanagh

Authors
  1. Sangeetha Shyam
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  2. Sabrina Ayoub-Charette
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  3. Neha Khandpur
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  4. Meaghan E. Kavanagh
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  5. Tauseef Khan
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Contributions

Conceptualisation: SS. Data curation and analysis: All authors. Writing original draft: SS. Writing, reviewing and approval of final draft: All authors.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Sangeetha Shyam.

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Competing interests

SS is supported by the Miguel Servet Contract 102 (CP24/00066) from the Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Spain and co-financed by the European Union. S.S has received consulting fees from Abbott Industries Sdn. Bhd. SS is a member of the Federation of European Nutrition Working Groups on Improving Standards in the Science of Nutrition. She also chairs the IUNS-ACTIVATOR Task Force funded by the International Union of Nutrition sciences. S.A.-C. received research support from a CIHR Canadian Graduate Scholarship Doctoral Award (funding reference number 476251) and has received an honorarium from the international food information council (IFIC) for a talk on artificial sweeteners, the gut microbiome, and the risk for diabetes, and from the Arkansas Children’s Hospital for participation in a “lumping vs. splitting” event. NK serves as a consultant to United Nations agency for children (UNICEF) and the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO). MK has recieved funding from the Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship Program through CIHR (funding reference No. 192526). TAK has received research support from Diabetes Canada, Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the International Life Science Institute (ILSI), and the National Honey Board. TAK discloses receiving research grants from Diabetes Canada, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the Institute for the Advancement of Food and Nutrition Sciences (IAFNS, formerly ILSI North America), the National Honey Board (USDA Checkoff Programme), and the Toronto 3D Knowledge Synthesis and Clinical Trials Foundation. TAK has received honoraria for speaking engagements or advisory roles from IAFNS, the International Food Information Council (IFIC), the Calorie Control Council (CCC), the International Sweeteners Association (ISA), AmCham Dubai, and the Ontario Maple Syrup Producers’ Association (OMSPA). Additionally, TAK has served as a consultant for Heartland Foods Product Group.

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Shyam, S., Ayoub-Charette, S., Khandpur, N. et al. Plant-based meat alternatives: understanding the benefits and trade-offs for human and environmental health. Eur J Clin Nutr 80, 445–448 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41430-026-01725-2

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