Tracking UK food system greenhouse gas emissions: 2015-2023

Robust data underpins collaborative action on food and drink emissions.

The UK Food and Drink Pact targets a 50% reduction in the emissions associated with consumption of food and drink in the UK. Understanding the progress made to date and identifying areas where further focus is needed requires robust data to track change over time.

In 2021, WRAP unveiled the UK Food System Greenhouse Gas model to identify emissions hotspots in UK consumption. We have released annual reports, available here, estimating how food consumption emissions have changed over time, and used the model to contribute to forward-looking analyses such as the Net Zero Transition Plan

2026 update

Our latest report updates this model with the latest available data, covering 2015-2023, to show where good progress is being made and where more needs to be done.

Main findings

• WRAP estimates a 14% reduction in GHG emissions (17% excluding land use change due to uncertainties associated) between 2015-2023.
• This decrease has been driven mainly by decreased emission intensity of energy, with smaller and more modest reductions in fertiliser production, domestic and imported production of food.
• Emission reductions in food consumption have decreased more slowly across 2015-2023 than UK territorial emissions from all sectors over the same period, suggesting more needs to be done for the food sector to catch up.
• Food produced overseas is particularly critical for the UK footprint: this report improves how imports and exports are presented, revealing imports of food as by far the single largest contributor to the UK footprint. Deep emission reductions cannot be achieved in the UK alone; international cooperation is essential to drive improvements in efficiency, farming practices and land management, including through UK businesses leveraging their international supply chains.

The reports below are technical in nature. WRAP will soon be publishing a short report with more strategic insight on what the latest data means for the UK food sector over one year on from the release of the Net Zero Transition Plan.