You can ask ChatGPT to give you an estimate how much a carbon footprint growing vegetables is if the energy comes 100% from renewables. You will find that my comments are totally justified.
From chatGPT:
Bottom Line:
If you're growing vegetables using:
Renewable energy,
Organic methods,
And distributing locally or consuming directly,
Then you're likely looking at a carbon footprint below 0.2–0.5 kg CO₂e per kg of produce, or even close to net-zero if composting and soil carbon are considered.
_____________
After we have achieved net zero:
In short: food production will be cleaner, smarter, and more circular, designed to either emit very little or absorb as much carbon as it releases.
If you read my post above, you will see that I covered those points about fertiliser, and local production. Your point still doesn't really cover the fact that any efficient food production method that can produce vegetables at an affordable price requires fertiliser which uses high carbon output ammonia production for fertiliser making. The use of so called organic methods leads to inefficient use of land and low output. That's why organic food costs so much.
What is more, human beings evolved to eat meat, Our dentition tells us that.
What you REALLY need to look at if you want to lower the impact of humanity on the planet is why the population of human beings has more than doubled in the last fifty years and that growth happened in Africa and Asia not where we live. Population growth in Europe is entirely driven by migration.
In 1983 the people of Ethiopia were in the grip of a famine. There were 37.74 million Ethiopians then. The land could not support them. The Sahel has been semi desert for at least ten thousand years.
Guess how many Ethiopians there are now...............
135,472,051
Three and a half times as many.
The population of Africa is out of control and growing at an exponential rate. The predictions are that there will be
three and a half billion people living there by 2070. As it happens, that was the population of the entire planet in 1975.
Of course they won't be all living there, they will as now be walking into Europe.
The Middle East and south Asia are similar in population growth.
ALL THESE PEOPLE CONSUME AND EMIT WASTE, and as economies develop even people in comparatively poor nations will drive up consumption and waste.
Instead of worrying about where your lettuce comes from and whether it is organic, you need to look at the real problem - massive population growth and migration.
Half the population of London were not born in the UK.
Population growth since 1990 in the UK has been entirely driven by immigration.
In 1990 we had 57.25 million people.
In 2025 we have 69.95 million people.
For forty years the white British population has had a fertility rate FAR below replacement level, so you can say that migration has added about 12.5 million people in 35 years - a 22% growth rate.
This is a DISASTER. Why do you think the youngsters of our population have to spend about twice the proportion of their income that we did, to put a roof over their heads?
Why do you think so many aspects of our environment and public services are under such pressure?
Why do you think England has a population density nearly four times that of France?
Population density of European countries.
England 434
France 122
Spain 96
Germany 241
Italy 201
Sweden 26