No. This is a misconception. The Planetary Health Diet (PHD) is not a one-size-fits-all prescription but a flexible dietary pattern designed to support optimal health across diverse populations and contexts. It emphasizes a diet rich in plants—whole grains, fruits, vegetables, nuts, and legumes form the foundation—while allowing for modest amounts of animal-sourced foods, including dairy, fish, and meat, depending on cultural preferences. Red and processed meat is limited due to strong evidence of health risks. The core principle is adaptability: the PHD can align with local food cultures while encouraging nearly universal increases in consumption of whole grains, fruits, nuts, and vegetables, alongside regionally appropriate reductions in meat intake. It’s often described as “flexitarian”—plant-forward, diverse, and adaptable—while setting healthy boundaries against both under- and over-consumption.

Food system boundaries are science-based targets representing the food system share of the safe operating space within planetary boundaries. This “safe operating space” is based on earth systems science (water, carbon, nutrient cycles), and aims to keep climate, biodiversity, water, and land systems within a space (stocks and flows for nutrients and energy) for humanity. The commission examines all nine planetary boundaries: (1) Climate, (2) Biodiversity, (3) Land, (4) Freshwater, (5) Nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus), (6) Ocean Acidification, (7) Ozone, (8) Aerosol Pollution, and (9) Novel Entities (Chemical, biological, and material pollution). These food system boundaries are based on the available evidence representing the degree of contribution needed for the food system to return or remain within planetary boundaries, estimates of minimum environmental impacts from food systems that are hard to abate (ie, through optimisation modelling across sectors), and estimates of reduced Earth system impact while also retaining productive agricultural systems.

Both. A fair food system requires that everyone everywhere has their rights to food, a healthy environment, and decent work realised. This implies that everyone have the right to access to affordable, healthy, culturally appropriate, and sustainably produced food; that everyone have the right to live in a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment; and that everyone have the right to work in just and favourable conditions; to be free to choose their work, with a salary that allows them to live and support a family; and to receive equal pay. The Commission emphasizes that everyone has the right to a stable environment. It recognizes a deeply unjust that the overconsumption of many of us, imposes environmental instability and degradation on others, often those with the least ability to adapt.

The social foundations are the conditions that enable the rights to food, a healthy environment, and decent work to be met. The Commission specifies the threshold for each of the social foundations and estimates the number of people falling below the social foundations globally.

The planetary health diet (PHD) is based entirely on the direct effects of different diets on human health, not on environmental criteria. The diet’s name arose from the evidence suggesting that its adoption would reduce the environmental impacts and nutritional deficiencies of most current diets.