Environmental impact of various food products
How significant is the environmental impact of various food products? Using data from a comprehensive dataset on the environmental impact of food production from Kaggle, this project analyzes and predicts the potential carbon footprint associated with different foods. The dataset was meticulously cleaned and standardized to ensure accurate modeling. We explored several regression models, including Decision Tree, Random Forest, Ada Boost, and K-Nearest Neighbour, to predict the total emissions generated by various food items. Our analysis found that the Decision Tree model provided the most accurate predictions, offering valuable insights into the primary contributors to food-related emissions. This project aims to inform sustainable food choices by highlighting the environmental consequences of different dietary options.
I gathered data from Kaggle: https://www.kaggle.com/datasets/selfvivek/environment-impact-of-food-production
Depending on the structure of my dataset, I manipulated it to get it in the right format for plotting. Group by food type and get mean values of “Total emissions” and “The land used”.
Decision Tree emerged as the most accurate model, predicting the potential carbon footprint of various foods with an R² score of 0.78, highlighting its effectiveness in identifying key contributors to food-related emissions.
As the world’s population has expanded and gotten richer, the demand for food, energy and water has seen a rapid increase. Emissions from most plant based Foods are much lower than most animal based foods.
The following data was pulled from Kaggle. Then, the relevant data frames were joined to analyze the relationship between types of food and negative impact on the environment.
Looks like Beef is responsible for most of the greenhouse gas emissions.
Plant based foods are hardly visible in the graph indicating their significantly low carbon footprint.
Emissions from most plant based Foods are much lower than most animal based foods.
As the world’s population has expanded and gotten richer, the demand for food, energy and water has seen a rapid increase. Not only has demand for all three increased, but they are also strongly interlinked: food production requires water and energy; traditional energy production demands water resources; agriculture provides a potential energy source. This data analysis focuses on the environmental impacts of food. Ensuring everyone in the world has access to a nutritious diet in a sustainable way is one of the greatest challenges we face.