Giki App Launches New Plant Based Badge to Help People Cut the Environmental Impact of Their Diet
Giki, the Social Enterprise committed to making it easy to find sustainable, healthy and ethical products, just announced the release of its brand new Plant Based badge, available on the Giki app. The new badge identifies plant-based products available in major UK supermarkets, from processed foods such as ready meals to unprocessed like fruits, vegetables, pulses and grains, drawing together information from the Giki database. The new sustainability badge was created to highlight the environmental benefits of a plant based diet, and was specifically requested by Giki users. The demand for this new badge reflects the growing popularity of a more plant based diet in the UK. Over 23,000 products across food categories in the Giki database are awarded the new badge, giving users many options to choose from.
“Our aim is to make it easy for people to identify products made from plants. Eating more plant based food significantly cuts the environmental impact of our diets”
A diet which is mainly plant based reduces carbon emissions by around 40% compared to a typical UK diet, and uses less land and less water. A high proportion of the carbon emissions from a typical UK diet comes from meat (especially beef and lamb), and land cultivated for animals combined with animal feed accounts for 77% of all agricultural land but for only 18% of the calories.
Since its launch in May 2018, Giki has continuously surveyed its users to improve the app. The growing user requests for a Plant Based badge matches the ongoing growth of plant based products sold in the UK. Demand for meat free products increased by nearly 1000% in 2017. People’s motivations for moving to more plant based diet are varied, with animals, health and the environment being the most frequent reasons. For some this involves moving to a vegan diet although for many others it entails shifting to more plant based foods within their diet.
“Our aim with the plant based badge is to help people identify products that are made from plants, to support people wishing to reduce or cut out meat, fish or dairy in their diets. This includes both processed foods which are plant based but also unprocessed foods such as fruit, vegetables, pulses and grains.” says Jo Hand, co-founder of Giki.
“As we become more aware of the urgency to act on climate change and biodiversity loss, addressing what we eat is a key area where we can reduce our own environmental impact, eating more plants and less meat is a good step to take.”
Giki’s mission is to help people cut their environmental impact. We provide accessible, independent, transparent information to help people change their habits to live more sustainably.
Giki is a Social Enterprise co-founded by Jo and James Hand in 2017 and stands for Get Informed Know your Impact. The free Giki mobile app launched on iPhone in May 2018 and on Android in October 2018 and now counts over 280,000 rated products from major UK supermarkets and brands, including own label, with 15 badges, including Low Carbon Footprint, Sustainable Palm Oil, Animal Welfare, Healthier Option, Better Packaging, the Hero badge and the brand new plant based badge. Users simply scan the product barcode or search to see which badges have been awarded and to find higher scoring alternatives. Giki draws on a number of different data sources such as product information, government guidelines, company reports and scientific and academic research. The app uses a combination of human research and raw computing power, translated into a point system that awards badges for sustainable, healthy and ethical indicators.
As of Jan 2020, the Giki app has 37,000 downloads. Users surveyed showed that over 80% make changes to their buying decisions as a result of using Giki.
For more details on Giki and the new Plant Based badge, visit Giki’s website https://gikibadges.com/
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