Exploring what helps families reduce the amount of meat in their diet

Eating a diet rich in plant-based foods and reducing the amount of meat we eat is important for our health. It helps reduce our risk of developing long-term conditions such as heart disease and type 2 diabetes.

Substituting meat with meat-free products, such as beans, nuts, lentils or mycoproteins (proteins produced from fungi) is one way of reducing the amount of meat in our diet. This approach ensures that we’re still eating protein, it meets our nutritional needs and is also key to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Only 14 per cent of UK adults report following a flexitarian diet (focused primarily on meat-free protein while eating moderate amounts of meat and other animal protein). Previous research has explored the reasons why consumers may or may not choose to eat meat-free protein. However, this research focused on individual adults and did not include the people they buy food for and eat food with, especially children.

Project aims

The aim of this project is to explore why families in the UK may or may not choose to buy and eat meat-free protein. We will examine whether these reasons are different when parents eat with their children compared to when they eat alone or with other adults.

To do this we will recruit parents of children aged 6 months to 16 years living in the UK and invite them to take part in focus groups divided into:

• parents of pre-schoolers (6 months-3 years)
• parents of primary school children (4-11 years)
• parents of secondary school children (12-16 years)

Within these groups we will explore:

• family-level interactions and decision-making around eating meat-free protein
• potential solutions for overcoming barriers to eating meat-free protein
• how to increase acceptance for eating meat-free protein

What we hope to achieve

We will use our findings to develop and evaluate an intervention aimed at promoting the adoption of flexitarian diets, and particularly the eating of meat-free protein among families with children living in the UK.

The intervention will be co-designed with parents and developed in collaboration with our industry partner (Marlow Foods Ltd. – Quorn).