For this week's eye-opener I took a "Score your diet" quiz which calculates how nutritious, environmentally friendly, and considerate to animals my current diet is. This quiz asked a series of questions about how many servings per week I eat of beef, chicken, eggs, and other animal products as well as fruits, veggies and whole grains. There were more detailed questions as well, asking whether the fruit and veggies are organic, whether the dairy products are fat free, and whether eggs and chicken are free-range, just to name a few. The quiz then gives your diet a score in three categories: Health Score, Environmental Score, and Animal Welfare Score.
Although my overall score on this quiz was 46 which is classified as "good", my results for the environmental and animal welfare scores apparently need help. I was surprised by this, because I'm not a very big meat eater and I've recently cut back on other animal products like dairy, yet according to this quiz I desperately need to help the animals more (my score was -13). I also make an effort to buy local fruits and vegetables to minimize my environmental impact. I even buy bread that's made locally (but my score here was -26)! I feel bad for scoring so low in both of these categories and I'd like to learn more about how I can change this for the better. I don't really want to become a vegetarian but I will do my best to buy free-range animal products and to eat grass fed beef whenever possible.
On the bright side, according to this quiz my diet is a very healthy one. I was happy to read that part because I try my best to eat well most of the time and I was hoping this quiz would reflect that.
Before taking this quiz I thought I had a pretty environmentally friendly and animal friendly diet. I was really surprised to learn that, according to this quiz, my regular diet is actually really harmful to the environment and to the welfare of animals! This quiz opened my eyes to the fact that I could probably do with making a few more changes to my food choices. I would recommend taking this quiz just to see how good your diet is and to become aware of areas that need improvement.
