Healthy diets could shrink livestock industry value by 42%, eliminate 400 million animals by 2050

If the world shifts to healthy diets, the production value of the livestock industry could fall 42% by 2050, and more than 400 million cattle, sheep and goats could disappear — a transformation that would reshape the very structure of global agriculture, not just what people eat.

An international research team from Cornell University, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and other institutions published findings in the 2026 issue of Nature showing that a global transition to healthy, sustainable diets would send agricultural output, economic value and land use in a fundamentally different direction from current trends.

The healthy diet the research team modeled is based on the EAT-Lancet Commission's 2025 guidelines. It calls for less red meat and sugar and more vegetables, fruit, nuts and legumes.

The team fed those parameters into 10 global economic models and compared two scenarios for 2050: one in which current trends continue, and one in which the world transitions to healthy diets.

The results pointed overwhelmingly in one direction. Under the healthy-diet scenario, global agricultural output in 2050 would be 17% lower than under the business-as-usual path. The economic value of that production would fall about 26%, to $1.6 trillion. The team said the majority of the 10 models moved in the same direction, lending high confidence to the conclusion.

Livestock would take the hardest hit. Production of red meat from cattle, sheep and goats would drop 53% compared with the business-as-usual trajectory. In terms of animal numbers, the decline would exceed 400 million head — rolling back the global herd to 1996 levels.

The total production value of the livestock sector would fall 42% compared with 2020. Measured against the business-as-usual scenario for 2050, the gap widens to 60%.

Vegetables, fruit, nuts and legumes would move in the opposite direction. Output would rise 23% above the current-trend baseline, and cultivated area would expand 26%. Livestock's share of total agricultural production value would shrink from 36% to 20%, while the share held by vegetables and fruit would jump from 34% to 58%.

In effect, the center of gravity on the world's dinner table would shift from meat to plants.

Sugar crops and grains would also decline — sugar crop production would fall 34% below the current-trend path, and grain production would drop 23%.

The transition would also reduce agricultural land by 274 million hectares by 2050, the largest such decrease in the past 2,000 years, the research team said. That is more than 12 times the area of the Korean Peninsula.

Without a dietary shift, however, farmland would actually grow by 6% under the current-trend scenario. Only the transition to healthy diets reverses that direction.

The primary driver of the land reduction is livestock. As grazing animals such as cattle and sheep decline in number, pastureland shrinks with them. According to the research, pastureland would decrease 10% from 2020 levels. That land would not simply convert to cropland, however — about 65% of pastureland is unsuitable for crop cultivation and would likely exit agriculture altogether.

The shift to healthy diets would also benefit the environment. Agricultural greenhouse gas emissions, excluding carbon dioxide, would fall 34% below the current-trend level. Carbon dioxide released from clearing new land would drop by as much as 85%.

The research also projects that if healthy diets took hold globally, annual adult deaths would fall by 15 million.

The problem, however, is that the gains and losses would not be evenly distributed. The health benefits would spread broadly across society, while the economic costs would concentrate in specific sectors such as livestock.

The team said a sharp decline in the value of cattle and sheep production could push small and medium-sized livestock farms out of the market and deal a serious blow to rural economies that depend on herding.

The study synthesizes projections from multiple economic models, and actual outcomes would depend on the policies each country chooses to adopt.

DOI: 10.1038/s41586-026-10775-2

Gibson, M., Sundiang, M., Mason-D'Croz, D. et al. Food systems transformation would reshape global agriculture. Nature (2026).