BruinMUN 31 is Plant-Based by Default

Learn more about our responsible food policy and how you can help make a difference.

Our Policy

BruinMUN 31 will serve plant-based meals and refreshments by default, while giving advisors and staff the choice to opt into meat and/or dairy options upon request. This commitment allows us to extend our core values of sustainability and inclusivity to our food choices and is in line with official recommendations from several United Nations bodies.

If all 2000 BruinMUN 31 attendees, advisors, and staff ate plant-based lunches for two days, we could save…

1,466,447 gallons of water

That’s as much as 58,658 ten minute showers

27,143 lbs of CO2

That’s like driving 35,251 miles in the average passenger car (more than the Earth’s circumference)

1,333 animal lives

Learn more at https://www.greenerbydefault.com/

Sources: http://www.waterfootprint.org/, http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/earth-talks-daily-destruction/, http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10584-014-1169-1/fulltext.html, http://static.ewg.org/reports/2011/meateaters/pdf/methodology_ewg_meat_eaters_guide_to_health_and_climate_2011.pdf, https://www.amazon.com/Food-Choice-Sustainability-Buying-Eating/dp/1626524351

Plant-Based Defaults and Inclusivity

About 65% of the world cannot digest lactose, particularly individuals of East Asian, West African, Arab, Jewish, Greek, and Italian descent. In these groups, lactose malabsorption is as high as 70%-100%.

Source: https://medlineplus.gov/ genetics/condition/lactose-intolerance/#frequency

Religious Cultural Sensitivity

Many religions have restrictions on what types of animal products can be consumed by its followers, especially on Saturdays and Sundays. These include but are not limited to:

  • Islam (1.8 billion followers) - restrictions on pork, the meat of carnivores, and animals that died due to illness, injury, stunning, poisoning, or haram slaughtering

  • Hinduism (1.2 billion) - restrictions on beef and sometimes ghee, milk, eggs, domestic fowl or salted pork

  • Buddhism (511 million) - restrictions on meat

  • Sikhism (26 million) - restrictions on beef and sometimes all meat

  • Judaism (16 million) - restrictions on pig, shellfish, and rabbit

  • Jainism (5 million) - restrictions on meat, eggs, and root vegetables

BruinMUN 31 aims to provide for all of its attendees and staff, regardless of their ethnic or religious background.

Join us

To multiply the impact of our policy, delegates are encouraged to participate in sustainable eating with the help of our plant-based dining guide. BruinMUN attendees can show their credentials to get 20% of at Hibachi Papi and 10% at California Pizza Kitchen in Westwood. View our dining guide below for more details.

  • "Opting for plant-based diets when possible is the most effective way to reduce the wide-ranging impacts of food consumption"

    UNEP “Five tips for living more sustainably”

  • Plant-based offerings "allow delegates to disucss strategies around mitigating the climate crisis without contributing to it"

    VegNews on the COP28 Climate Summit

  • "The evidence compiled so far points to the combined health and enviornmental benfits of shifting towards a more plant-based diet"

    FAO “Sustainable Healthy Diets Guiding Principles”

  • "Switching to a plant-based diet can reduce an individual's carbon footprint by up to 2.1 tons"

    United Nations “Your guide to climate action: Food”

  • "Plant-based alternative are derived from legumes, which in addition to being nutritious also enrich soil fertility through nitrogen fixation.

    FAO “New food sources and food production systems”