--- title: "Tofu on top, cheddar at the bottom: the index that redrew the protein map - IVU - International Vegetarian Union" description: "A Cambridge index scored 20 protein foods on emissions, land, sodium and price. Tofu won with 36/40; cheddar came last with 13." url: "https://ivu.org/nutrition/medicine-and-nutrition/6757-tofu-on-top-cheddar-at-the-bottom-the-index-that-redrew-the-protein-map.html" date: "2026-10-10T12:13:10+00:00" language: "en-GB" --- Written on 01 September 2026. ![Watercolour illustration of a pyramid of protein foods: a glowing block of tofu at the top; around it, bowls of black beans, lentils, chickpeas, quinoa, chia, sunflower seeds and nuts; at the base, in muted grey tones, beef, cheese, eggs, fish and chicken.](https://ivu.org/images/BACKGROUND/proteinas_vegetais_sao_melhores_que_animais.jpg)The hierarchy proposed by the BPI Score inverts the protein pyramid most of us grew up with: tofu at the top, cheese and red meat at the bottom.Vegan Nutrition # Tofu on top, cheddar at the bottom: the index that redrew the protein map A researcher at the University of Cambridge folded emissions, water pollution, land use, sodium, saturated fat, cholesterol and price into a single score from 0 to 40. When the numbers landed, the ten plant proteins assessed held ten of the top twelve places — and the first six were all plant-based. Analysis Based on a paper published in *Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems* 29 July 2026 Ask ten people which protein source is best and you will hear ten answers — nearly all of them anchored to some label, some nutrition table, some green seal on the front of a pack. The problem is not a shortage of information. It is that each of those instruments measures one thing only. The British traffic-light system sees fat, sugar and salt, but is blind to deforestation. The carbon footprint label sees the climate, but cannot tell a food loaded with sodium from one that carries none. And a label that measures a single thing, read in isolation, can be technically correct and still misleading. That discomfort is where the BPI Score begins. It was set out by Chris Macdonald, of the University of Cambridge, in a paper published in July 2026 in *Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems*. The proposal is easy to state and hard to execute: instead of twenty partial labels, one score, built from eight indicators that cut across health, environment and household budget. It is worth being clear from the outset about what this work is and is not. It is a **Perspective article**, an editorial category intended to set out and argue for a conceptual framework. It is not a clinical trial, not a systematic review, not a meta-analysis. What Macdonald does is combine established, existing datasets according to a method of his own, stating openly that this is a first version. He also discloses that he founded the Better Protein Institute (BPI), the organisation the index is named after — a transparency readers should weigh when judging the conclusions. ## One score, built in two halves Twenty high-protein foods went into the assessment: ten of plant origin (tofu, beans, lentils, chickpeas, quinoa, chia, sunflower seeds, walnuts, Brazil nuts and peanuts) and ten of animal origin (eggs, chicken breast, salmon, tuna, cod, pork, lamb, beef, mozzarella and cheddar). The unit of comparison is the most important methodological decision in the whole paper — and the most honest. Everything is calculated **per 100 grams of protein**, not per 100 grams of food. It is the ruler that defenders of animal agriculture usually ask for, because it neutralises the obvious advantage of comparing a steak with a lettuce leaf. Here every item delivers the same quantity of protein, and the question becomes: what else comes in the package? The score splits in two. The **Planet Score** is worth up to 16 points and draws on four indicators taken from the dataset published by Clark and colleagues in *PNAS* in 2022, built from 57,000 food products: greenhouse gas emissions, water pollution, land use and blue water use — the freshwater actually consumed, rather than the rain that falls on the field. The **People Score** is worth up to 24 points and mixes health (sodium, saturated fat, cholesterol and the question of complete protein) with accessibility (price and retail availability). Maximum possible total: 40 points. Each indicator is scored by quintiles on a 0-to-4 scale: the best 20% of each list take 4 points, the worst 20% take none. It is a deliberately simple system — and, as we will see, that is precisely where one of the limitations acknowledged by the author sits. ## What happened when the numbers landed The result is more lopsided than anyone used to the nutrition debate would expect. There was no technical draw, no grey zone, no familiar "it depends". There was an almost clean separation between two blocs. ### The BPI Score ladder Twenty foods, one score from 0 to 40. The top quintile and the bottom quintile do not mix: one is entirely plant-based, the other entirely animal-based. #### Top quintile — the first four All plant-based. Tofu leads comfortably and is the only food to reach the maximum environmental score. - Tofu **36/40** - Chia seeds - Beans - Quinoa #### Fifth and sixth place The plant run continues: the first six places in the overall ranking are held exclusively by plant-based foods. No animal protein appears before seventh. - Two more plant proteins #### The middle block — down to 12th place Ten of the top twelve places are plant-based. Since there are only ten plant foods in the sample, that means **every one of them** finished in the top twelve. Just two animal proteins broke through. - All 10 plant proteins assessed - 2 animal proteins #### Bottom quintile — the last four All animal-based. Cheddar closes the list with a little over a third of tofu's score. - Mozzarella - Lamb - Beef - Cheddar **13/40** Tofu 36 of 40 Cheddar 13 of 40 02040 Plant protein Animal protein Scale: 0 to 40 points (16 environmental + 24 health and access) Taken separately, each half repeats the pattern. On the Planet Score, tofu scored **16 out of 16** — the absolute ceiling, the only food to take full marks on all four environmental indicators. Beef finished on 1 point out of 16. On the People Score, tofu made 20 out of 24; lamb, 10. ## The scale of the gap The figures behind that separation are not marginal differences. On several metrics the distance runs to two orders of magnitude — around a hundredfold. #### Greenhouse gas emissions kg of CO₂ equivalent per 100 g of protein Tofu**0.61 kg** Beef**64.19 kg** A difference of roughly 105 times. The tofu bar is not a rendering error: that is the real proportion. #### Land use square metres per 100 g of protein Tofu**2.16 m²** Beef**211.38 m²** About 98 times more land to deliver the same protein. #### Water pollution grams of PO₄ equivalent per 100 g of protein Chia**3.07 g** Pork**46.23 g** Eutrophication of rivers and lakes: 15 times between the two extremes cited in the paper. #### Freshwater use litres of blue water per 100 g of protein Beans**0.07 L** Tofu**14.23 L** Nuts**2,239.1 L** The one indicator where a plant food comes out worst in the sample — and the paper does not hide it. Nuts are thirsty; beans and sunflower seeds (6.68 L) are among the most frugal foods on the planet. The water case deserves attention precisely because it is the counterpoint that lends the rest its credibility. If every indicator pointed the same way without exception, it would be reasonable to distrust the method. That is not what happens: nuts drag the plant average down on water consumption, and the paper records it plainly. ## What travels with the protein On the health side, Macdonald made a decision worth explaining, because it is the opposite of what campaigning rankings usually do. He chose **not to penalise** foods for lacking micronutrients. Marking beef down for being low in vitamin C would be misleading, he argues, since nobody eats steak expecting vitamin C — fruit and vegetables cover that role in the meal. The focus therefore falls only on what comes *with* the protein and may do harm: sodium, saturated fat and cholesterol, the factors linked to obesity and cardiovascular disease, the world's leading cause of death. The values were drawn from the Nutritionix database. On sodium, the plant-animal split reappeared brutally: beans register 11.11 mg per 100 g of protein; mozzarella, 2,549.55 mg — **229 times more**. Beans, walnuts, Brazil nuts and lentils form the lowest group; eggs, tuna, cheddar and mozzarella the highest. On saturated fat the picture is more nuanced, and again this works in the index's favour: the best and worst performers are both animal foods. Cod records 0.47 g per 100 g of protein; cheddar, 84.74 g. Among the plants, beans sit in the good quintile (1.11 g) and Brazil nuts in the bad one (78.32 g). On cholesterol there is no softening the picture: **every** plant food registers zero. Absolute zero, without exception. To avoid turning the indicator into an unfair on-off switch, the author built an internal scale across the animal products, recognising that tuna (152.94 mg) sits a long way from eggs (2,960.32 mg). ### The handicap tofu won in spite of The "complete protein" criterion is the most generous to animal foods in the whole index — and the author admits it is debatable. It works as a switch: 4 points for a food containing all nine essential amino acids, zero for one that does not. **All** ten animal proteins took the full 4 points. Among the plants, only some — tofu included — were classed as complete; most scored zero. Macdonald acknowledges the obvious objection: anyone eating varied plant sources across the day obtains all nine essential amino acids without difficulty — which is exactly what rice and beans has done for centuries, on several continents. He kept the penalty anyway, out of rigour towards the question he had set. The detail matters. Even carrying a **4-point handicap** in a 40-point system, most plant proteins stayed ahead of most animal ones. And the top quintile remained 100% plant-based. ## And the price? Here the index usefully contradicts the received wisdom on both sides of the debate. Converted to the same standard — cost per 100 g of protein, with prices collected at Aldi, Britain's cheapest chain — the top and bottom accessibility quintiles each contain plant *and* animal foods. The cheapest product in the whole sample is plant-based: lentils. So is the most expensive: quinoa. The lesson is that "plant food is expensive" and "plant food is cheap" are equally false as generalisations. What exist are expensive and cheap foods within each category — and pulses sit consistently among the cheapest protein sources available to any consumer, anywhere. ## What was left out — and why it matters The most revealing part of the paper is not the results but the list of what this first version could **not** measure. Because everything left out would push the result in the same direction. Animal welfare and ethics do not enter BPI Score V1. Macdonald discusses the absence explicitly and argues that including them, even modestly, would widen the gap between the two groups further still. He notes that **more than 80 billion land animals are killed every year** for meat production, most of them in industrial systems, and that in some sectors of animal agriculture the freedom to roam is incompatible with the product itself. The paper contains a cool, methodical description of the dairy cycle in the United States: artificial insemination, pregnancy, separation of the calf shortly after birth, mechanised milking on concrete floors, re-insemination, the cycle repeating until yield falls — and then slaughter. He also identifies a dilemma that rarely surfaces in the debate: *the space trap*. More room improves welfare for confined animals — there are some 8.3 billion laying hens worldwide, a figure close to the human population, and most live in cages offering less space than a sheet of A4 paper. But expanding the footprint of an already resource-hungry industry shrinks the space available to wildlife. Pasture expansion for cattle is the main driver of deforestation in the Amazon. It is a game in which someone always loses: either farmed animals or wild ones. Macdonald's conclusion is blunt — the only fair way to score ethics in animal agriculture may be a blanket deduction across the sector. ### Three risks the index cannot yet score - **Antimicrobial resistance.** The routine use of antibiotics for growth promotion and disease prevention in animal agriculture is identified as a source of selective pressure on bacteria — a global public health problem with no bearing at all on the individual plate of the person eating. - **Zoonotic disease risk.** High-density confinement combined with the low genetic diversity of farmed herds and flocks creates conditions favourable to the emergence and circulation of pathogens capable of jumping between species. - **Carcinogen classification.** The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC/WHO) classifies processed meat as carcinogenic to humans and unprocessed red meat as probably carcinogenic. Then there is the carbon opportunity cost of land, possibly the most striking figure in the entire paper. If humanity moved entirely to plant proteins, global agricultural land would fall from more than 4 billion hectares to around 1 billion. If that released land were returned to nature, the potential carbon sequestration would exceed **500 billion tonnes of CO₂**. For scale: annual fossil fuel emissions for the whole planet total less than 40 billion tonnes. That is more than a decade of global fossil emissions — and it excludes the recovery of biodiversity, which does not even enter the calculation. > "our protein choice is a referendum on the compassion we are willing to show" Chris Macdonald, University of Cambridge ## Where the index is fragile No serious reading of a scientific paper stops at the favourable results. Macdonald devotes a substantial part of the text to listing the limitations of his own creation, and that self-criticism is what separates an index from a piece of advertising. The most serious limitation is geographical. Prices came from a single British supermarket chain and availability was defined by a binary test — whether the product is on sale in UK retail. The author classifies both indicators as a **localised proof of concept**, not a globally generalisable model. Agricultural subsidies, import tariffs, socioeconomic inequality and food deserts change the relative cost of every food dramatically from country to country. For readers outside the UK, that caveat is the one to keep in mind. The availability criterion, in fact, turned out redundant: all twenty items scored "yes". The author kept it because it will be decisive in future, when precision fermentation proteins and cultivated meat move from laboratory to shelf. The second limitation is the scale. A five-point ruler flattens the extremes. Beef is so far outside the distribution on emissions that "zero points" fails to express what it actually represents — awarding it the same minimum as a food ten times less polluting distorts the reading. A wider scale is planned for V2, already in development, alongside regionally weighted data or a purchasing-power-parity framework. ## What this means in an ordinary kitchen An index built from British retail prices arrives at a conclusion that grandmothers across Latin America, the Caribbean, South Asia and West Africa reached long ago. **Beans** sit in the top quintile of the overall ranking, register the lowest sodium level in the entire sample, consume almost no freshwater (0.07 L per 100 g of protein), contain zero cholesterol and rank among the cheapest protein sources in the world. The only disadvantage beans carry in the BPI Score is the complete-protein criterion — precisely the criterion that the rice-and-beans plate has resolved for centuries, effortlessly and without planning, simply by putting a grain alongside the pulse. What nutrition calls amino acid complementarity, most of the world calls lunch. There is a useful irony there. While much of the debate about sustainable protein organises itself around products that are new, expensive and ultra-processed, the food this index crowns is tofu —[ invented two thousand years ago](https://ivu.org/history-of-vegetarianism-and-veganism/the-history-of-vegetarian-thought-and-practice/articles/2328-from-ancient-china-to-global-tables-the-remarkable-journey-of-tofu.html) — and the runner-up group is led by the most ordinary pulse on the planet. For most people, the protein transition so widely discussed requires buying nothing that is not already in the cupboard. ## What to do with a score Macdonald is clear about the objective: the BPI Score is not meant to become another front-of-pack label. The ambition is different — to build *literacy*, the capacity to see the whole system behind a food rather than react to a single isolated indicator, chosen by industry precisely because it is the most flattering. It is a modest and an ambitious goal at once. Modest because it does not promise to change behaviour on its own — the author himself acknowledges, citing earlier research, that environmental labels produce mixed and discreet effects on purchasing decisions. Ambitious because it changes the question. It is no longer about which food carries the most protein, but about what each 100 grams of it costs the body, the land and other beings. For that question, on the evidence of this first version, the answer has already emerged: the six best available answers are all plant-based. ## Frequently asked questions about the BPI Score Direct answers to the most common questions about the index and what it measures. ### Which is the best source of protein according to the BPI Score? Tofu. It finished on 36 points out of a possible 40 and was the only food to reach the maximum environmental score of 16 out of 16. The first four places in the index are all plant-based: tofu, chia seeds, beans and quinoa. All ten plant proteins assessed finished within the top twelve places. ### What is the BPI Score and how is it calculated? It is an index created by Chris Macdonald, of the University of Cambridge, that folds eight indicators into a single score from 0 to 40. The Planet Score is worth 16 points and measures greenhouse gas emissions, water pollution, land use and freshwater use. The People Score is worth 24 points and measures sodium, saturated fat, cholesterol, complete protein, price and availability. Each indicator is scored by quintiles, from 0 to 4. ### Why is the comparison made per 100 grams of protein? Because it is the fairest unit for comparing protein sources. Measuring per 100 grams of food would artificially favour products concentrated in protein. By standardising everything to 100 grams of protein delivered, the question becomes what else comes with it: how much carbon, how much land, how much sodium and how much cholesterol accompany the same quantity of nutrient. ### How much less does tofu pollute than beef? Around a hundred times less, on two separate metrics. Per 100 grams of protein, tofu accounts for approximately 0.61 kg of CO₂ equivalent against 64.19 kg for beef — a difference of roughly 105 times. On land use, tofu occupies 2.16 m² against 211.38 m² for beef, about 98 times more. ### Is plant protein incomplete? Does rice and beans solve it? The index classes a source as complete when it contains all nine essential amino acids on its own, and awards 4 automatic points to every animal protein. The author himself acknowledges the objection: anyone eating varied plant sources across the day obtains all nine amino acids without difficulty — which is exactly what a plate of rice and beans achieves. Even carrying that 4-point handicap, the top quintile of the ranking remained 100% plant-based. ### Which foods finished in the last places? The bottom quintile is composed exclusively of animal proteins: mozzarella, lamb, beef and cheddar. Cheddar closed the list on 13 points out of 40, a little over a third of tofu's score. On the environmental half, beef scored just 1 point out of 16. ### Where does the study have limitations? It is a Perspective article, not a clinical trial or a systematic review. Prices came from a single British chain, Aldi, and availability was defined by UK retail — what the author himself calls a localised proof of concept. The five-point scale also flattens the extremes. Animal welfare, ethics, antimicrobial resistance and zoonotic risk were left out of this first version. The original paper is open access under a CC BY licence and can be read in full. The complete PDF is available for download. [ pdfDownload the paper as PDF(344 KB)](https://ivu.org/nutrition/nutrition-articles/health-nutrition/294-what-are-the-best-sources-of-protein-introducing-the-bpi-score.html) ### Study at a glance - **Publication type:** Perspective article — the presentation of a conceptual framework. Not a clinical trial, systematic review or meta-analysis. - **Sample:** 20 high-protein foods (10 plant-based, 10 animal-based). - **Unit of comparison:** per 100 g of protein. - **Data sources:** Clark et al. (2022, *PNAS*) for environmental indicators; the Nutritionix database for nutrients; the Aldi UK website for prices. - **Scoring:** quintiles from 0 to 4 per indicator; maximum of 16 points on the Planet Score and 24 on the People Score. - **Funding:** publication costs supported by Lucy Cavendish College, University of Cambridge. - **Conflicts of interest:** none declared. The author discloses that he is the founder of the Better Protein Institute, the organisation the index is named after. - **Generative AI:** declared as not used in preparing the manuscript. Alex Fernandes This analysis was written from a full reading of the original paper. The figures cited are those presented by its author; the interpretation and editorial framing are the author's own. **Source:** Macdonald, C. (2026). *What are the best sources of protein? Introducing the BPI Score.* Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems, 10:1677796. DOI: [10.3389/fsufs.2026.1677796](https://doi.org/10.3389/fsufs.2026.1677796). Published 29 July 2026 under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence. - Created on 01 September 2026. - Hits: 311 ## Schema ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://ivu.org/#website", "url": "https://ivu.org/", "name": "International Vegetarian Union", "alternateName": "IVU", "inLanguage": "en", "publisher": { "@id": "https://ivu.org/#organization" } }, { "@type": ["NGO", "Organization"], "@id": "https://ivu.org/#organization", "name": "International Vegetarian Union", "alternateName": "IVU", "url": "https://ivu.org/", "foundingDate": "1908", "logo": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://ivu.org/images/logos/ivu-2021-logo-com-margem.png" }, "description": "International non-profit organisation founded in 1908 that promotes vegetarianism and veganism worldwide, publishing nutrition guidance, scientific resources and educational material for health professionals and the general public.", "sameAs": [ "https://www.facebook.com/groups/IVUMembers/", "https://www.instagram.com/internationalvegetarianunion/" ] }, { "@type": "Person", "@id": "https://ivu.org/#alex-fernandes", "name": "Alex Fernandes", "affiliation": { "@id": "https://ivu.org/#organization" }, "memberOf": { "@id": "https://ivu.org/#organization" }, "knowsAbout": [ "Veganism", "Vegan nutrition", "Animal ethics", "Food system sustainability", "Plant protein" ], "knowsLanguage": ["en", "pt-BR"] }, { "@type": ["WebPage", "FAQPage"], "@id": "https://ivu.org/nutrition/medicine-and-nutrition/6757-tofu-on-top-cheddar-at-the-bottom-the-index-that-redrew-the-protein-map.html#webpage", "url": "https://ivu.org/nutrition/medicine-and-nutrition/6757-tofu-on-top-cheddar-at-the-bottom-the-index-that-redrew-the-protein-map.html", "name": "Tofu on top, cheddar at the bottom: the index that redrew the protein map", "description": "The BPI Score folded emissions, water pollution, land use, sodium, saturated fat, cholesterol and price into a single score from 0 to 40. Tofu won with 36 points; cheddar finished last on 13. 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M.; Zhao, J. V.", "datePublished": "2023", "isPartOf": { "@type": "Periodical", "name": "European Heart Journal" }, "identifier": "https://doi.org/10.1093/eurheartj/ehad336", "url": "https://doi.org/10.1093/eurheartj/ehad336" } ], "mainEntity": [ { "@type": "Question", "name": "Which is the best source of protein according to the BPI Score?", "acceptedAnswer": { "@type": "Answer", "text": "Tofu. It finished on 36 points out of a possible 40 and was the only food to reach the maximum environmental score of 16 out of 16. The first four places in the index are all plant-based: tofu, chia seeds, beans and quinoa. All ten plant proteins assessed finished within the top twelve places." } }, { "@type": "Question", "name": "What is the BPI Score and how is it calculated?", "acceptedAnswer": { "@type": "Answer", "text": "It is an index created by Chris Macdonald, of the University of Cambridge, that folds eight indicators into a single score from 0 to 40. 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By standardising everything to 100 grams of protein delivered, the question becomes what else comes with it: how much carbon, how much land, how much sodium and how much cholesterol accompany the same quantity of nutrient." } }, { "@type": "Question", "name": "How much less does tofu pollute than beef?", "acceptedAnswer": { "@type": "Answer", "text": "Around a hundred times less, on two separate metrics. Per 100 grams of protein, tofu accounts for approximately 0.61 kg of CO2 equivalent against 64.19 kg for beef, a difference of roughly 105 times. On land use, tofu occupies 2.16 m² against 211.38 m² for beef, about 98 times more." } }, { "@type": "Question", "name": "Is plant protein incomplete? Does rice and beans solve it?", "acceptedAnswer": { "@type": "Answer", "text": "The index classes a source as complete when it contains all nine essential amino acids on its own, and awards 4 automatic points to every animal protein. The author himself acknowledges the objection: anyone eating varied plant sources across the day obtains all nine amino acids without difficulty, which is exactly what a plate of rice and beans achieves. Even carrying that 4-point handicap, the top quintile of the ranking remained 100% plant-based." } }, { "@type": "Question", "name": "Which foods finished in the last places?", "acceptedAnswer": { "@type": "Answer", "text": "The bottom quintile is composed exclusively of animal proteins: mozzarella, lamb, beef and cheddar. Cheddar closed the list on 13 points out of 40, a little over a third of tofu's score. On the environmental half, beef scored just 1 point out of 16." } }, { "@type": "Question", "name": "Where does the study have limitations?", "acceptedAnswer": { "@type": "Answer", "text": "It is a Perspective article, not a clinical trial or a systematic review. Prices came from a single British chain, Aldi, and availability was defined by UK retail, which the author himself calls a localised proof of concept. The five-point scale also flattens the extremes. Animal welfare, ethics, antimicrobial resistance and zoonotic risk were left out of this first version." } } ] }, { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://ivu.org/nutrition/medicine-and-nutrition/6757-tofu-on-top-cheddar-at-the-bottom-the-index-that-redrew-the-protein-map.html#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://ivu.org/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Nutrition", "item": "https://ivu.org/nutrition.html" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Medicine and Nutrition Department", "item": "https://ivu.org/nutrition/medicine-and-nutrition.html" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "Tofu on top, cheddar at the bottom: the index that redrew the protein map" } ] }, { "@type": "ScholarlyArticle", "@id": "https://doi.org/10.3389/fsufs.2026.1677796", "name": "What are the best sources of protein? Introducing the BPI Score", "headline": "What are the best sources of protein? Introducing the BPI Score", "url": "https://doi.org/10.3389/fsufs.2026.1677796", "identifier": [ { "@type": "PropertyValue", "propertyID": "DOI", "value": "10.3389/fsufs.2026.1677796" } ], "genre": "Perspective article", "learningResourceType": "Perspective article", "inLanguage": "en", "datePublished": "2026-07-29", "abstract": "Introduces the BPI Score, a multidimensional index assessing 20 protein sources by combining environmental impact (emissions, water pollution, land and water use) with health and accessibility factors, always per 100 g of protein. Tofu scored highest and cheddar lowest.", "author": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Chris Macdonald", "affiliation": { "@type": "CollegeOrUniversity", "name": "University of Cambridge", "url": "https://www.cam.ac.uk/" } }, "isPartOf": { "@type": "Periodical", "name": "Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems", "publisher": { "@type": "Organization", "name": "Frontiers Media" } }, "license": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/", "isAccessibleForFree": true, "funder": { "@type": "CollegeOrUniversity", "name": "Lucy Cavendish College, University of Cambridge" }, "keywords": "BPI Score, protein, plant-based diet, carbon footprint, sustainability, veganism, product rating" }, { "@type": "ItemList", "@id": "https://ivu.org/nutrition/medicine-and-nutrition/6757-tofu-on-top-cheddar-at-the-bottom-the-index-that-redrew-the-protein-map.html#ranking", "name": "BPI Score V1 ranking: best and worst protein sources", "description": "Top and bottom quintiles of the 20 protein sources assessed. 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Vegan Nutrition Tofu on top, cheddar at the bottom: the index that redrew the protein map A researcher at the University of Cambridge folded emissions, water pollution, land use, sodium, saturated fat, cholesterol and price into a single score from 0 to 40. When the numbers landed, the ten plant proteins assessed held ten of the top twelve places — and the first six were all plant-based. Analysis Based on a paper published in Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems 29 July 2026 Ask ten people which protein source is best and you will hear ten answers — nearly all of them anchored to some label, some nutrition table, some green seal on the front of a pack. The problem is not a shortage of information. It is that each of those instruments measures one thing only. The British traffic-light system sees fat, sugar and salt, but is blind to deforestation. The carbon footprint label sees the climate, but cannot tell a food loaded with sodium from one that carries none. And a label that measures a single thing, read in isolation, can be technically correct and still misleading. That discomfort is where the BPI Score begins. It was set out by Chris Macdonald, of the University of Cambridge, in a paper published in July 2026 in Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems. The proposal is easy to state and hard to execute: instead of twenty partial labels, one score, built from eight indicators that cut across health, environment and household budget. It is worth being clear from the outset about what this work is and is not. It is a Perspective article, an editorial category intended to set out and argue for a conceptual framework. It is not a clinical trial, not a systematic review, not a meta-analysis. What Macdonald does is combine established, existing datasets according to a method of his own, stating openly that this is a first version. He also discloses that he founded the Better Protein Institute (BPI), the organisation the index is named after — a transparency readers should weigh when judging the conclusions. One score, built in two halves Twenty high-protein foods went into the assessment: ten of plant origin (tofu, beans, lentils, chickpeas, quinoa, chia, sunflower seeds, walnuts, Brazil nuts and peanuts) and ten of animal origin (eggs, chicken breast, salmon, tuna, cod, pork, lamb, beef, mozzarella and cheddar). The unit of comparison is the most important methodological decision in the whole paper — and the most honest. Everything is calculated per 100 grams of protein, not per 100 grams of food. It is the ruler that defenders of animal agriculture usually ask for, because it neutralises the obvious advantage of comparing a steak with a lettuce leaf. Here every item delivers the same quantity of protein, and the question becomes: what else comes in the package? The score splits in two. The Planet Score is worth up to 16 points and draws on four indicators taken from the dataset published by Clark and colleagues in PNAS in 2022, built from 57,000 food products: greenhouse gas emissions, water pollution, land use and blue water use — the freshwater actually consumed, rather than the rain that falls on the field. The People Score is worth up to 24 points and mixes health (sodium, saturated fat, cholesterol and the question of complete protein) with accessibility (price and retail availability). Maximum possible total: 40 points. Each indicator is scored by quintiles on a 0-to-4 scale: the best 20% of each list take 4 points, the worst 20% take none. It is a deliberately simple system — and, as we will see, that is precisely where one of the limitations acknowledged by the author sits. What happened when the numbers landed The result is more lopsided than anyone used to the nutrition debate would expect. There was no technical draw, no grey zone, no familiar \"it depends\". There was an almost clean separation between two blocs. The BPI Score ladder Twenty foods, one score from 0 to 40. The top quintile and the bottom quintile do not mix: one is entirely plant-based, the other entirely animal-based. Top quintile — the first four All plant-based. Tofu leads comfortably and is the only food to reach the maximum environmental score. Tofu 36/40 Chia seeds Beans Quinoa Fifth and sixth place The plant run continues: the first six places in the overall ranking are held exclusively by plant-based foods. No animal protein appears before seventh. Two more plant proteins The middle block — down to 12th place Ten of the top twelve places are plant-based. Since there are only ten plant foods in the sample, that means every one of them finished in the top twelve. Just two animal proteins broke through. All 10 plant proteins assessed 2 animal proteins Bottom quintile — the last four All animal-based. Cheddar closes the list with a little over a third of tofu's score. Mozzarella Lamb Beef Cheddar 13/40 Tofu 36 of 40 Cheddar 13 of 40 02040 Plant protein Animal protein Scale: 0 to 40 points (16 environmental + 24 health and access) Taken separately, each half repeats the pattern. On the Planet Score, tofu scored 16 out of 16 — the absolute ceiling, the only food to take full marks on all four environmental indicators. Beef finished on 1 point out of 16. On the People Score, tofu made 20 out of 24; lamb, 10. The scale of the gap The figures behind that separation are not marginal differences. On several metrics the distance runs to two orders of magnitude — around a hundredfold. Greenhouse gas emissions kg of CO₂ equivalent per 100 g of protein Tofu0.61 kg Beef64.19 kg A difference of roughly 105 times. The tofu bar is not a rendering error: that is the real proportion. Land use square metres per 100 g of protein Tofu2.16 m² Beef211.38 m² About 98 times more land to deliver the same protein. Water pollution grams of PO₄ equivalent per 100 g of protein Chia3.07 g Pork46.23 g Eutrophication of rivers and lakes: 15 times between the two extremes cited in the paper. Freshwater use litres of blue water per 100 g of protein Beans0.07 L Tofu14.23 L Nuts2,239.1 L The one indicator where a plant food comes out worst in the sample — and the paper does not hide it. Nuts are thirsty; beans and sunflower seeds (6.68 L) are among the most frugal foods on the planet. The water case deserves attention precisely because it is the counterpoint that lends the rest its credibility. If every indicator pointed the same way without exception, it would be reasonable to distrust the method. That is not what happens: nuts drag the plant average down on water consumption, and the paper records it plainly. What travels with the protein On the health side, Macdonald made a decision worth explaining, because it is the opposite of what campaigning rankings usually do. He chose not to penalise foods for lacking micronutrients. Marking beef down for being low in vitamin C would be misleading, he argues, since nobody eats steak expecting vitamin C — fruit and vegetables cover that role in the meal. The focus therefore falls only on what comes with the protein and may do harm: sodium, saturated fat and cholesterol, the factors linked to obesity and cardiovascular disease, the world's leading cause of death. The values were drawn from the Nutritionix database. On sodium, the plant-animal split reappeared brutally: beans register 11.11 mg per 100 g of protein; mozzarella, 2,549.55 mg — 229 times more. Beans, walnuts, Brazil nuts and lentils form the lowest group; eggs, tuna, cheddar and mozzarella the highest. On saturated fat the picture is more nuanced, and again this works in the index's favour: the best and worst performers are both animal foods. Cod records 0.47 g per 100 g of protein; cheddar, 84.74 g. Among the plants, beans sit in the good quintile (1.11 g) and Brazil nuts in the bad one (78.32 g). On cholesterol there is no softening the picture: every plant food registers zero. Absolute zero, without exception. To avoid turning the indicator into an unfair on-off switch, the author built an internal scale across the animal products, recognising that tuna (152.94 mg) sits a long way from eggs (2,960.32 mg). The handicap tofu won in spite of The \"complete protein\" criterion is the most generous to animal foods in the whole index — and the author admits it is debatable. It works as a switch: 4 points for a food containing all nine essential amino acids, zero for one that does not. All ten animal proteins took the full 4 points. Among the plants, only some — tofu included — were classed as complete; most scored zero. Macdonald acknowledges the obvious objection: anyone eating varied plant sources across the day obtains all nine essential amino acids without difficulty — which is exactly what rice and beans has done for centuries, on several continents. He kept the penalty anyway, out of rigour towards the question he had set. The detail matters. Even carrying a 4-point handicap in a 40-point system, most plant proteins stayed ahead of most animal ones. And the top quintile remained 100% plant-based. And the price? Here the index usefully contradicts the received wisdom on both sides of the debate. Converted to the same standard — cost per 100 g of protein, with prices collected at Aldi, Britain's cheapest chain — the top and bottom accessibility quintiles each contain plant and animal foods. The cheapest product in the whole sample is plant-based: lentils. So is the most expensive: quinoa. The lesson is that \"plant food is expensive\" and \"plant food is cheap\" are equally false as generalisations. What exist are expensive and cheap foods within each category — and pulses sit consistently among the cheapest protein sources available to any consumer, anywhere. What was left out — and why it matters The most revealing part of the paper is not the results but the list of what this first version could not measure. Because everything left out would push the result in the same direction. Animal welfare and ethics do not enter BPI Score V1. Macdonald discusses the absence explicitly and argues that including them, even modestly, would widen the gap between the two groups further still. He notes that more than 80 billion land animals are killed every year for meat production, most of them in industrial systems, and that in some sectors of animal agriculture the freedom to roam is incompatible with the product itself. The paper contains a cool, methodical description of the dairy cycle in the United States: artificial insemination, pregnancy, separation of the calf shortly after birth, mechanised milking on concrete floors, re-insemination, the cycle repeating until yield falls — and then slaughter. He also identifies a dilemma that rarely surfaces in the debate: the space trap. More room improves welfare for confined animals — there are some 8.3 billion laying hens worldwide, a figure close to the human population, and most live in cages offering less space than a sheet of A4 paper. But expanding the footprint of an already resource-hungry industry shrinks the space available to wildlife. Pasture expansion for cattle is the main driver of deforestation in the Amazon. It is a game in which someone always loses: either farmed animals or wild ones. Macdonald's conclusion is blunt — the only fair way to score ethics in animal agriculture may be a blanket deduction across the sector. Three risks the index cannot yet score Antimicrobial resistance. The routine use of antibiotics for growth promotion and disease prevention in animal agriculture is identified as a source of selective pressure on bacteria — a global public health problem with no bearing at all on the individual plate of the person eating. Zoonotic disease risk. High-density confinement combined with the low genetic diversity of farmed herds and flocks creates conditions favourable to the emergence and circulation of pathogens capable of jumping between species. Carcinogen classification. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC/WHO) classifies processed meat as carcinogenic to humans and unprocessed red meat as probably carcinogenic. Then there is the carbon opportunity cost of land, possibly the most striking figure in the entire paper. If humanity moved entirely to plant proteins, global agricultural land would fall from more than 4 billion hectares to around 1 billion. If that released land were returned to nature, the potential carbon sequestration would exceed 500 billion tonnes of CO₂. For scale: annual fossil fuel emissions for the whole planet total less than 40 billion tonnes. That is more than a decade of global fossil emissions — and it excludes the recovery of biodiversity, which does not even enter the calculation. \"our protein choice is a referendum on the compassion we are willing to show\" Chris Macdonald, University of Cambridge Where the index is fragile No serious reading of a scientific paper stops at the favourable results. Macdonald devotes a substantial part of the text to listing the limitations of his own creation, and that self-criticism is what separates an index from a piece of advertising. The most serious limitation is geographical. Prices came from a single British supermarket chain and availability was defined by a binary test — whether the product is on sale in UK retail. The author classifies both indicators as a localised proof of concept, not a globally generalisable model. Agricultural subsidies, import tariffs, socioeconomic inequality and food deserts change the relative cost of every food dramatically from country to country. For readers outside the UK, that caveat is the one to keep in mind. The availability criterion, in fact, turned out redundant: all twenty items scored \"yes\". The author kept it because it will be decisive in future, when precision fermentation proteins and cultivated meat move from laboratory to shelf. The second limitation is the scale. A five-point ruler flattens the extremes. Beef is so far outside the distribution on emissions that \"zero points\" fails to express what it actually represents — awarding it the same minimum as a food ten times less polluting distorts the reading. A wider scale is planned for V2, already in development, alongside regionally weighted data or a purchasing-power-parity framework. What this means in an ordinary kitchen An index built from British retail prices arrives at a conclusion that grandmothers across Latin America, the Caribbean, South Asia and West Africa reached long ago. Beans sit in the top quintile of the overall ranking, register the lowest sodium level in the entire sample, consume almost no freshwater (0.07 L per 100 g of protein), contain zero cholesterol and rank among the cheapest protein sources in the world. The only disadvantage beans carry in the BPI Score is the complete-protein criterion — precisely the criterion that the rice-and-beans plate has resolved for centuries, effortlessly and without planning, simply by putting a grain alongside the pulse. What nutrition calls amino acid complementarity, most of the world calls lunch. There is a useful irony there. While much of the debate about sustainable protein organises itself around products that are new, expensive and ultra-processed, the food this index crowns is tofu — invented two thousand years ago — and the runner-up group is led by the most ordinary pulse on the planet. For most people, the protein transition so widely discussed requires buying nothing that is not already in the cupboard. What to do with a score Macdonald is clear about the objective: the BPI Score is not meant to become another front-of-pack label. The ambition is different — to build literacy, the capacity to see the whole system behind a food rather than react to a single isolated indicator, chosen by industry precisely because it is the most flattering. It is a modest and an ambitious goal at once. Modest because it does not promise to change behaviour on its own — the author himself acknowledges, citing earlier research, that environmental labels produce mixed and discreet effects on purchasing decisions. Ambitious because it changes the question. It is no longer about which food carries the most protein, but about what each 100 grams of it costs the body, the land and other beings. For that question, on the evidence of this first version, the answer has already emerged: the six best available answers are all plant-based. .gvfaq{ --gvfaq-ink:#2B3326; --gvfaq-ink-soft:#57614D; --gvfaq-line:#DCD5C0; --gvfaq-sage:#8FA476; --gvfaq-moss:#5E7549; --gvfaq-gold:#BE9C31; margin:3.2em auto 0; max-width:70ch; color:var(--gvfaq-ink); } .gvfaq *,.gvfaq *::before,.gvfaq *::after{box-sizing:border-box;} .gvfaq h2{ font-weight:600; font-size:clamp(1.45rem,3vw,2rem); line-height:1.15; margin:0 0 .35em; } .gvfaq-intro{font-size:.98rem;color:var(--gvfaq-ink-soft);margin:0 0 1.6em;} .gvfaq-item{ border:1px solid var(--gvfaq-line); border-radius:16px; background:linear-gradient(180deg,rgba(255,255,255,.82),rgba(255,255,255,.5)); box-shadow:0 2px 4px rgba(60,66,48,.04), 0 12px 28px -20px rgba(60,66,48,.45); margin-bottom:.85em; overflow:hidden; transition:border-color .25s ease, box-shadow .25s ease; } .gvfaq-item[open]{ border-color:rgba(94,117,73,.42); box-shadow:0 3px 8px rgba(60,66,48,.06), 0 20px 40px -24px rgba(60,66,48,.55); } .gvfaq-item summary{ cursor:pointer; list-style:none; padding:1.05em 3em 1.05em 1.3em; position:relative; font-weight:600; line-height:1.4; } .gvfaq-item summary::-webkit-details-marker{display:none;} .gvfaq-item summary:hover{color:var(--gvfaq-moss);} .gvfaq-item summary:focus-visible{outline:3px solid var(--gvfaq-gold);outline-offset:-3px;} .gvfaq-item summary::after{ content:\"\"; position:absolute;right:1.25em;top:50%; width:11px;height:11px; border-right:2.5px solid var(--gvfaq-sage); border-bottom:2.5px solid var(--gvfaq-sage); transform:translateY(-70%) rotate(45deg); transition:transform .28s cubic-bezier(.2,.8,.3,1); } .gvfaq-item[open] summary::after{transform:translateY(-30%) rotate(-135deg);} .gvfaq-answer{ padding:0 1.3em 1.25em; color:var(--gvfaq-ink-soft); animation:gvfaq-open .3s ease both; } .gvfaq-answer p{margin:0 0 .8em;} .gvfaq-answer p:last-child{margin-bottom:0;} @keyframes gvfaq-open{from{opacity:0;transform:translateY(-6px);}to{opacity:1;transform:none;}} @media (prefers-reduced-motion:reduce){ .gvfaq *{animation:none !important;transition:none !important;} } Frequently asked questions about the BPI Score Direct answers to the most common questions about the index and what it measures. Which is the best source of protein according to the BPI Score? Tofu. It finished on 36 points out of a possible 40 and was the only food to reach the maximum environmental score of 16 out of 16. The first four places in the index are all plant-based: tofu, chia seeds, beans and quinoa. All ten plant proteins assessed finished within the top twelve places. What is the BPI Score and how is it calculated? It is an index created by Chris Macdonald, of the University of Cambridge, that folds eight indicators into a single score from 0 to 40. The Planet Score is worth 16 points and measures greenhouse gas emissions, water pollution, land use and freshwater use. The People Score is worth 24 points and measures sodium, saturated fat, cholesterol, complete protein, price and availability. Each indicator is scored by quintiles, from 0 to 4. Why is the comparison made per 100 grams of protein? Because it is the fairest unit for comparing protein sources. Measuring per 100 grams of food would artificially favour products concentrated in protein. By standardising everything to 100 grams of protein delivered, the question becomes what else comes with it: how much carbon, how much land, how much sodium and how much cholesterol accompany the same quantity of nutrient. How much less does tofu pollute than beef? Around a hundred times less, on two separate metrics. Per 100 grams of protein, tofu accounts for approximately 0.61 kg of CO₂ equivalent against 64.19 kg for beef — a difference of roughly 105 times. On land use, tofu occupies 2.16 m² against 211.38 m² for beef, about 98 times more. Is plant protein incomplete? Does rice and beans solve it? The index classes a source as complete when it contains all nine essential amino acids on its own, and awards 4 automatic points to every animal protein. The author himself acknowledges the objection: anyone eating varied plant sources across the day obtains all nine amino acids without difficulty — which is exactly what a plate of rice and beans achieves. Even carrying that 4-point handicap, the top quintile of the ranking remained 100% plant-based. Which foods finished in the last places? The bottom quintile is composed exclusively of animal proteins: mozzarella, lamb, beef and cheddar. Cheddar closed the list on 13 points out of 40, a little over a third of tofu's score. On the environmental half, beef scored just 1 point out of 16. Where does the study have limitations? It is a Perspective article, not a clinical trial or a systematic review. Prices came from a single British chain, Aldi, and availability was defined by UK retail — what the author himself calls a localised proof of concept. The five-point scale also flattens the extremes. Animal welfare, ethics, antimicrobial resistance and zoonotic risk were left out of this first version. The original paper is open access under a CC BY licence and can be read in full. The complete PDF is available for download. Download the paper as PDF Study at a glance Publication type: Perspective article — the presentation of a conceptual framework. Not a clinical trial, systematic review or meta-analysis. Sample: 20 high-protein foods (10 plant-based, 10 animal-based). Unit of comparison: per 100 g of protein. Data sources: Clark et al. (2022, PNAS) for environmental indicators; the Nutritionix database for nutrients; the Aldi UK website for prices. Scoring: quintiles from 0 to 4 per indicator; maximum of 16 points on the Planet Score and 24 on the People Score. Funding: publication costs supported by Lucy Cavendish College, University of Cambridge. Conflicts of interest: none declared. The author discloses that he is the founder of the Better Protein Institute, the organisation the index is named after. Generative AI: declared as not used in preparing the manuscript. Alex Fernandes This analysis was written from a full reading of the original paper. The figures cited are those presented by its author; the interpretation and editorial framing are the author's own. Source: Macdonald, C. (2026). What are the best sources of protein? Introducing the BPI Score. Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems, 10:1677796. DOI: 10.3389/fsufs.2026.1677796. Published 29 July 2026 under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence.", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://ivu.org/images/BACKGROUND/proteinas_vegetais_sao_melhores_que_animais.jpg" }, "publisher": { "@type": "Organization", "name": "International Vegetarian Union", "logo": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://ivu.org/images/logos/logo-ivu-tranparent-background.png" } }, "author": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Alex Fernandes", "url": "https://ivu.org/nutrition/medicine-and-nutrition/6757-tofu-on-top-cheddar-at-the-bottom-the-index-that-redrew-the-protein-map.html" }, "datePublished": "2026-09-01T19:58:24+00:00", "dateCreated": "2026-09-01T19:58:24+00:00", "dateModified": "2026-09-01T20:42:15+00:00" } ```