Finland’s Oldest and Largest University Ditches Beef

Starting February 2020, the University of Helsinki—the oldest and largest university in Finland—will no longer serve beef for lunch. The school’s food provider UniCafe—which serves approximately 1,000 lunches daily—made the decision to remove beef from the menu in a bid to fight the climate crisis and revealed that the move would reduce its carbon footprint by 11 percent annually. “The idea came from the staff as we were thinking about our next responsibility action,” Leena Pihlajamäki, the chief operating officer at UniCafe, told local media outlet YLE. “We realised that this is a way to reduce our carbon dioxide emissions significantly. Studies show that it’s one of the most effective ways. The goal is ambitious but far from impossible.” The University of Helsinki follows the University of Coimbra (Portugal’s oldest university), University of Cambridge, and Goldsmiths college which have all pledged to remove beef from on-campus dining facilities in recent months for environmental purposes.