Consumer perception and trends about health and sustainability: trade-offs and synergies of two pivotal issues

•Health and sustainability are crucial current and future issues in the food area.•There are arguments for trade-offs as well as for synergies of the issues.•Improved understanding of the interrelation can contribute to pursuing both goals.

Modern affluent societies encounter the challenge of the so-called obesity pandemic in terms of health, and the environmental strain of resource intensive production and consumption in terms of sustainability. Consumer's role and the consumption side of the supply chain have been identified to be crucial in improving healthy choices and achieving sustainability goals, and both issues are increasingly discussed alongside each other. Arguments for why pursuing health and sustainability goals might entail challenges are presented, as well as arguments for why it might allow for synergies. It is concluded that understanding and acknowledging these interrelations can improve actions for tackling one of the issues alone, and even more so actions to advance both jointly.