The concept of the declining "starchy-staple ratio" originated in Merrill K. Bennett's 1941 paper, "International Contrasts in Food Consumption.
Bennett's law is now a "well-established stylized fact"[4] referenced in university textbooks, reports of the FAO and the World Bank, and many global food system models.
One implication of Bennett's law is that global demand for animal-based foods is predicted to increase more rapidly than human population growth.
Because animal-based foods are generally considered to have larger environmental impacts than plant-based foods, Bennett's law suggests that, holding other factors constant, the environmental impacts of agricultural production will increase in absolute and relative terms as economies continue to grow.
[5] By adopting processes of "sustainable intensification" in agriculture, it has been argued that these environmental impacts could be greatly lessened.