Bristol has had a reputation of being the place for veganism in the UK for some time now (perhaps just ahead of Brighton).
But it’s now been crowned vegan capital of the world.?
Yep, move over Melbourne and LA – it’s our own fair west country that’s got the most plant-based business going on.
Researchers from Chef’s Pencil – an online cookbook where chefs share their favourite recipes – used data from Google Trends to examine vegan-related searches (in any language).
Google assigned a score for each location and gauged the interest level by comparing individual topic searches to all Google searches in that particular area.?
The UK is the world’s second most vegan country
Australia was found to be the most vegan country (no surprise there), closely followed by the UK.
But when it came to cities, Bristol came out top, followed by Portland, Edinburgh, Vancouver, and Seattle.
A Chef’s Pencil spokesperson said: “Bristol’s concentration of vegan-related searches on Google surpassed every other city in the world.
“While this may come as a surprise to many, the locals know all to well that their city has turned into a vegan Mecca.
“There are lots of vegan restaurants, cafes, vegan hair and beauty salons and even an active Bristol vegan community.”?
And Bristol is the world’s most vegan city
It’s home to Viva!, the animal rights action group, and three out of four of its MPs are veggie or vegan.
There’s a whole website dedicated to vegan businesses in Bristol, which lists cafes, restaurants, takeaways, health food shops etc in Bristol and Bath.
As for the UK in general, we now boast six of the world’s top 20 cities for veganism (compared to Australia’s three).
The Chef’s Pencil cites Veganuary as being the real driving force behind so many people ditching animal products for good.
We’re followed by New Zealand (the surge in interest apparently has meant that vegan product suppliers are struggling to keep up with demand), Sweden (one in five Swedes under 30 identifies as veggie or vegan), and Canada.
Israel, the USA, Ireland, Austria and Germany made up the rest of the top 10.