Why Sustainable Eating Matters
Industry leaders agreed that sustainable diets need greater clarity – across the industry as well as for consumers, and they acknowledged that there’s a grey area when defining sustainable diets.
Representatives from across the food industry came together last week to talk about sustainable diets at the Footprint Sustainability Symposium: Sustainable Diets podcast, in association with Nestlé Professional. Discussing how the concept has evolved over recent years and how it is currently interpreted – among foodservice operators and consumers – experts identified areas the industry should address to both create and promote sustainable diets that meet the health needs of humans as well as the planet.
After all, for our partners and for the industry, hospitality is our business...
What is a sustainable diet?
Sustainable diets have grown in popularity during recent years. Vegan and plant-based diets are disrupting the industry with 14% of UK consumers now defining themselves as flexitarians1. And with the industry realising that 70-90% of its carbon footprint comes from the ingredients on the plate, attention has firmly shifted to menus and ingredients in supply chains, according to Deloitte Research.
Chaired by Amy Fetzer of Footprint Intelligence, the podcast welcomed industry leaders: Chantelle Nicholson, Chef Patron of Apricity; Anna Collins, Nutrition Manager at Nestlé; Marisa Heath, Chief Executive of the Plant-based Food Alliance; and Emily Pinkney, Head of Sustainability at Sysco Speciality foods. Sharing experiences from across the value chain, they discussed the current lack of clarity in the term, ‘sustainable diets’ and how this might be overcome.
Despite acknowledging that public awareness of seasonality is high, there is a “quiet consciousness developing” as consumers become more wary about where food comes from and how it gets on the plate.
The industry needs to turn to sustainable eating
Chantelle Nicholson said the industry is too focused on carbon to even begin to make the switch to a sustainable diet. This leads to practices like intensive feed lots, which may have lower emissions but are not as sustainable as regenerative farming methods. Talking about the importance of looking at the whole picture, she recommended choosing ingredients and products with “a good impact across all those important sustainability criteria: biodiversity, soil, health, welfare of animal, of people, of workers".
Emily Pinkney explained that, although they’re keen to establish a global approach towards evaluating carbon footprint at Sysco, they’ve struggled to establish a common methodology, explaining, “we're even seeing between ourselves that there's a different way of looking at the carbon footprint of a product between US and UK and seeing our counterparts in France. How do we come at this in a really consistent way, where we're not all going down different methodologies or displaying things in different ways?”
Bringing sustainable diets to the public
Talking about public awareness of plant-based dining and nutrition, as well as promoting sustainable eating, Marisa Heath explained, “There have been a lot of conversations going on, particularly at government level, about processed foods. Mentioning the rise in companies replicating burgers and hot dogs with meat analogues, which are not generally the healthiest options - animal or plant-based – she advocated a nutrition-based approach, rather than looking at whether products are ultra-processed or not."
Anna Collins, explained that, as well as talking about the nutritional benefits of Nestlé’s GARDEN GOURMET range, they always refer to public health and labelling guidelines, such as the UK salt reduction program, government nutrient profiling model or the front of pack traffic light labelling scheme. An “easy and transparent way that we can demonstrate to consumers where our products sit for public health,” this has the added benefit of enabling consumers to “compare products like for like.”
She added, “it's all very well to create a plant-based burger that offers the right nutrition credentials. But if that ends up on a plate with a sugary bun, loads of fries, mayonnaise and cheese, actually, are we really helping from a sustainable diets point of view?”.
To address this, Anna explained how Nestlé development chefs work with customers and chefs to create dishes that incorporate GARDEN GOURMET products, but which also include at least two servings of vegetables per person, and stay within public health calorie and salt guidelines, and to also make the shift to sustainable eating more natural.
How the food service industry will make the shift to sustainable diets
Keen for the foodservice industry to play its part, Emily Pinkney entreated operators to put more emphasis on plant-based menus and dishes that are as “delicious and inviting” as a standard meat dish. We want to create an interesting and tasty culture around sustainable eating, so that customers are more likely to choose sustainable food choices off the menu. Crucially, she talked about the importance for operators to make these accessible for customers, “if they see something that looks maybe slightly daunting or a bit scary for them to try, then they will just not try it and they'll stick to what they know.”
Podcast attendees agreed that the industry is likely to change dramatically over the coming years if it’s to meet the demands of a rapidly growing global population. And they mused on the future of food as a result: from lab-grown meat to fermented dairy, to renewed focus on the humble legume.
They also talked about the critical importance of managing food waste, and the need to challenge the commonly-held chef mindset where meat is the star of the show, making the skilful preparation of plant-based dishes an aspiration for up-and-coming chefs. For these and other inspiring conversation topics, the full podcast will be released online today, and can be downloaded or streamed online from HERE
About Footprint Intelligence
Footprint is the UK’s leading sustainability and ESG expert in the food and drink industry. For over a decade we have been the catalyst of debate, shifting the dial of the ESG agenda in the industry significantly. Through our media channels, forums, conferences, awards, research and consultancy, Footprint provides knowledge, insights and practical support to the sector. Footprint intelligence aids businesses in tackling complex ESG challenges, is the number one community for sustainability leaders and remains the only conduit connecting the whole supply and operational chain, government, academics, media and NGO’s.
For more interesting facts and ideas about sustainable diets, and how you and your business can start shifting towards a more sustainable future, take a look at our plant-based page for more details.
1. https://yougov.co.uk/topics/consumer/articles-reports/2019/03/26/flexit…
