Project

Call for Partners | FUEL: Fostering a Unique out-of-home Environment for Long-term healthy & sustainable choices for consumers

There is an urge to accelerate dietary changes for health and environmental- and for corporate social responsibility reasons. The food that is being offered and consumed has an important role to play in the solution to these challenges, and service staff members in out-of-home settings can be seen as important change agents. This project will empower the staff community with sustainable implementation of effective interventions, concrete staff engagement tools, and new insights in establishing a distinctive organisation profile to stimulate customers (clients) to make sustainable and healthy food choices.

We are looking for partners to join us in a public-private partnership. As a partner you will:

  1. Gain new insights into the short- and longer-term implementation and effects of interventions in out-of-home settings to stimulate sustainable and healthy food choices;
  2. Receive concrete tools to further boost the facilitation of sustainable and healthier dietary choices in out-of- home settings by engaging all staff members, providing concrete suggestions to increase compliance with upcoming regulations and guidelines regarding corporate social and sustainability responsibility;
  3. Gain new insights to establish a distinctive organisation profile facilitating sustainable and healthy food choices supporting the transition needed and in communication strategies

A transition to more sustainable and healthy eating patterns in the Netherlands and internationally is urgently needed, both to preserve the planet and to tackle diverse health related issues such as rising numbers of people with chronic diseases and accompanying health care costs. Changing eating patterns of consumers, however, is difficult and the current food environment mostly tempts to eat unhealthy and unsustainable. Out-of-home settings, where the food offer is determined by the caterer or purchaser, can play an important role in improving consumers’ food choices by offering healthier and more sustainable food choices, with possible positive spill-over effects to the home-setting. The effectiveness of implementing sustainable and healthy food choices in these settings is, at least partly, dependent on the extent to which they are accepted and implemented by the staff community. A vision on sustainable and healthy eating behaviour in the organisation as well as sufficient motivation, knowledge, skills and opportunities of kitchen and service staff are crucial.

A former PPP on this theme showed that staff especially needed information (knowledge) and skills on sustainable food choices in addition to the opportunity. The aim of this PPP is to investigate together with organizations and companies how their staff community could be supported in selecting relevant and promising interventions (such as changes in food assortment, communication strategies or nudging strategies), sustainably implement these and measure the short and longer term effects on the employees’ implementation of the interventions, on clients’ food choices in these settings, and on possible spill-over effects to other settings.

Partners

We are looking for organizations and companies where food is provided to consumers, such as a restaurant, kiosk, hospital, or child day-care, and caterers, food suppliers and food producers that supply to these settings. We aim to apply for the TKI-A&F PPS Agri & Food grant call (deadline 1 Sept. 2024), which means a financial contribution of 50% from the industrial partners (25% cash, 25% in kind) and 50% governmental contribution. This call is open to Dutch and international partners. This PPP will be a joint project between WFBR, WECR and Louis Bolk Instituut.