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Carole Scott2025-11-20 11:42:492025-11-20 11:44:49New 3Keel webinar: Addressing deforestationCASE STUDY WWF UK/SODEXO GROUP
Helping the Food Service Sector deliver sustainable eating
Photo: © Sabrina Bqain / WWF
Globally, the food service sector is expected to be worth US$ 330.3 billion by 2028. The industry includes businesses, institutions, organisations and companies that prepare meals outside the home.
The scale of the sector means that concerted efforts from food service organisations to drive sustainable meal choices could have a transformational impact on diets globally. This has potential to influence the social norms that filter down to our food choices at home.
WWF has been working with food services company, Sodexo, for over a decade. As part of the partnership, they are looking at how the sector can leverage its unique position to accelerate the shift towards healthy, sustainable diets.
The brief
In 2023, WWF and Sodexo needed a partner to investigate what key actions food service companies can take with clients to catalyse this shift. Client organisations include universities, hospitals and private business.
The output needed to be practical and useful for food service businesses. It would need to consider the dynamics of the relationship between provider and client, highlighting the barriers to change, and set out practical actions to take – levers to pull on.
The work
We began the project by determining which potential levers of change the sector could use, based on our sectoral knowledge of sustainability strategy and implementation in the food service sector. Informed by a systems approach, we designed a new framework. This sets out how these levers could be deployed in a complementary way by a range of actors within food service organisations in collaboration with clients. While helping customers to make healthy choices is at the heart of change, we focused much of our research on what else is required to support those choices. This ranges from staff training to organisational strategy to government and sector-wide support.
Our resulting framework is structured around five categories:
- Foundational enablers, such as embedding sustainability and nutrition commitments into organisational strategy and setting KPIs.
- Staff engagement levers, mainly focused on training.
- Value chain engagement levers, such as designing contracts that support a sustainability agenda.
- Customer engagement levers around behavioural change strategies, such as positioning and presentation of different menu choices.
- External stakeholder engagement including partnerships and advocacy.
The Levers
For each of the levers, we determined who within food service companies is responsible for driving change and implementing the actions. This includes teams responsible for sustainability, marketing, procurement, menu management, front of house, as well as senior leaders.
We considered the challenges companies may face when trying to implement recommended actions. Potential issues included leadership communications, data collection, costs associated with new training programmes, the need for cultural sensitivity when promoting dietary change, adapting global targets to local settings, and more. We covered tips and guidance on how best to overcome such challenges.
The report detailed how the levers can work together and approaches to the sequencing of actions to achieve change. We recommended that:
- Embedding the foundational enablers across every level of the business is a key first step
- Addressing multiple levers simultaneously will bring the strongest results
- Operational context is key to successful implementation
- Sectoral collaboration and transparency can accelerate the pace of change.
Our work was based on 3Keel’s expertise and sectoral knowledge around food systems sustainability. It tapped into academic and industry research. We also conducted interviews with key foodservice stakeholders to ground-truth our approach and provide case studies. Throughout the process, we worked closely with colleagues at both WWF and Sodexo to co-author a final output that meets the aims of the collaboration.
The outputs
The final report, ‘Sustainable eating: Pulling the levers in food service’ set out a practical framework to think through actions that will support the food service sector to put sustainable meals at the heart of operations. This could be achieved through internal environmental targets, staff training and engagement, embedding nutrition and sustainability criteria into client and supplier contracts. It could involve a greater focus on enabling and encouraging as many customers as possible to make healthier and more sustainable choices.
In addition to the report, WWF held a webinar, showcasing the report to a range of stakeholders across the food sector. Julian Cottee (former 3Keel consultant) presented 3Keel’s work, alongside Lisa Huggins, Food Service Sustainable Diets Manager at WWF UK, and Lloyd Mann, Sodexo Global Executive Chef and Culinary Vice President.
The report continues to inform WWF’s work in partnership with Sodexo, and its engagement with the food service sector on sustainable diets.
Read the full report here
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