There are also arguments that food waste quantification in itself is an intervention, since those who perform the quantification become aware of the issue and its magnitude, and start to change their behaviour. Tests on this issue in 735 hotels and restaurants, primarily based in Sweden and Norway, found that 61% of the catering units had reduced their waste and that initial waste per guest was the most altered factor, since the staff had the largest opportunities for its reduction (Eriksson et al., 2019).
Filimonau and Coteau (2019) concluded that managers or similar staff
need to reflect on their role. Since kitchen staff are those who decide and
are responsible for activities and decision making on the floor, by
determining what food to order and cook and how to serve it, they have
expert knowledge in relation to causes of food waste generation. Moreover,
Filimonau and Coteau (2019) argue that the underlying causes are
connected to the challenges of effective mitigation, for instance
irresponsible consumer behaviour brings about large food wastage, but
managing consumer behaviour in the hospitality context can be difficult
due to high competition, volatile customer loyalty and limited in-house
resources. The challenges of food waste reduction can be categorised as
internal or external to operations, depending on the extent of control
managers can exert. The willingness of managers to address waste
challenges is in turn determined by their beliefs on the value/benefits of
food waste reduction. Food waste challenges are costs to businesses that
need to be carefully evaluated when deciding on mitigation options.
underlying data (associated with the method of choice) when aggregating data on national level and comparing results (Grolleaud, 2002; Caldeira et al., 2019). The current strategy to monitor food waste across the food supply chain in the European context is reflected within the European Commission delegated decision (EU) 2019/1597 that covers the topic of a common methodology and minimum quality requirements for the uniform measurement of levels of food waste. The requirement is that amounts of food waste must be measured in metric tons of fresh mass by either direct measurement, performing a mass balance, waste composition analysis, counting/scanning items or using diaries or coefficients (a representative number for a sector based on secondary data). Further, the measurements conducted must be based on a representative sample of the population to which its results are applied, and adequately reflect the variations in the data on food waste amounts to be measured (European Commission, 2019)
The key here is that there is a balance between robust quantification and feasible quantification and that there can be large variation between e.g.
direct measurement and diaries or secondary data and type of data available. Swedish public catering organisations represent a unique opportunity in this context, since they have been active in quantifying food waste by direct observations for years (even if organisations often focus quantification on a couple of weeks per semester) and since the quantification data are publicly available for study as they fall under the Swedish Public Access to Information and Secrecy Act (Swedish Parliament, 2009). This means that it is possible to study how different aggregations would affect the results when scaled to national level and how this changes over time with relatively high precision, since many organisations and canteens are active with food waste quantification.
As a way to make it easy for both kitchens and organisations to quantify
food waste, the Swedish National Food Agency has established a
quantification standard for the public catering sector that includes both
standardised nomenclature (as described in Table 2) and a suggestion on
how to quantify waste, which means that kitchens and organisations can
compare themselves on equal terms (Swedish National Food Agency,
2019c). The quantification standard aligns well with that proposed by
Eriksson et al. (2018b), which puts weight on flexibility and comparability,
but with the notable difference that the National Food Agency’s standard
does not go deeper than the process level (kitchen waste, serving waste, plate waste).
Apart from that, the National Food Agency’s standard defines waste processes such as kitchen waste (either aggregated or as separate sub-processes), serving waste and plate waste. It also requires number of guests to be recorded, together with the amount of mass thrown away in each waste process. This makes it possible to calculate the relative indicator
‘waste per guest’ and to allocate waste to the different processes, so that kitchens get an understanding of where they have the largest potential for improvement. Under the standard, it is possible to record the amount of food served and hence derive the indicator ‘waste in relation to mass of food served’. It is also possible to monitor the amount of food consumed (as a proxy at least).
However, the National Food Agency’s quantification standard does not consider liquid waste and omits certain food items, such as bread and butter, with the aim of making the standard more practical. Another simplification to make the standard easier to handle is that if the amount of food served is quantified, it is enough to quantify one container of each component (if they are somewhat equal) and then multiply the weight by the total number of containers of each component.
While standards and frameworks to quantify food waste are relatively new, food waste quantification is not completely new for canteens and kitchens. A survey conducted by the organisation School Food Sweden (Skolmat Sverige) in 2012 showed that about half of Swedish schools quantified food waste at a frequency of one week per semester or more at that time (School Food Sweden, 2013). A later study conducted in 2018 showed that 160 of 290 Swedish municipalities quantified food in some form. According to the study, they most commonly quantified serving and plate waste from school lunches during two weeks per year. The first municipality to quantify food waste started measurements in 2000, but only 17 municipalities had started on quantification before 2010 and a rapid expansion has taken place in the past decade (Eriksson et al., 2018a). All this quantification work has taken place without official guidelines or policies requiring the municipalities and their canteens to do so.
Since the launch of the National Food Agency’s food quantification
standard, two major mappings of the food waste situation within Swedish
public catering have taken place. The first mapping, which involved 211 of
290 municipalities contributing some kind of data, indicated a median waste level of 60-70 g per portion served, excluding drink, and was a combined result for both preschools and schools (Swedish National Food Agency, 2019a). In the second mapping, in 2020, fewer municipalities participated (159 of 290) and the conclusion was that in order to detect any trends, food waste needs to be monitored over a more extended period (Swedish National Food Agency, 2020b). Both mappings revealed large variations in reported levels of food waste between different organisations.
The National Food Agency collects food waste data by asking municipalities to complete a survey on how much food waste the organisation produces in aggregated terms. This means that potentially valuable information gets lost in the aggregation process. At present, no hospitals and no actors in the private sector are encompassed by the Agency’s mapping. Instead, the official food waste figures for Sweden are the responsibility of the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, which monitors the situation every other year. According to the latest report, restaurants and hotels account for around 65,000 tonnes of food waste per annum and the public catering sector generates around 33,000 tonnes (Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, 2022)
Since there is interest from both the food industry and authorities in
addressing food waste, a negotiated agreement between actors is underway
in Sweden. It is similar to the existing agreements in Norway and UK
(KuttMatsvinn, 2020; WRAP, 2021b). In this process, data collection is an
important aspect to track whether the agreement has any effect and find
potential hotspots to target across the value chain (IVL, 2020). To this end,
Strid (2019) proposed a national data centre for food waste data collection
that can help to identify hotspots and monitor developments.
The material used for the analyses in Papers I, II and V was food waste data. Paper II used a subset of these data, but with additional collected data on parameters for identification and modelling of risk factors. The material used for Paper III consisted of measured data on the number of guests and metadata on the canteens, to understand demand dynamics. Paper IV used food waste quantifications as a basis for evaluating four interventions of different complexity designed to reduce food waste in school canteens.
Paper V focused on the changes in food waste over time. The principal
ways in which the material and methods are linked are shown in Figure 4.
