Public Food Service Research Articles

MedDietMenus4Campus: Integrating Views from Nutrition, Marketing and Psychology to Improve Diets

Abstract Food service is an important setting for public health interventions, educating consumers and modulating behaviours through the meals provided. Social Marketing is one of the strategies designed to promote behaviour change, which contributions to health and well-being of consumers are widely recognised. This project aims to identify the compliance of food service menus with the Mediterranean Diet (MD) in public high education institutes (HEI) canteens, pinpointing opportunities to intervene, namely: 1) promoting changes in the food offer addressing proximity to the MD, creating, and offering plant-based meals, with seasonable and local food products and 2) developing tailored social marketing strategies to engage stakeholders to encourage healthier and sustainable food habits. It gathers a team comprised of nutrition experts on public health and food service, food technologists, gastronomy experts, psychologists, and marketers. To achieve the objectives researchers will: 1) develop an index to evaluate compliance of menus with the MD; 2) define priority stakeholders and define a methodology for engagement; 3) evaluate perceptions, barriers and facilitators; 4) develop a meal plan framework; 5) develop a new food concept “student bag” (meal on the go) and test it for industry scale-up; 6) use previous diagnosis to develop social marketing strategies directed to stakeholders and consumers to achieve food behaviour change and 7) measure the impacts of the implemented strategies. This research intends to create and implement a new healthy and sustainable food service concept, expecting to define the standpoint to inspire other food service settings to achieve an effective and sustainable food offer change and positively influence food service consumers’ food pattern towards Mediterranean recommendations, while addressing the Sustainable Development Goals (3 - good health and 12 - responsible consumption and production; 17 - partnerships for the goals).

Schools' green restaurant assessment (S-GRASS): From validating an instrument to identifying sustainable practices in schools food services

School food services can potentially promote changes in the food system to make it healthier and more sustainable. They can dictate which foods to buy and how to acquire, produce, and distribute them, favoring the production of meals based on sustainable nutrition. The study aimed to obtain an instrument to identify sustainability practices in school food services, covering the five dimensions of sustainable nutrition. The preliminary instrument's version underwent content validation and semantic evaluation. Reliability was assessed by evaluating 23 school food services for interobserver reproducibility and 148 for internal consistency in the Federal District and the State of Mato Grosso (Brazil). The instrument was composed of 76 items divided into 3 sections (1. Water, energy, and gas supply; 2. Menu and food waste; 3. Reduction of waste, construction materials, chemicals, employees and social sustainability). The instrument showed excellent results in content validation, semantic evaluation, and interobserver reproducibility (ICC = 0.949) and reasonable results for internal consistency (KR-20 = 0.660). Evaluating public and private school food services, they showed low sustainability scores in the general instrument (26.93 ± 4.87) and in all 3 sections (1 = 9.97 ± 1.67; 2 = 9.16 ± 2.54; 3 = 7.80 ± 2.39). Section 3 was the one in which school food services performed the worst. Some practices seem consolidated, such as employee attitudes towards reducing water and energy use, recycling cooking oil, offering vegetables and fruits regularly and encouraging diners to reduce waste. Public and private school food services in the Federal District had better results than those in the State of Mato Grosso (31.86 ± 4.63 versus 25.35 ± 3.76). The instrument has strengths, considering its excellent results for content validation, semantic evaluation, and interobserver reproducibility. For internal consistency, the result is believed to reflect the recent topic within school food services. The low performance of school food services points to the need for specific legislation on sustainability, greater planning and investments at the management level, and the execution and recording of activities at the operational level.

What Is Quality Food? The Opinion of Key of the Brazilian Food System.

The aim of the study was to explore the concept of quality food in the opinion of key informants of the food system. This qualitative research included 208 key informants related to the food supply for Brazilian public food services. The participants were grouped into three groups according to their participation in the food system: 1. Food production; 2. Management and marketing; 3. Meal's production process. Key informants answered the following question: "In your opinion, what is quality food?". The answers were analysed through qualitative content analysis. The data analysis resulted in 52 codes grouped into eight categories, expressing the opinion of the study participants about what quality food is: nutritional, sustainable, sensory, hygienic-sanitary, care, regulatory, dependability and symbolic. Nutritional and sustainable dimensions were predominantly considered. The activities carried out in the food system seem to influence the opinion on food quality. The groups linked to food production put more emphasis on the sustainable dimension, followed by the nutritional dimension, while the groups linked to management and marketing and to the meals production process put more emphasis on the nutritional and sensory dimensions. These differences may indicate a difficulty in the transition towards a more sustainable and healthy food system.

Tracking progress toward a climate-friendly public food service strategy: assessing nutritional quality and carbon footprint changes in childcare centers

BackgroundPublic food procurement and catering are recognized as important leverage points in promoting sustainable and healthy dietary habits. This study aimed to analyze changes in nutritional quality and carbon footprint (CF) of food service in childcare centers in the City of Copenhagen from 2018 to 2022, following a new climate-friendly food strategy in 2019. The strategy has a target of decreasing the CF of municipal food service by 25% before 2025 compared to a 2018 baseline.MethodsKey initiatives in the municipality’s strategy included creating guidelines for food-service providers to reduce their CF while ensuring meal nutritional quality and providing food professionals an advisory process to develop necessary competencies.In this quasi-experimental study, food procurement data from Copenhagen’s childcare centers (n = 356 [2022]) from 2018 and 2022 were combined with CF and nutrient composition data. Dietary CF and food and nutrient content were calculated per 10 MJ of energy and compared to guideline targets. Furthermore, data for 2022 were analyzed separately for institutions that had received an advisory process (n = 87) and those that had not yet (n = 269).ResultsOn average, the CF of the food procurement decreased by 15%, mainly driven by a decrease in ruminant meat purchases (-37%). While the procurement of plant-based protein sources (pulses, nuts, seeds) increased by 25%, it was still considerably below targets. Nutrient content did not substantially change, and recommendations for calcium, iron, vitamin D, sodium, and total and saturated fat were not met in either measurement year. Institutions that had received an advisory process had a 14% lower CF in 2022 than institutions that had not.ConclusionsWith the observed 15% CF reduction, Copenhagen’s childcare centers are on track to reach the 25% reduction goal outlined in the municipality’s food strategy by 2025. Nutritional quality was largely unchanged, but further efforts to increase especially the consumption of plant-based protein sources, while simultaneously reducing meat and animal-based fat, and maintaining sufficient dairy consumption, are needed to improve nutritional quality and reach the target CF reduction in the coming years. Providing training for food professionals could play an important role in seeing the changes through.

Knowledge, Attitude, and Practices on Food Safety among Food Handlers Working in Public Food Service Establishments in Lemi Kura Subcity, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Foodborne diseases, resulting from poor food handling and sanitation practices, are common public health problems globally. The primary contributing factors to potential foodborne disease outbreaks are often attributed to the poor perception and practices of food handlers regarding food safety. This study is aimed at assessing the knowledge, attitude, and practices of food handlers working in public food service establishments in Lemi Kura subcity, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. A cross-sectional study was conducted from December 2022 to September 2023, involving 400 food handlers from 20 randomly selected public food service establishments. Data were collected using a structured interview-administered questionnaire and an observational checklist. The collected data were entered into Microsoft Excel and then transferred to SPSS version 20 for analysis. Descriptive statistics were employed to summarize the data, and Pearson's chi-square test was used to evaluate the association of sociodemographic factors with the knowledge, attitude, and practices of food handlers towards food safety. Of the 400 food handlers, 65.5% had good knowledge about food safety. All food handlers were knowledgeable that washing hand before handling food will reduce risk of poisoning, bacteria are the main cause of food poisoning, and temperature plays a big role in bacterial growth. This study also revealed that 65.3% of the food handlers had good attitude towards food safety and 55.3% of food handlers had good food handling practice. Based on the observation, 38.5% of food handlers had good food handling practice. Taking training, age, and work experience of food handlers have statistically significant (P < 0.05) association with good attitude towards food safety. Additionally, taking training, educational level, employment, and work experience of food handlers have statistically significant (P < 0.05) association with good practice towards food safety. However, there was no statistically significant association between all sociodemographic factors and knowledge about food safety. Good knowledge and attitude were also associated with good food handling practices of the respondents. Based on the observation, there was a statistically significant association between employment status and good food handling practice. In conclusion, the findings suggest the necessity for implementing formal educational and training programs aimed at positively influencing the knowledge and attitude of food handlers, subsequently improving their food handling practices.

Learning to relocalize: institutional entrepreneurs as transformative agents in public food services

ABSTRACT We explore purposive institutional change and the role of institutional entrepreneurs in initiating and driving relational learning processes. Supplementing new institutionalist theory with an institutional learning lens and using a longitudinal set of rich qualitative interview and observation data, we investigate how institutional entrepreneurs engage in transformational work to effectuate change in dominant institutional logics, thus transforming the institutional field. We propose that institutional entrepreneurs, by skilfully utilizing discursive and material practices to catalyze reciprocal learning processes, can introduce a new institutional logic and ensure its adoption and internalization by pivotal actors and stakeholders. We illustrate these dynamics using a municipality situated in Northern Finland as an example. The municipality has successfully managed to transform its food services as part of efforts to develop more sustainable regional economies and communities. It offers a rare case of successful purposive institutional change and an interesting best practice example both nationally and internationally.

Changes in food purchase, consumption and handling during COVID-19 pandemic among single person households.

As a new type of consumer subject in the market that was formerly dominated by multiple person families, single households are driving the change in the buying structure. Food purchase activities have undergone significant changes since the outbreak of the COVID-19. The objective of this study was to assess and compare variations in food consumption, purchase and handling during the COVID-19 pandemic between single person households (SPH) and multiple person households. A cross-sectional study conducted among 211 individuals in communities in Harris and Waller Counties, Texas. Sociodemographic, food purchase, food consumption and food handling activities during the COVID-19 pandemic were assessed with a validated COVID-19 Nutrition questionnaire. Non-Hispanic Black participants constituted 42.6%, and 28.4% were Hispanics. Participants were made up of mostly aged 18-24 years (39.3%), 47.9% single household composition, 30.4% in full time employment, and 29.1% partook in food assistance programs. A large proportion of them had never used grocery pickup services, online grocery shopping and a farmers' market. During the COVID-19 pandemic, majority of the participants used more of large supermarkets, restaurant/fast food, and online grocery but food consumption seemed to remain the same for the majority of participants. For beverages, majority of participants consumed more water, less soda, and no alcohol. There was a significant association between single person household and higher restaurant/fast foods purchase. Many of the participants reported weight gain and less physical activity during the pandemic. Restaurant meal purchases was more prevalent in single-person families. The results from the study have the potential to contribute to how public policy officials, food service, and health authorities forecast how different categories of consumers will react in pandemics and may be used to inform area-specific alleviation strategies to minimize the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and future events.

Spatiotemporal analysis of bike-share demand using DTW-based clustering and predictive analytics

This paper investigates bike-share activities and explores their relationships with neighborhood features, advancing our current knowledge for integrating cycle facilities into urban space to support first/last-mile mobility. To identify distinct demand patterns, bike stations are clustered based on time-series ridership. Measuring the similarity between time-series data in the transportation field should take into account the influence of phase difference because similar demands happening in the morning and in the afternoon should be considered dissimilar. This study uses a weighted Dynamic Time Warping to address this issue by assigning a larger weight to data points with a larger time difference, enabling a more realistic measure to compare ridership. Using bike-share trip data from Citi Bike, we identified eight station clusters, each of which exhibits unique temporal activities. We further integrated the locations of various points of interest to explore the profiles of the clusters. Bike stations that are closer to public transport, commercial buildings and food service establishments are generally more popular, suggesting that incorporating spatial contexts can develop a richer understanding of bike-share usage. In addition, this study goes beyond descriptive analytics by investigating the role of neighborhood features in predicting cluster memberships of bike stations. Our results show that non-tree-based models, such as Support Vector Machines and K-Nearest Neighbors, outperform tree-based models. This study provides valuable insights for both urban planners and bike-share operators. When assessing the potential of new bike-share infrastructure, urban planners can deploy our models to identify the cluster-specific demand pattern based on neighborhood features. Bike-share operators can also utilize our findings to identify neighborhoods that require strategic supply of bikes and parking space that may vary within a day.

Food Waste in Public Food Service Sector—Surplus and Leftovers

Food waste occurs at various stages of the food supply chain, starting from the production stage on farms to processing, distribution, and consumption. It is an important global problem that has social, environmental, ethical, and economic costs. The present work aims to discuss the differences in waste generated from surpluses or leftovers, the monitoring systems of food waste in public food services, and the good practices to reduce food waste. Besides the accessible knowledge about reducing waste, tonnes of food were daily discarded and wasted. To achieve a sustainable food system, food waste must be reduced significantly. Collaborative efforts are necessary to achieve significant reductions in food waste for achieving SDG 12.3 in public food services. Thus, policies that support or enforce larger implementation of best practices are needed. Knowledge about food waste is important to change attitudes and behaviors toward surplus food and leftovers. Some best practices can include promoting awareness campaigns to educate staff about the impact of food waste and the best practices to reduce it, including information on proper storage, portion control, and meal planning; implementing inventory management systems; donating surplus food via collaboration with food banks and charities; optimizing portion sizes, ensuring they are adequate and manageable for customers, reducing the likelihood of leftover food on the plate; allowing customers to order smaller quantities or share a meal; providing packaging to allow customers take their leftovers home for later consumption. The procedures to be adopted by public food services should provide guidance for the selection of products that can be donated. However, specific temperature requirements depending on the food category should be complied with. This paper enlarges the understanding of surpluses and leftovers and the best practices that could be implemented in public food services to minimize food waste.

A Campylobacteriosis Outbreak Caused by One Asymptomatic Food Handler Carrier

In August 2021, three students with diarrhea from the same school visited a local hospital in the S district of Beijing. An epidemic investigation showed that there were more students with diarrhea in the same school and they had one meal together. Campylobacter jejuni was isolated from both patients with diarrhea and asymptomatic food handlers; however, the latter also carried Campylobacter coli. Phylogenomic analysis showed that there was a campylobacteriosis outbreak among the students, and the asymptomatic food handler may have been the source of the infection. Routine inspection and surveillance for Campylobacter is needed for the food producing staff, particularly those cooking in the cafeteria in schools or other public food services.

Consideration of the national communicative behavior features in the public food service when teaching Russian to Chinese students

The article is devoted to the relationship between the linguistic and cultural aspects of communicative behavior and their consideration in the content of teaching Russian as a foreign language. The object of our study is the norms and traditions of everyday behavior of Russian and Chinese culture representatives in the field of public food service. The purpose of the study is to compare Russian and Chinese traditions of communicative behavior in the gastronomic field, to determine the level of ethnocultural and linguistic knowledge of international students in this study area, to identify the relationship between their level of knowledge and the development of the students’ intercultural communicative competence, which is an integral characteristic of the personality. We aim to substantiate the need to take into account the features of the national communicative behavior in the field of public food service in the content of teaching the Russian language to Chinese students. The study was conducted using the methods of the analysis of scientific and educational literature on the research problem, the survey of 962 students from higher educational institutions of China, mathematical processing of the obtained data and a comparative analysis. Quantitative and substantive processing of the survey data showed considerable differences in the norms and traditions of Russian and Chinese culture representatives in this study area, a low level of students’ ethnocultural knowledge, a high level of students’ lexical knowledge in the field of public food service and cultural barriers affecting the level of Chinese students’ intercultural communicative competence development. The article comes to the conclusion about the need to take into account the communicative-behavioral aspect of everyday life culture and the norms and traditions of Russian and Chinese cultures in the field of public food service in teaching Russian as a foreign language. Research prospects are connected with the development of the educational interactive platform “Gastronomic trip through time”.

Analysis of Tourism Infrastructures of Lori Region

Key words: hospitality industry, accommodation facilities, tourist attraction, transport services The article represents current state and analysis of tourism infrastructures in Lori Region as an important factor in the development of tourism. Since tourism is one of the important keys to the economic development of the region now, it’s quite necessary to study and evaluate the current state of tourism infrastructures, the degree of their development as well as the possibilities of use. Lori Region is famous for its unique nature and rich historical and cultural resources, which have great potential as a tourist attraction. However, because of insufficient coverage and weak development of those infrastructures it has remained a passive field of tourism for a long time. At the same time, it should be noted that the constantly increasing number of tourists in Lori Region indicates the growing pace of tourism, which has been greatly facilitated by the recent infrastructure development. The quality of hotel resorts, guest houses, public foodservice, transport services and roads has improved significantly. We’ve analyzed and assessed the hospitality industry, transport and oublic catering industry services, entertainment facilities and their activities, significance and location. In our study, we highlighted both the advantages and the gaps in the operation of the tourism infrastructures, and offered several recommendations for their regulation. Having analyzed the subject matter we came to the conclusion that the region needs serious investments for the development of tourism infrastructures. Only if the infrastructure network, which includes hotels, restaurants, transportation, communication, and other service facilities, is upgraded can the region’s tourism development prospects be fully realized.

Mississippi School Food Service Directors' Interest and Experience With Local Food Procurement and Farm to School Activities.

The purpose of this study was to collect updated school food service purchasing practices from K-12 public school food service directors (SFSD) in Mississippi and to determine their current abilities, experiences, and desires to engage in Farm to School (F2S) activities. The online survey was created using questionnaire items from existing F2S surveys. The survey opened in October 2021 and closed in January 2022. Descriptive statistics were used to summarize the data. Of the 173 SFSD sent email invitations, 122 (71%) completed the survey. The most common fresh fruit and vegetable purchasing practices included Department of Defense Fresh Program (65%) and produce vendor (64%). Forty-three percent of SFSD purchased at least one locally sourced fruit and 40% purchased at least one locally sourced vegetable, while 46% did not purchase any locally sourced foods. The most common challenges for purchasing from farmers included no relationship with farmers (50%) and food safety regulations (39%). Sixty-four percent of SFSD were interested in at least one F2S activity. Most SFSD do not purchase local foods directly from farmers and almost half do not purchase any local foods regardless of source. Lack of connection with local farmers is a significant challenge to F2S. Recently proposed framework by USDA for shoring up the food supply chain and transforming the food system may help reduce or remove ongoing challenges to F2S participation.

Evaluation of Waste in Food Services: A Structural Equation Analysis Using Behavioral and Operational Factors

To make the activities of food service companies more sustainable, it is essential to continuously improve their production processes. Understanding which factors are associated with the phenomenon of waste, as well as how they are causally related, is essential for proposing more effective actions to mitigate it. However, the vast majority of studies consider only the analysis of behavioral factors in food waste. To fill this gap, this work evaluates the behavioral and operational dimensions of the phenomenon studied, assessing the implications of the interdependence and causality relations for the respective factors of these dimensions, bringing a broader perspective to the waste problem. The behavioral dimension is developed from the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) (Motivation (MO), Intention (IN), and Waste Behavior (CD)) associated with the operational aspects, which are treated in this study as Opportunity (OP), Ability (HB), and Waste Control and Management (CGD), through the use of structural equation modeling (SEM) using the partial least squares in a public food service establishment. The sample size was calculated using the GPower calculator. The composition of the sample was defined considering (i) public profile; (ii) definition of the number of indicators; and (iii) definition of the power of the statistical test and the effect of exogenous variables (f2). Contact was made by sending an email. A return of 102 respondents was obtained. A minimum value of 86 observations was necessary to achieve a statistical power of 80% to identify R2. Highlighting the participation of some indicators, Situational Factors 36%, Environmental Beliefs 29%, Health Risks 40%, Training 35%, and Technical Skills 42%, have a strong influence on the average variance extracted (AVE) in their constructs. The proposed model showed the importance of alignment between the factors of the behavioral and operational dimensions in view of improvements in production processes and reduction of waste in food service units.

Public Food Service Field Vocabulary in the Content of Teaching Russian Language to Chinese Students

Public Food Service Field Vocabulary in the Content of Teaching Russian Language to Chinese Students

Public food service communication field in the Chinese students’ linguistic consciousness: ethnocultural barriers and obstacles

The authors identify, classify and methodologically interpret communicative barriers and interferences arising for Chinese students in the sphere of catering, which is a fundamentally important culturally marked area of social and everyday communication. The relevance of this study is due to the significance and complexity of this social everyday sphere for the consciousness of foreign students, who face significant communicative barriers and obstacles that require methodological interpretation and consideration in the content of teaching Russian as a foreign language. The aims of this work are to identify and methodo- logically interpret communicative barriers of Chinese students in everyday communication (on the material of catering sphere), and to establish their correlations with the phenomena of lexical asymmetry. The main methods used in the research: mathematical processing of the obtained data, questionnaires, component analysis of vocabulary and comparison. The research material includes the results of the questionnaire aimed at identifying the barriers and obstacles encountered by Chinese students in the field of catering. It was determined that barriers and interference related to catering communication occurred for more than 75% of the students. Quantitative and meaningful processing of the questionnaire materials demonstrated that barriers and interference appeared in three main aspects: ethnographic, ethno- psychological, and ethnolinguistic. Methodologically oriented interpretation of communicative barriers is based on their correlation with the facts of the language. The integrative approach to the word taking into account its linguistic and extra-linguistic content determined which components of its structure translate ethnographic, ethnopsychological and ethnolinguistic differences of Russian and Chinese linguistic cultures that create communicative barriers. That is why the process of Russian language teaching considers conceptual, proper-lexical, semantic, connotative, background and contextual lacunas. Considering asymmetrical phenomena in the content of vocabulary teaching allows reducing the level of ethnographic, ethnopsychological and ethnolinguistic barriers and hindrances that arise for Chinese students in the sphere of catering. The prospects of the research include creation of the training dictionary “Gastronomic Culture Code in Language Vocabulary,” aimed at the Chinese students studying Russian.

Factors interfering with the adoption of good hygiene practices in public school food services in Bahia, Brazil.

This cross-sectional study aimed to identify factors that interfere with the adoption of good hygiene practices in public school food services (SFS) in Bahia, Brazil. The search was conducted in public schools in Bahia/Brazil. Data collection included (i) evaluation of the adoption of Good Practices in school food services through visual observation and registration in the checklist in Good Hygienic Practices in School Food Services; (ii) Identification of schools' foodservice physical areas and environmental comfort measures; (iii) identification of sociodemographic and occupational characteristics and assessment of attitudes and level of knowledge in food hygiene. The minimum sample of 158 schools (confidence level of 95% and an error of 5%) was stratified considering the total number of districts (areas) and the schools' number per area. The data were analyzed using the Statistical Package for Science—SPSS® in version 26.0. The categorical variables were described as frequencies and percentages, and the quantitative variables as mean and standard deviation. Chi-square, Kruskal-Wallis with Tukey's post-hoc tests were used to examine qualitative variables. Independent Student t-test and ANOVA with Tukey's post-hoc tests were used to examine quantitative variables. Categorical variables were evaluated by Pearson Chi-squared tests. The Pearson test was used to analyze the correlation between Attitude and knowledge. The classification of the sanitary status was of moderate risk in 74.8% (n = 119) of the SFS (51-75% of compliance) and 25.2% (n = 40) at high risk (26-50% compliance). The average percentage of compliance for the 159 SFS in the municipality was 50.23%, obtaining a high-risk classification (26–50% compliance). In the SFS, the absence of dry goods' storage, meat preparation area, and storage of residues in more than 98% of schools was observed. Accessing attitudes, 1.4% (n = 2) of the food handlers were classified as unsatisfactory (0 to 49% of correct answers), 8.5% (n = 12) as satisfactory with restriction (50–69% of correct answers) and 90.1% (n = 128) as satisfactory. There was no correlation between Attitude and Knowledge level (p = 0.394). Considering the knowledge level, the item with the highest and lowest number of hits were: “To avoid food contamination, I wash and disinfect my hands before preparing food” and “Contaminated food will always have some change in color, smell, or taste”. There was a significant difference in the level of knowledge considering mean wage (p = 0.000), time working in school food service (p = 0.001), weekly workday (p = 0.000), and participation in food hygiene training (p = 0.000). Therefore, factors that interfered in adopting good practices in the SFS were: inadequate physical structure, absence of areas in the SFS, and absence/low number of equipment to control the production process in the cold and hot chain. Food handlers showed satisfactory attitudes and level of knowledge. However, the physical structure of the SFS compromises the adoption of good practices. It risks the safety of the food served to students at the evaluated public schools.

Food consumption and plate waste study in a public hospital food service in Natal, RN, Brazil

Aiming to better understand the food waste and eating habits of diners, this study determined, by sex, food consumption and plate waste in the lunch meal served to employees at a public hospital in Natal, RN, Brazil, during one week. Men consumed 34% more than women did. The average consumption of the week by men and women was 469 g. Women wasted, on average, 9% of what they placed on their plates, or 39 g per day. Men wasted, on average, 5% of what they placed on their plates, discarding 34 grams of food per day. According to these results, women wasted 4% more than men did. The average PW% of the week was of 7.7% (37 g per capita per day). The food wasted during the 5 days of distribution would have been enough to serve lunch to a total of 122 diners. The data here provided are useful for several reasons, as this study may be used as reference to evaluate food waste more accurately in the food service, to elaborate educational material to create awareness among diners and food service professionals, and to estimate the financial impact of food waste on the budget. One of the highlights of this study is the provision of data on the consumption and plate waste (% and in grams) not only by the whole population studied, but discriminated considering women and men, which is not the most conventional way presented by studies.

Food consumption and plate waste study in a public hospital food service in Natal, RN, Brazil

Food consumption and plate waste study in a public hospital food service in Natal, RN, Brazil

From Old Habits to New Routines—A Case Study of Food Waste Generation and Reduction in Four Swedish Schools

Public food service organizations are large producers of food waste, which leads to greenhouse gas emissions and the waste of natural resources. The aim of the present article was to gain insight into reasons for food waste and possible solutions for lowering food waste in schools in Sweden. In order to do so, food waste quantification in school canteens in two Swedish municipalities and nine qualitative interviews with key actors were conducted. Both municipalities displayed a high degree of variation in food waste, but the common pattern was that serving waste constituted the largest fraction of food waste, followed by plate waste and storage waste, as well as a gradual decrease in food waste over time. Food waste was mainly a result of old, disadvantageous habits, such as overproduction due to forecasting difficulties, whereas new, better routines such as serving fewer options, better planning, and a less stressful environment are the key to lowering food waste. Because food waste varies from one case to the next, it becomes important to identify and measure the causes of food waste in each school in order to be able to establish tailor-made, conscious, and flexible food waste mitigation routines.