Waste not, want not : food waste practices in Swedish restaurants

Sammanfattning: Food waste is a global issue with environmental, social, and economic consequences. With a growing population the topic of food waste and how to use our resources more efficiently is more important than ever. Currently there are various policies aimed at lowering food waste amounts both at an EU level down to a Swedish municipal level. This thesis focuses mainly on the EU Waste Framework Directive which is implemented even at a municipal level in Sweden. The problem of food waste is linked to practices, habits and cultural attitudes in developed nations. For this reason it is important to study these practices in order to accommodate change and tackle the food waste issue. Many studies have focused on investigating the sources of food waste from households while very little is known about other outlets such as restaurants whose services contribute to the food waste amounts. Limited research can be found on prevention, sources, and practices regarding food waste in restaurants. By understanding the practices and what affects food waste, work can be done in order to lower the waste amounts. Social practice theory provides a framework to understand food waste management in restaurants by looking at the practices and what affects them while bringing the socio-technical structure and cultural context into consideration. Stakeholder theory, sustainability management, and the triple bottom line are concepts that influence and relate to social practice theory in various ways while they also provide perspectives to help analyze the elements of practice theory. The aim of this research project is to investigate food waste practices in restaurants during a time of awareness and efforts to change and address the food waste issue. The qualitative project consists of four case study restaurants, two full service and two quick service, in Uppsala municipality. The primary empirical sources consist of semi-structured interviews and participatory observations within the case study restaurants. A review of the existing literature as well as a study of the company websites and selected social media accounts make up the secondary sources of empirical evidence in the study. The analysis of the empirical findings is done with the help of the conceptual framework and selected theories. The results of the project consist of four main findings and indicate that the restaurant type affects the food waste practices due to their systems and organizational differences. Further, the restaurant type has a significant impact on the type of food waste produced in the restaurant. Customer plate waste was discovered to be one of the bigger sources of food waste in the full-service restaurants and the use of doggy bags would be a way to lower food waste amounts but a cultural resistance toward the use of doggy bags was discovered in the case study restaurants. Lastly, none of the EU or national policies and regulations aimed towards the minimization or prevention of food waste has been directed at the restaurants in this study. The municipality encourages the sorting of food waste but there are no observed efforts to help the prevention of food waste in the restaurants. Since the prevention of food waste is prioritized in the EU and national policies, this finding is of significance.