Publication
The food industry belongs to the most significant economic sectors worldwide. Regarding resource use, human nutrition is responsible for about 30 % of global resource consumption. In order to decrease resource consumption to a level in line with planetary boundaries, it is suggested to reduce the resource use of the nutrition sector by factor 2. In view of about 40 % market share in the total nutrition market in Germany, the restaurant and catering sector presents a large untapped potential to increase resource efficiency and improve consumers’ health status. In the light of the above, the current project NAHGAST aims at initiating, supporting and promoting transformation processes for sustainable business in the hospitality sector. Therefore, the project will promote the concept of a resource-efficient and socially inclusive economy through the development and testing of instruments for sustainable product innovations, which should be integrated in hospitality settings so actors will be able to measure and assess foodstuff and menus from the viewpoint of sustainability and health. By now, already existing indicators and assessment methods, e.g. Carbon and Material footprinting, or already targeted concepts such as the Nutritional Footprint or SusDISH have to be compared and analyzed. The aim is to provide a comparison of existing concepts and their adaption to reach the overall goal towards a deeper understanding of sustainable catering and food procurement. The paper may be seen as the conceptional and methodological part of the general framework of the NAHGAST project.