Connecting local food system actors for climate-friendly public catering in Germany

Lessons learned from a transformative and transdisciplinary research project

Abstract

Climate-friendly nutrition is a pivotal subject for the future. The Climate-friendly Cafeterias (CliCa) project was initiated as a one-year transformative and transdisciplinary initiative to support the Karlsruhe (Germany) Climate Protection Concept 2030. Linked to this, the transformation goal of CliCa was to implement climate-friendly and sus­tainable measures (referred to as ‘levers’) in local cafeterias. These measures included increasing the share of organic, regional, seasonal, vegetarian, and vegan food, along with reducing food waste. The research goal (research question) was to identify the barriers for implementing levers. This was accompanied by the educational goal aimed to raise awareness among cafeteria staff and guests. The article presents the transdisciplinary design, ad­dresses the research question, and evaluates the transfor­mational goal by presenting outcomes (changes within the project duration) and impacts (changes after the project duration). Within the CliCa pro­ject, a heterogeneous network consisting of up to 40 actors was established, with a core group of 11 institutions engaging in regular participation. Two open questionnaires (N = 10 and N = 9) were con­ducted during the project’s duration, and eight fol­low-up interviews were conducted two years after the project’s conclusion. The data analysis revealed 10 key barriers to implementation and several measurable changes related to the identified levers. The most frequently cited barrier was ‘Guest acceptance,’ followed by ‘Missing/unclear frame­work conditions,’ ‘Lack of money,’ and ‘Higher price.’ The majority of barriers were mentioned in relation to the lever ‘Increasing the use of organi­cally produced food.’ The findings of this study indicate that individual levers and barriers are inter­related and should be addressed in combination. With respect to the transformation goal, we con-clude that establishing a stakeholder network with a focus on peer-to-peer counseling is particularly effective when participants encounter similar chal-lenges and operate under comparable systemic conditions, such as infrastructure, acceptance by cafeteria guests, and economic frameworks.