The food sector has reached a critical fork in its sustainability journey. Doing ‘less bad’ is no longer a credible strategy for the future. By Nick Hughes.
“The revolution is here!”
It’s a refrain I’ve seen posted numerous times on social media in recent months; one that ascribes irresistible momentum to a groundswell of public demand for buying healthy, sustainable, usually wholefoods with premium price tags from fledgling brands and disruptive businesses.
Are we really in a moment of radical change in how we buy and consume food? It’s a question I’ve been pondering as Footprint enters the next stage of its own evolution as was formally announced last week.
Maybe the magma of revolution is indeed bubbling away beneath the surface, ready to erupt in a lava flow that sweeps away the legacy food system. And good on the upstarts and agitants for freeing themselves from the shackles of a system that has incentivised cheap, uniform food unconstrained by the need to account for its pervasive environmental and social cost.
Yet radical change is easiest to effect from a standing start. Talk of revolution feels cheap when low-cost, high-margin ultra-processed foods made from indecipherable ingredients derived from intensive farming systems continue to dominate large parts of the food environment – on billboards, social media feeds and, yes, on television, despite new advertising restrictions. Little wonder shifting dietary habits at scale is the slowest of slow burns.
Established businesses with legacy infrastructure, large debt piles and hungry shareholders are unable to simply tear down the edifice of their business models and build again from scratch. The system still incentivises the pursuit of short-term profit and operational efficiencies over all else. More recently, an ever-expanding cost base for the hospitality and foodservice sector, driven by hikes in taxation, labour and input costs, has caused many businesses to redouble their focus on surviving the next quarter – quite understandably so.
Yet the corporate world has also reached a critical fork in the road. For businesses for which investment in sustainability has largely been a PR-driven tick-box exercise, the Trump-led backlash against ESG and DEI has given them tacit permission to remove the mask. My feeling is this characterisation doesn’t represent the majority and there remains a moral and increasingly financial motivation among most businesses to contribute to environmental and social improvement. That cringe-inducing maxim often trotted out in the noughties – that sustainability is merely a ‘nice to have’ – still has currency in certain public fora (no doubt even more so behind closed doors), but is now mercifully drowned out by an acceptance that sustainability – or perhaps more accurately, resilience – and commerciality must now be viewed as two sides of the same coin.
Time for transformation
Still, there remains a clear gulf between ambition and action within the corporate world as food industry whistleblowers have been at pains to spell out during the past year. One need look no further than limited success in reducing those hardest to abate scope 3 supply chain emissions to realise that progress remains incremental rather than transformational.
That needs to change. The operational challenges experienced by all food businesses over recent years require leaders to lift their gaze towards the horizon. The food system is both a contributor to and victim of the erosion of natural capital that has accumulated in recent decades. Last month, a national security assessment published by the UK Government concluded that global ecosystem degradation and collapse threaten UK national security and prosperity through crop failures, intensified natural disasters and infectious disease outbreaks.
Large, legacy businesses will need to rewire their commercial and operational models to be resilient to a post 1.5℃ future characterised by unpredictable supply and persistent price inflation – not to mention geopolitical instability and rapid technological change.
Regulatory requirements that curtail harmful business activities and demand complete transparency are gathering pace, while investor scrutiny of the health and sustainability of product portfolios and consumer backlash against those businesses perceived as health- or greenwashing will only grow.
Businesses that align their supply chains and menus with the notion of planetary health, whereby what is good for the planet is also good for our own wellbeing, look set to emerge from the shake-down in the strongest position.
Yet those engaging in serious structural change remain the outliers in a field dominated by those still tinkering around the edges of the status quo. For all the standalone achievements by businesses in areas like waste reduction, packaging sustainability, menu reformulation and support for sustainable agriculture, there remains a collective lack of success in scaling these endeavours to the point where they put a proper dent in emissions reduction and nature renewal. This is often in spite of the best intentions of sustainability leaders and many boardroom colleagues.
Doing less bad isn’t a credible strategy for the future. The impact of the food system pervades every environmental indicator you can imagine: from GHG emissions and nature loss to river pollution and soil infertility.
The flip side is that a thriving food system can have a positive impact on all of these indicators. When I think about what the future business should look like, I keep returning to Kate Raworth’s influential book Doughnut Economics in which the author talks about the need for organisations to be regenerative by design, “giving back to the living systems of which we are part”. Raworth argues that the urgency of the crises facing society and the planet mean there is no time to make that shift step-by-step: “far more inspired is to transform like a caterpillar into a butterfly”.
Footprint’s evolution
Speaking of transformation, Footprint is poised to emerge from a figurative chrysalis of its own. From this week onwards you will notice some changes to our editorial offer reflecting our own need to respond to the changing world around us.
Since the business was established almost 20 years ago, Footprint’s guiding principle has been to act as a source of business intelligence on environmental and social issues as they relate to and impact the foodservice and hospitality sector.
We have always sought to go beyond surface level insight to offer the kind of in-depth, intelligent analysis of the key issues impacting the sector that readers won’t find in titles that don’t have food and/or sustainability at their core.
We are first and foremost a sustainability platform and so should not, and will not, be afraid to push businesses hard and challenge their assumptions around what is or isn’t possible. You might argue this editorial is a case in point. That said, we will always strive to present a balanced view that considers, but is not beholden to, the wider commercial and (geo)political context businesses find themselves in. Our sweet spot is to offer challenge in a constructive way. This includes calling out slow or insufficient progress where the evidence points this way, while ensuring our coverage remains inquisitive, hopeful and solutions-focused.
Much as the food sector is changing so too is the publishing industry and Footprint must change with it. That means evolving our editorial proposition in line with what readers tell us they want.
From here on, every Monday, newsletter subscribers will receive Footprint In Focus, a deep dive report into an issue of pertinence to the hospitality and foodservice sector.
We’ve heard loud and clear from our readership that there is demand for Footprint to deliver content in a wider range of formats. In response, Wednesday will see the launch of our new weekly podcast, The Small Print.
Footprint is known for digging beneath the headlines and unearthing the nuggets of data and detail that cast stories and events in a fresh light. The Small Print is the latest vehicle for delivering against that expectation. In each episode we will be joined by a special guest – ranging from leading industry lights to subject matter experts – to explore key recent developments within the sector and unpick their relevance to Footprint’s audience. It may be an important new government report, a game-changing piece of innovation or a significant market development, with the conversation packaged up in an accessible 30-minute episode perfect for consumption during your lunch break or morning dog walk.
Fridays will see Footprint News evolve into Footprint Friday Bites: a carefully curated newsletter containing the most important stories from the past week in a new easy-to-read format (with no need to navigate away from the newsletter to the website).
Later in the year, we’ll be launching new editorial products, including Footprint Surveillance Quarterly: a visually compelling compilation of the key trends and developments we’re seeing in the market.
These are daunting and challenging times across all industries, but also times full of positive energy and inspiration. Stay with us on our journey and we promise to provide the insights that help guide your business towards its own North Star.
Nick Hughes, Editorial Director, Footprint Media Group
Please send press releases and news to editorial@footprintmediagroup.co.uk
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