Foodservice Footprint pig2 Foodservice fails to make welfare impact Out of Home News Analysis

Foodservice fails to make welfare impact

A new report finds business commitments on animal welfare have not yet translated into substantive improvements on the ground. Nick Hughes reports.

Making a sustainability commitment is one thing; delivering against it is another entirely.

Some food and drink businesses that have set ambitious packaging targets have already recognised this truism; those beginning their journey to net-zero will do so soon enough (if they haven’t already).

The same, it seems, can now be said of animal welfare commitments. The business benchmark on farm animal welfare (BBFAW) report published last month found a stark disconnect between companies’ commitments to improved animal welfare and the actual impact in their supply chains.

Foodservice operators were cast in an especially unflattering light. Out of 150 global food companies surveyed, the report showed the restaurants and bars sector (which also includes contract caterers) lagged behind retailers and manufacturers in company commitments, as well as achievements on welfare. Bakery chain Greggs was the sector’s sole representative in the top two (of six) echelons of the league table.

So what explains the relatively poor performance of foodservice businesses and is there hope that the next benchmark survey will see an improvement?

The 2021 report, whose methodology is based on assessing published animal welfare information on company websites and reports, showed a fall across the board in company progress against criteria like the use of prophylactic antibiotics and avoidance of close confinement for animals such as laying hens and broiler chickens. The overall average score for retailers and wholesalers was 32% compared with 36% in 2020; for producers and manufacturers it was 35% (38% in 2020); while for restaurants and bars it was 27% (31%).

Rather than a regression in welfare commitments, the main reason for the decline, according to the BBFAW, was a change in methodology which increased the weighting for companies’ performance reporting and performance impact from 35% to 45% of the total score available (the remainder is made up of 22% management commitment, 9% innovation and leadership and 24% governance and management).

Low impact

The latest benchmark also marked the first year that a separate impact rating for individual companies has been publicly disclosed (in addition to the overall rating). The impact rating considers whether management policies and practices have translated into actual impact on the ground for farm animals; examples of impact criteria include the proportion of laying hens that are cage-free and pork that is sourced from sows that are free from sow-stalls.

Other than Greggs with its B impact rating, and Domino’s Pizza Group with a D rating, all other foodservice companies gained either an E or an F grade – the lowest two grades available, indicating they are yet to demonstrate improvement in welfare impacts for farm animals in their supply chains.

Greggs retained its overall tier 2 ranking and won plaudits for its reporting across all the main welfare issues and positive welfare impacts, which include over 90% of eggs in the company’s supply chain now being cage-free, and 84% of chickens reared at lower stocking densities (below 30kg/m2).

The rest of the sector was left to reflect on a mountain of work yet to do. Globally, 10 foodservice companies dropped one tier between 2020 and 2021, in large part due to the extra weighting given to performance reporting and impact.

During the launch of the report, BBFAW executive director Nicky Amos said the reduced tier rating would come as a disappointment to companies but noted that this did not necessarily mean they weren’t investing in farm animal welfare.

Foodservice challenges

Amos subsequently explained to Footprint that there were a number of possible reasons why foodservice businesses were trailing behind their retail and manufacturing peers. Amos said that parent or group companies within the sector would likely not be familiar names to many consumers who typically have a relationship with single brands operating under the parent company. “As such, consumer concern, which is a principal driver for many companies adopting a commitment to farm animal welfare, may exist only in specific brand categories in which these companies operate. This means that companies operating multiple brands and in multiple geographic markets may not – unlike retailers and producers/manufacturers – have a universal approach to managing farm animal welfare risks and opportunities.”

Amos cited sensitive pricing margins in foodservice as another factor that could restrict the ability of companies to demand higher welfare standards without passing the additional cost onto consumers.

Compared to retailers, foodservice companies may also lack the purchasing power to influence higher welfare standards, while Amos suggested consumers may be less discerning about the food they are served out of home than the food they purchase to prepare at home.

Finally, she suggested a lack of demand for animal welfare standards from public sector customers when tendering for catering services was another potential barrier. 

Public food

These challenges will not come as a surprise to seasoned industry watchers – indeed they were identified in Footprint’s ‘A caterer’s guide to better meat’ report, published last year.

Cost pressures are here to stay given the current inflationary environment, however there are reasons to be cautiously optimistic that certain other barriers to investing in better welfare outcomes could soon be reduced.

In his national food strategy for England, Henry Dimbleby recommended the government reform its buying standards for food so that all public sector organisations are required to supply healthy, sustainable food to a prescribed set of standards. He added that a current loophole allowing “substandard food” to be supplied where necessary to avoid a significant increase in costs should be removed. If adopted in the government’s forthcoming food strategy white paper, the policy could see higher standards – including for welfare – mandated rather than left to the whim of customer demand thereby driving foodservice commitments and performance.

The foodservice sector may also stand to benefit from an evolution in the focus of the BBFAW, which for the first time from 2023 will consider company commitments to replace a proportion of animal-sourced foods with plant-based products as part of a wider ambition to see the number of animals farmed for food globally reduced by at least 50% by 2040.

Plant-based innovation is widespread within the foodservice sector and some of the sector’s larger players have already made firm commitments to shift menu options towards plant-based options. Compass is targeting a 40% switch from animal to plant-based proteins by 2030, while Sodexo has a target to ensure 33% of menus are plant-based by 2025.

New methodology

There will be no company assessments in the 2022 calendar year as the BBFAW secretariat develops its new methodology. Companies will be assessed against the new criteria for the first time in Q1 2023 at which point a new baseline will be established.

The latest benchmark survey is the tenth to be carried out. Over a period of a decade, the overall trend towards stronger welfare commitments is positive. Of the 150 companies covered by the latest benchmark, 134 (89%) now acknowledge farm animal welfare as a business issue compared to 71% of the 68 companies evaluated in 2012. Some 122 companies (81%) have formal policies on farm animal welfare (compared to 46% of companies in 2012) and 119 companies (79%) have published formal objectives and targets for animal welfare (compared to just 26% of companies in 2012).

Individual companies have also shown improvement during this period. Sodexo, Elior and Aramark are among the foodservice operators to have moved up two tiers since the first benchmark was published in 2012.

Amos said investors had played a major role in influencing corporate practice and disclosure on farm animal welfare during recent years. But all companies – especially those within the foodservice sector – need to start moving further and faster to translate their good intentions on animal welfare into better outcomes on the ground.