How can restaurants become more climate-friendly?

At home, we can control how climate-conscious we eat relatively well. But when visiting restaurants, canteens or cafeterias, it is much more difficult to keep track of what exactly ends up on our plate.

The vegetarian restaurant The Canteen in Bristol, England, is breaking new ground: since July 2022, the menu has shown the estimated carbon footprint per portion, along with a simple traffic light system and a comparison to a beef burger. In a blog post, there is an example with the current menu and some background on the collaboration with the vegan organization Viva! and the data platform MyEmissions. Also interesting is this article with comments from guests and staff.

I find the campaign interesting because it addresses a possible conflict: many people try to live environmentally conscious lives and make decisions in such a way that they do not excessively harm our planet. The note on the menu provides transparency here, much like I try to do here on the blog. On the other hand, many people want to relax during a restaurant visit and not be constantly reminded of the crises of our world. This is understandable, but even now there are obligations for restaurants to provide certain information - for example, in some countries the calories per portion are also indicated and in Switzerland it is necessary to name the geographical origin of the meat. The carbon footprint on the menu is just another step in this direction.

Labels and labeling are good approaches for this. They do not dictate what we have to do and what we have to leave. They merely provide more transparency. According to the British organization E.Mission, three quarters of the population would approve if restaurants mentioned the carbon footprint of each dish on the menu (source).

In the meantime, there are various scientific studies that deal with the effect of labeling the carbon footprint on the decisions of restaurant visitors.

One group of studies deals with the effect of better labeling. An article published in Nature Climate Change shows how consumers initially have relatively little knowledge about the carbon footprint of their diet, but a simple traffic light system leads them to systematically make more sustainable decisions (Camilleri et al. 2019). Other studies show that consumers can also remember such a traffic light system relatively easily and can also use it quickly and under time pressure (Panzone et al. 2020). Further studies are currently being carried out in this direction, for example as part of a cooperation between the University of Oxford and the canteen operator Compass Group, which is explained in an article in The Guardian. There are also scientific reports on how such adjustments can be implemented in restaurants in the long term (Pulkkinen et al. 2015).

Another group of studies deals with subtle differences to standard options and the order of the offers. In behavioral research, this is referred to as nudging. The central element here is that in principle all options are available - so it is not about removing offers with meat, but only about how prominently they are seen in comparison to meatless alternatives. A study by Verena Kurz, for example, shows that CO₂ emissions in a restaurant can be reduced by 5% if vegetarian dishes are given more prominence (Kurz 2018). Other scientific reports come to a similar effect (Gravert and Kurz 2019). An interesting paper by Julie de Vaan and other researchers deals with the standard option: it compares a menu where dishes with meat can also be optionally modified to be vegetarian with another menu where the vegetarian options are the standard and can be supplemented with meat (de Vaan 2019). In the second variant with a standard vegetarian menu with additional meat options, the restaurant visitors make more climate-friendly decisions - so it makes a difference what the standard is. Other works that deal specifically with desserts come to a similar conclusion (Bergeron et al. 2019). There are also studies that emphasize that the effect of the standards also depends on the previous eating habits of the restaurant visitors (Bacon and Krpan 2018). A study from Canada takes an interesting perspective: Campbell-Arvai et al. 2012 show that more attractively designed meatless options already contribute to more climate-conscious decisions being made.

A number of studies try to measure the strength of the effect of these interventions. Interestingly, many studies here use university canteens as the object of investigation. A study from the University of Oxford shows that the proportion of meat dishes sold falls by around 20% when the availability of meatless alternatives is increased (Pechey et al. 2022). In another paper, Andersson and Nelander 2021 report that the proportion of meat dishes sold falls by about 11% and the CO₂ emissions caused by the food fall by around 6% when a vegetarian option is mentioned first in the canteen’s offer. In an experiment with a traffic light system, one finds about 3-4% lower CO₂ emissions (Brunner et al. 2018). In a study recently published in PLOS Climate, a group from the University of Würzburg reports 13-32% lower emissions depending on the type of menu change (Betz et al. 2022).

Overall, we see a multitude of scientific studies that show that a more climate-friendly diet not only depends on each and every individual, but also on whether we receive transparent information and which option is the standard on the menu (see also the meta-study by Potter et al. 2021, which summarizes over 70 individual studies). It is not about taking something away: in all the studies examined, there are still options with meat on the menus.

Restaurants are an important factor here because they influence how easy or difficult it is for all visitors to behave in a climate-friendly way there. Whoever designs the menu for a restaurant therefore influences the decisions of many every day and therefore has a much greater lever for a contribution against the climate crisis than someone who only cooks for themselves. Some practical recommendations from these scientific studies are very easy to implement:

• It helps if climate-friendly options are the standard in the restaurant. What are the most important offers on the menu and on the lunch menu? Are there dishes that are standardly vegetarian and can be offered with an optional meat supplement? Is there a place on the menu with a recommendation from the chef where climate-friendly dishes can be integrated and emphasized?
• Labels and traffic light systems work and do not take anything away from anyone, but create transparency.
• A separate section on the menu with vegetarian or vegan dishes is counterproductive because it pushes these offers to the side and it is “too” easy to ignore them without even dealing with them. Instead, it is better to show the more climate-friendly vegetarian and vegan dishes right next to dishes with meat (e.g. both together in sections like “oven-baked” or “pasta”).

Do you work in a restaurant? Think about your daily customers and what effect it would have if they ate 5% more climate-friendly. You will see: this is a huge lever, much bigger than a much more radical change in your own behavior.