Addressing food waste as an unintended consequence of the public food procurement system

Food waste is addressed internationally through the Sustainable Development Goals adopted in September 2015, committing the EU countries to meet the SDG 12.3 targeting to halve per capita food waste by 2030, and reduce food losses along the food production and supply chains. The Food Waste Index rapport 2021 informs us that 931 tons of food waste was generated worldwide in 2019, but problematizes insufficient data on the edible fractions of food waste. The report demands for systematic measurements of food waste across the food supply chain as well as deeper knowledge upon which sectors of the supply chain generates most food waste. This study addresses edible food waste in the context of the Danish public food procurement system with Copenhagen Municipality as point of departure. The public kitchens in Copenhagen Municipality serves 800.000 meals per day, buying their food products through public procurement systems. As the public sector covers a prominent part of the marked, public procurement agreements gains attention as important regulative tools promoting and evolving sustainable development. The purpose of this study is to understand how large amounts of food waste related to the public food sector comes into being in the everyday practices across the public food supply chain, as an unintended consequence of the public food procurement system. The study explores how the demands related to food quality expressed in the tenders are interpreted, translated and evaluated down through the public food supply chain, and how these demands generate food waste in the dynamics of the everyday practices they engage in. By following the quality demands formulated by the chief procurement officer in Copenhagen municipality across the public food supply chain – crossing private-public sectors, the study identifies in which constellations quality demands generate food waste. This study draws upon an ethnographic data collection (interviews and observations) collected across the Danish food supply chain over a period of two years. A systematic analysis and evaluation of the empirical data material reveals a correlation between a need (and demand) for first quality food products across the public food supply chain and large amounts of unintended food waste across the public food supply chain, especially amongst the food categories of fresh fruit and vegetables as well as fresh milk. Furthermore, the study finds that different dynamics of power relations across the food supply chain affects how the quality criterias are engaged with across sectors. The study suggests how to (re)-develop the structure of the public food procurement process in such way that sustainable actions of minimizing food waste can be adapted as part of the regulative tool of the tender.