This document discusses ways to make sustainable food choices easier for consumers. It outlines BEUC's vision of a sustainable food system that guarantees safe, affordable and healthy food for all while respecting the earth's capacity. The document notes that while consumers are concerned about food challenges, they struggle to make sustainable choices due to limited availability, higher prices and unclear labeling. It proposes several actions to address this, including: raising consumer awareness of food production; providing understandable labeling; cutting food waste through better date labeling and campaigns; and making healthy eating less challenging through supportive environments and increased availability of sustainable options. The document calls for ongoing consumer research to ensure solutions meet consumer needs.

1. Making
sustainable food
choices easier for
consumers
FOOD2030: Consumers and Global
Food Systems
11th October 2016

2. BEUC - Who we are and what we do
• BEUC is the umbrella organisation in Brussels for 42
independent national consumer organisations.
• Five priorities: Financial Services, Food, Digital Rights,
Consumer Rights & Enforcement and Sustainability.
• We work to ensure that consumer policy at EU level is
sustainable for all (incl. vulnerable groups and low-income
consumers).
• Beyond Europe, we collaborate closely with CI (Consumers
International) and TACD (Transatlantic Consumer Dialogue).

3. BEUC’s vision:
A sustainable food system
guarantees safe, affordable
and healthy food for all
consumers while using
natural resources at a pace
that observes the capacity of
the earth to replenish them.

4. What do consumers think?
• Consumers are generally unaware of the scale of the challenges
the food system faces.
• But if told about the problems, they are concerned and want
more information about how their food is produced and how
they can access sustainable and healthier choices.
Source: Which? and UK Government Office for Science (2015), “Public Dialogue on food system
challenges and possible solutions”
• Still they struggle to make more sustainable (incl. healthier)
food choices (attitude-behaviour gap):
• limited availability
• higher prices (real or perceived)
• unclear labelling
• confusing message and trade-offs (e.g. fish)

5. Raise consumer awareness about today’s
food production
• Inform consumers about where and how their food is produced
 The example of food origin labelling

6. Provide information consumers can use
• Too many labels, some little known, many
poorly understood.
• Consistency needed to avoid confusion and
facilitate comparison.
• Truthful (avoid green washing), independent
labels underpinned by transparent criteria.
• User-friendly
 Can issues be combined into a single composite
label (“sustainability score” vs. series of
individual elements of sustainability)?

7. Cut food waste – The scale of the
problem
• In the EU, food waste is expected to rise to about 126 million
tonnes a year by 2020 unless action is taken.
Source: European Commission
• Food waste is a shared responsibility of all actors in the food chain,
incl. consumers.
• A consumer issue with ethical, environmental and economic
dimensions.
Source: EP Research Service
Source: Test-Achats, 2014

8. Cut food waste – What needs to be done?
• Get a better picture on which foods are
wasted the most, where in the food chain
and why.
• Date labelling:
• Help consumers make more sense of ‘use
by’ and ‘best before’ dates
• More realistic food dates based on a set of
clear and transparent rules
• Awareness raising campaigns and wide
dissemination to the public of tips that can
help consumers waste less food.
• Concerted action from all actors in the
chain (from farmers to industry, retailers,
consumers and caterers)

9. Make healthy & sustainable eating less of
a challenge for consumers
• Create an environment that supports healthy food choices, which is
not the case today:
o sweets, biscuits placed within children’s reach next to checkout in nearly 90% of
Swiss supermarket (FRC, 2013)
o “all-you-can-drink” soda fountains and supersize menus
o half of special offers in UK supermarkets on unhealthy food (2016, Which?)
o food offer in vending machines
• Sustainable “by design”: make food production more sustainable
by integrating sustainability elements in food production standards.
• Increase the availability and affordability of healthy and sustainable
food options.
• Involve consumers in discussions on possible solutions to make
food systems more sustainable.

10. Research needs?
• Regular and on-going consumer research and insight to ensure
that innovation in the agri-food sector captures the consumer
dimension (issues of consumer concern, acceptability of solutions).
• Develop a better understanding of the consumer attitude-
behaviour gap in order to identify the most effective
measures/incentives to enhance sustainable food consumption.
• Consumer representatives should be involved … but very often
lack resources to contribute.
• Trust in science factor: need to reverse trend of shrinking public
funding of research

11. e
www.beuc.eu
@beuc
Thank you for your attention