Biodiversität über den Tellerrand: Plans for increasing biodiversity in supply and demand in out-of-home catering

Biological diversity, or biodiversity, covers the wealth of ecosystems, animal and plant species, biotic communities and living organisms, as well as their genetic diversity. It is the prerequisite for human life and economic activity, such as agriculture and food. We all depend on biological diversity as the basis for all ecosystem services. However, 75 percent of land surface and 66 percent of ocean surface have now changed significantly, making action necessary. These interconnections and the link to individual foods or their value chains need to be incorporated into everyday life.
Researchers in the BiTe project want to achieve this for out-of-home catering. The aim is to establish a biodiversity index for meals in company restaurants, hospitals and canteens. This will make it possible to quantify the loss of biodiversity and make it comparable and observable. To achieve this, the project participants are developing and testing a biodiversity index for lunchtime meals in out-of-home catering for the first time. Workshops will be held in companies and organizations to communicate the aims in a consumer-oriented way.

During the first project phase, researchers devoted themselves to developing the concept in detail: On the one hand, the biodiversity index was integrated into the database of an existing biodiversity calculator (www.nahgast.de/rechner) to be able to measure the impact of a midday meal on (agro)biodiversity. They were also creating a design concept that will help users of out-of-home catering services to experience and understand biodiversity in a playful way. In order for the biodiversity index and the design concept to be effective in practice, the project participants were also developing an implementation concept with various businesses from the out-of-home catering sector within a co-creation process.

Testing of the concepts and materials will take place in the second project phase.

More information: https://bite-projekt.com/