CLIMATE CHANGE
be long-term changes in the cost of key crops.” Businesses will need to have more diverse supply chains, he adds, to maintain a consistent menu “and even so are likely to need to be more adaptable to changes in availability, quality and cost of ingredients.” Another futurist, Barry Thomas, global
customer and marketing leader for New York City-based Kantar, a data-driven analytics and brand consulting company, says there are signs across the world of what’s coming. “Climate change impacts restaurants in big ways,” he says. “We can look to western Europe on key signals coming here [to the US]. For example, we will see more restaurants mandate stronger sustainability metrics to suppliers, which then get labeled on menus in interesting ways.” Thomas, who leads Kantar’s foodservice practice, says more brands in the industry will be “questioned about their impact on the planet in terms of food waste, sourcing, carbon footprints, food production impacts and greenhouse gas emissions.” Meanwhile, futurist and demographer
Kenneth W Gronbach, president and CEO of KGC Direct LLC in Bonita Springs, Florida, suggests that “because so much of what will be considered green, healthy and climate-friendly will be determined by 140 million Generation Y, Millennials and Generation Z under 40, foodservice had better take them seriously.” Menus, service and marketing “will need to reflect an overt green consciousness. It doesn’t matter that foodservice does not buy into global warming; their customers do, and therefore becoming green is an imperative.”
“The impact will be felt in several
different ways,” predicts Martin Kruse, senior executive advisor and futurist for the non-profit think tank Copenhagen Institute for Futures Studies in Denmark. These include supply chain, food prices, regulation, consumer behavior, brand
exposure, packaging and new technology. Climate shaming, climate-positive diets, and consumers shunning beef and lamb “are already seen here in Europe,” Kruse reports. “Consumers are also pushed by high-end restaurants here in Denmark to appreciate new textures and new tastes, new products that are more sustainable.” Packaging may need to change, with a move towards non- plastic-based or bio-based plastics. Another factor is that environmental legislation will proliferate and will need to be taken into account, according to Ken Morris, futurist and managing partner of Cambridge Retail Advisors in Boston, Massachusetts. “Temperature shifts that move land and sea animals into new territories are bound to trigger reactions and legislation that will impact foodservice. There is already a shift in the lobster population in southern New England as the water warms, for example.”
Carbon cost
The demand to reduce the carbon footprint of agriculture will see changes in production methods, Cheesewright foresees, and consumers “are likely to be more open-minded about the use of genetic modifications to enable crops to thrive in changing conditions.”
The higher reliability and lower fertilizer requirements of urban/vertical farms in controlled conditions will further offset their higher expense, he feels, “making hyper-local produce much more attractive, particularly for salad leaves, herbs, mushrooms and even tomatoes and fruits.” Distribution will also be affected, according to Cheesewright. Higher carbon taxes and consumer consciousness of the carbon cost of produce “will lead us to rethink long-distance supply chains for foodstuffs.” Fruits and vegetables from foreign climes “might be more of an occasional luxury than a supermarket staple, so we may seek them out when eating out – or frown upon those serving them. The race is on to replace diesel engines and generators in the world's cargo ships that carry most of our produce internationally, but it is a huge challenge.”
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“It doesn’t matter that foodservice does not buy into global warming; their customers do, and therefore becoming green is an imperative”
THE AMERICAS
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