What is the impact of your purchases? Is your food service program taking steps to align its values—local sourcing, equity and diversity, climate, health, and beyond—with its purchases?
More and more, colleges and universities are rising to the occasion. Food service is evolving to meet the demand of their constituents and of the climate. They are setting internal goals and developing purchasing standards to serve as their procurement compass.
The Common Market—a nonprofit regional food distributor with a mission to connect communities to good food from sustainable family farms—will share examples of how they are innovating alongside two Georgia institutions and their shared food service management company to advance their food procurement through commitments to values-based, environmentally sound purchasing.
Join Kameko Nichols of The Common Market Southeast in conversation with Ciannat Howett, Associate Vice President for Sustainability, Resilience and Economic Inclusion of Emory University, Marissa Pace, Associate Vice President for Business and Financial Affairs at Spelman College, and Shira Kaufman, Local Sourcing Specialist at Bon Appétit Food Management as they dive into:
- What role food service and institutional purchasing power can play in helping to reduce environmental impacts often associated with food production?
Why Bon Appétit, Emory and Spelman are encouraged to make purchasing commitments that align with values along climate and equity. How are purchasing goals set and how are they creating buy-in?
- The institutions’ purchasing commitments to regenerative farming sources located within their region.
What impact does this procurement activity have on the Southeast’s sustainable grower network, on the institutions’ way of operating food service?
- How institutions can find ways to use their budgets to prioritize values-based procurement and environmentally friendly food purchases.
- How strategic partnerships, like those with The Common Market, help institutions’ food service meet its ESG goals and illustrate impact.
Learn how The Common Market’s Farm Impact Assessment became a helpful tool as these institutions set out to purchase from farms representing particular values.
The power of reporting and storytelling – see how a partnership with a food hub focused on transparency, source identification and intimate relationships with sustainable growers can help you create a rich story about your food to share with your students and college community!
This webinar is provided by AASHE, the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education. If you're interested in learning more about how to integrate sustainability into your student experience, classroom practice, or operations work at Notre Dame, sign up for a free AASHE membership using your Notre Dame email address!