Date Published: 16 September 2008
Caterers making progress on healthy eating
The Agency welcomes progress made by caterers Aramark, BaxterStorey, Compass, Elior, Sodexo, and suppliers Brakes and 3663, following their commitment to help customers make healthier choices when eating at work.
The commitments, made in January, build on existing healthy eating activity and are having a positive impact on more than 1.5 million meals served in workplaces every day.
Examples of progress include:
* increasing the range of ingredients that are lower in fat, salt and sugar
* developing new recipes for popular dishes that use ingredients lower in fat,
salt and sugar
* increasing training on healthy cooking techniques for chefs and kitchen staff
* offering customers more information on the nutritional content of food and
promoting healthy eating messages
* extending the number of workplaces operating healthy eating programmes
* continuing reformulation by suppliers to reduce the amount of saturated fat,
salt and sugar that popular products contain
These companies have now set themselves further targets, which include increasing the number of staff trained; introducing a greater number of healthier recipes available to chefs; building on reformulation activity; continuing to review ingredients; and introducing new customer awareness and promotional work.
In July, the Agency published similar commitments from a further six workplace caterers. They will report on their progress in February 2009.
To help consumers make healthier choices when eating out, the Agency is also working closely with some of the biggest pub dining, quick service restaurant, family restaurant and coffee shop chains to encourage similar commitments.
Source: Food Standards Agency (FSA), UK.
