Essay Sample on Sustainable Procurement and Healthy Food

Introduction

Sustainable procurement refers to the process whereby organization achieve their needs for services, goods, utilities and works in a way that accomplishes value for money in an entire life basis in terms of generating benefits to the organization, society, and the entire economy while reducing damages to the environment (Legrand et al. 2013, p.13). In pillars restaurant, sustainable procurement involves purchasing goods and services that take into account the economic, social and the environmental effect that such purchases have on communities and people. In pillars restaurants, sustainability is about considering where the products come from, where they are made of, the manufacturers, how they are disposed and the transport mechanisms that are used to deliver them(Mason and Lang 2017, p.11). Succinctly, sustainable procurement means considering the economic, social and environmental effects in buying choices. In pillars restaurants, the above process involves optimizing price, availability, and quality.

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In both the public and private sector, there is an increasing pressure from clients, customers, the public and the government to adopt sustainable procurement. In pillars restaurant, the implementation of sustainable procurement has enabled the management to cut costs, enhance stakeholder's relationships, shorten timescales, and increase sales (Baldwin 2009, p.8). Also, the practice of sustainability has led to the reduction of risks improve the profit margins and enhance reputation. In most cases, through the adoption of sustainable procurement the organizations have been able to control costs by adopting a wider approach to a whole life costing. Through sustainable procurement, pillars restaurants as well as other organizations, have been able to improve external and internal standards through performance assessment (Segnit, 2012). For different organizations, procurement should involve economic, social and environmental consequences of non-renewable material use, manufacturing and production methods, service delivery and logistics. In reality, the economic and social concerns underlying the sustainable procurement are observable within the supply chain and everyday procurement management activities.

In Pillars restaurants, sustainable procurement strategies ensure the use of whole life cycle assessments while purchasing services and goods, amidst the process, there is the recognition of the contribution of medium-sized and small enterprises to economic recovery. In many cases, pillars restaurants work collaboratively with suppliers to harness their innovation and expertise and at the same time assisting them to assess and improve the impacts of sustainability.

Food Safety

Food safety refers to preparing, storing and handling food in a way that best reduces the risk of individuals becoming sick from foodborne diseases. Food safety is a global issue that entails diverse areas of daily life (Roller 2012, p.14). The principle of food safety aims at preventing food from contamination, the process that is achievable through different avenues. The pillars restaurants are involved in the best practices that aims at ensuring food safety; maintaining a high level of hygiene is one of the practices that the pillars restaurants use to ensure the distribution of food to the consumers (Mortimore and Wallace 2013, p.6). Through sustainable procurements, pillars restaurants can isolate food substances that are harmful to consumers.

In the food business, when referring to food safety, ownership is placed exclusively on the food company. The organization thus have to ensure that all the foods prepared are safe to eat. To achieve the above safety requirement, the food companies need to employ trained food safety officer or supervisor. In the pillars restaurants, there are well-trained food personnel that ensures that foods that are going out to the market are safe and secure for human consumptions. Pillars restaurants often offer training for food safety experts and at the same time, they employ them to that the organization's reputation remains high when it comes to the safety standards.

The courses offered by the pillars restaurants provides an avenue for obtaining a fundamental understanding of the principles of food safety and how to apply them. Through sustainable mechanisms, the pillars restaurants engage in storing, heating and chilling food perfectly about temperature, equipment as well as the environment (Korsmeyer, 2005). According to pillars restaurants, regardless of how the food is handled, whether at home or as part of the job, it is necessary to apply effective food safety principles often. The potential food hazards usually exist in a food handling environment, some of which lead to serious consequences.

Pillars restaurants observe food laws, the legislation which controls the trade, production, and handling of foods. Food laws also ensure food control, relevant aspects of food trade as well as food safety. According to the above laws, the minimum quality requirements are always included in the food laws to make sure the food produced for human consumptions are untouched and are not exposed to any fraudulent practices that are intended to deceive the consumers. Besides, food laws need to cover the total chain starting with the provisions for the animal feed, early farm processing and on-farm controls through the final distribution as well as the consumer.

Energy Efficient Food Production

The sustainable restaurant production makes use of energy efficient food production. As the global population increases, there is a reduction in arable lands that can be used for farming. The increasing pressure on land thus makes the meat and other productions from livestock less sustainable compared to the earlier days hence the increase in global food shortage. Pillars restaurant is therefore involved in the production of energy efficient food products to ensure that they meet the growing demands of customers (Millstone and Lang 2008, p.12). The production of food through the in-house method, where individuals live is part of the effort to save energy (Thaker and Barton, 2012). Pillars restaurants prioritize the production of vegetables and fish through the in-house technique. The above process of food production is thus one of the most effective ways to increase the production of food across the world. In-house production is an exponential innovation that can reach many people across the globe within the shortest period. By producing food in-house, pillars restaurants often place them where they wish and where they have full control over all the flows, a situation that leads to the increasing possibilities of developing mutualistic and circular production systems. Placing the in-house food production system in urban areas where there are many people reduces the need for transportation. As a result, the food production companies such as pillars restaurants can benefit from surplus heat, organic materials, electricity as well as the unused resources within the cities and towns.

Food provides energy that is used for different metabolic activities. At the same time, it takes energy to process, prepare and gather food. The difference that exists between the energy used to produce food and the energy used to gather it is the net energy for food production. In the modern economies, most foods have negative net energies meaning that a lot of food materials takes more energy to produce than it provides. The above situation is thus unsustainable. Following the above scenario, if human utilizes more calories than he or she ingest, there is the negative net energy, and in other words, he will die quickly.

Healthy Menu Planning

Menu planning is a great process of ensuring a healthy balanced diet as well as ensuring the intake of essential nutritional needs. As every professional cook, knows, menu planning saves money and time. In pillars restaurants, there is a simple menu planning. One of the best approach employed in the organization is that there are well-developed plans that aims at availing appropriate meals to the relevant clients over a given period. There is always the planning of a week's meal at a time (McGee 2004, p.10). During the process of menu formulation, there is always the inclusion of side dishes, entrees as well as the healthy desserts. According to the pillars restaurants management, when there is a menu that is already filled, there is usually the creation of shopping list of all the ingredients that will be used.

Some of the factors that pillars restaurants consider while developing menus include Calendar check; here, there cooks often determines the times that they will dedicate in cooking and the periods that they will engage in the reheat of already cooked foods. During the formulation of menus, pillars restaurants also concentrate on what is on sale for a particular week in a given supermarket (Spence and Piqueras-Fiszman, 2014). Thinking seasonal is another way to incorporate while formulating the menus. The management of the pillars restaurants usually consider the kinds of products that are fresh and are available at a given time of the year. When planning for the menu, it is necessary to mix things up. Pillars restaurants normally keep the menu interesting by mixing meals to suit diverse customers that they have. In the process of making the menu, there is always alternation of new recipes with the old ones. Healthy menu planning is essential in many food production companies and restaurants that are looking forward to keeping their customers.

Waste Management System

The management of wastes in restaurants reduces food waste, a situation that reduces environmental pollution and saves money in the long run. To ensure effective waste management, pillars restaurants usually ensure that they only purchase the ingredients that will be utilized for completion. In other words, overbuying or overstocking just because there is a good deal from the suppliers may lead to a lot of wastes which cause environmental pollution. Storing food correctly and safely is another method that the pillars restaurants use to ensure waste management (Wareing, 2010). The above restaurants usually ensure that freezers and fridges are operating at the right temperatures. The organization also ensures that low-risk foods are often kept on higher shelves than the high-risk foods. Storing or keeping food materials under the correct conditions is essential in preserving their quality as well as preventing pathogenic bacterial growth, the conditions that can lead to quick food wastage.

Pillars restaurants, being one of the popular food companies, stresses the temperature controls. Good temperature control is important for food safety because it prevents the growth of bacterial; additionally, it means that there is less probability of food waste since foods are unable to spoil. The above conditions can be met through cooling hot foods quickly, heating or reheating foods to the correct temperatures required for their safety. Keeping high-risk foods in the refrigerators reduces the chances of spoilage and as a result, lessens the effects of environmental pollution. Pillars restaurants stress of the need to keep environmental healthy for the benefit of their customers and the organization itself. Environmental pollution is a problem that affects most industries in the current economic system, therefore, requires full attention especially from the businesses in the hotel sector. Food waste, as well as food materials, should, therefore, be managed effectively to ensure a safer environment.

References

Baldwin, C.J. ed., 2009. Sustainability in the food industry....