Overall Rating Silver - expired
Overall Score 57.29
Liaison Jennifer Kleindienst
Submission Date Dec. 1, 2016
Executive Letter Download

STARS v2.1

Wesleyan University
OP-7: Food and Beverage Purchasing

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 1.20 / 6.00 Michael Strumpf
Bon Appétit Resident District Manager
Campus Dining Service
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Percentage of dining services food and beverage expenditures on products that are third party verified under one or more recognized food and beverage sustainability standards or Local & Community-Based:
22.70

Does the institution wish to pursue Part 2 of this credit (expenditures on conventional animal products)? (If data is not available, respond “No”):
Yes

Percentage of total dining services food and beverage expenditures on conventional animal products (meat, poultry, fish/seafood, eggs, and dairy products that do NOT qualify in either the Third Party Verified or Local & Community-Based category):
67.80

A brief description of the sustainable food and beverage purchasing program, including how the sustainability impacts of products in specific categories are addressed (e.g. meat, poultry, fish/seafood, eggs, dairy, produce, tea/coffee):

Bon Appétit Management Company, Wesleyan's dining service, has a corporate commitment to sustainability that is evident at Wesleyan. All meals on campus are cooked from scratch. Bon Appétit's Farm to Fork program is a company-wide initiative that requires each of Bon Appétit’s 500 cafés across the country to purchase at least 20% of their ingredients from small, local, owner-operated vendors and farmers within a 150-mile radius of campus. Wesleyan purchases 22% of foods locally through its Farm to Fork program; another 2% of food and beverage purchases are sustainably sourced. All coffee is organic, fair trade, and kosher; all shell eggs are cage free and American Humane Certified; all poultry is antibiotic and hormone free; all seafood meets Monterey Bay Seafood Watch's "Best Choices" standards; all milk is RBST-free and purchased from Ronnybrook Farm, a local dairy; and the vegan program serves entirely organic produce, dry herbs, and rice.

In 2012, following the lead of students, President Michael Roth signed the Real Food Campus Commitment. This nationwide commitment pledges colleges and universities to buy 20% real food, defined as "local/community-based, fair, ecologically sound, and/or humane" by 2020. The commitment aims to get colleges and universities to use their purchasing power to support a healthy food system that strengthens local economies, respects human rights, ensures ecological sustainability, and facilitates community involvement and education.


An inventory of the institution’s sustainable food and beverage purchases that includes for each product: the description/type; label, brand or producer; and the category in which it is being counted and/or a description of its sustainability attribute(s):
A brief description of the methodology used to conduct the inventory, including the timeframe and how representative samples accounted for seasonal variation (if applicable):

Bon Appetit tracks this data through its Farm to Fork Program. Students, working in conjunction with Bon Appetit, use the Real Food Calculator to track and inventory sustainable food purchases from Usdan Marketplace (largest dining hall). The RFC does not include locally-procured meat without certification (all of Wesleyan's ground beef is from NE family farms, but this does not apply to RFC). For Usdan alone, RFC found that 15% of Wesleyan's food purchases were "real food."


Percentage of total dining services expenditures on Real Food A (0-100):
3.80

Percentage of total dining services expenditures on Real Food B (0-100):
16.90

Which of the following food service providers are present on campus and included in the total food and beverage expenditure figures?:
Present? Included?
Dining operations and catering services operated by the institution No No
Dining operations and catering services operated by a contractor Yes Yes
Student-run food/catering services Yes No
Franchises (e.g. national or global brands) No No
Convenience stores Yes No
Vending services Yes No
Concessions Yes No

A brief description of purchased food and beverage products that have other sustainability attributes not recognized above :

Ground beef is purchased through Northeast Family Farms, which is not recognized by RFC (beef comes from 3 family farms meeting RFC criteria, but because NEFF doesn't register which farm individual beef products come from, it is counted toward our total number but not our real food number).


Additional percentage of dining services food and beverage expenditures on conventional products with other sustainability attributes not recognized above (0-100) :
2

The website URL where information about the programs or initiatives is available:
Additional documentation to support the submission:
---

Data source(s) and notes about the submission:

Data above is from Bon Appetit's FY15 (October 2014-September 2015). Real Food data and meat data is extrapolated from a two-month period in Spring 2015.

Naked Juice contains fair trade bananas. Tomatoes are purchased through the Fair Food program.

The following animal product purchases are classified as sustainable:
Poultry: 6.1%
Meat: 39.4%
Seafood: 31.3%
Eggs: 89.2%
Dairy: 34.7%

For more information about Bon Appétit's Farm to Fork program, visit http://bamco.com/sustainable-food-service/farm-to-fork.
For more information about the Real Food Campus Commitment, visit http://www.realfoodchallenge.org/commitment.


Data above is from Bon Appetit's FY15 (October 2014-September 2015). Real Food data and meat data is extrapolated from a two-month period in Spring 2015.

Naked Juice contains fair trade bananas. Tomatoes are purchased through the Fair Food program.

The following animal product purchases are classified as sustainable:
Poultry: 6.1%
Meat: 39.4%
Seafood: 31.3%
Eggs: 89.2%
Dairy: 34.7%

For more information about Bon Appétit's Farm to Fork program, visit http://bamco.com/sustainable-food-service/farm-to-fork.
For more information about the Real Food Campus Commitment, visit http://www.realfoodchallenge.org/commitment.

The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.