Assessing the scale of adoption of sustainability practices by community pharmacies in Spain in the time of COVID-19.

Community pharmacies play a critical societal role and are well placed to enable the progress of national health systems towards sustainability. Nevertheless, there is a dearth of research which has been set up to understand sustainability practices adopted by community pharmacies and evaluate the drivers behind their adoption. This study undertook an exploratory analysis of 95 community pharmacies in Spain, measured their engagement with sustainability practices and assessed these practices in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. The results demonstrated the room for improvement in the adoption of green procurement practices in pharmacies and in their engagement with the community. Moreover, the study showcased that, during the COVID-19 crisis, the pharmacies with the largest extent of adoption of sustainability practices implemented preventative measures against the pandemic in a more diverse number during the first weeks of the lockdown, compared to their less sustainable counterparts. This indicates that, to build resilience to future (health) crises, the implementation of sustainable practices in community pharmacies should be encouraged by both policy makers and pharmaceutical firms.

The COVID-19 pandemic and organisational commitment of senior hotel managers.

The COVID-19 pandemic will reduce the attractiveness of hospitality occupations. This particularly concerns senior management positions whose holders may substitute hospitality jobs with more secure and rewarding employment in other economic sectors. Organisational resilience of hospitality businesses, including their response to COVID-19, and corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices may, however, affect perceived job security of senior managers and, thus, influence their commitment to remain in their host organisations. This paper quantitatively tests the inter-linkages between the above variables on a sample of senior managers in hotels in Spain. It finds that the levels of organisational resilience and the extent of CSR practices reinforce perceived job security of managers which, in turn, determines their organisational commitment. Organisational response to COVID-19 affects perceived job security and enhances managers' organisational commitment. To retain senior management teams in light of future disastrous events, hotels should, therefore, strengthen their organisational resilience and invest in CSR.

Data on the sustainability profile and food waste management in primary and secondary schools: The case of the Catalonia region in Spain.

This paper presents data from a survey administered to 548 public and private school headteachers in Catalonia (Spain) in 2018 on sustainability practices and food waste management. Raw data were collected through a standardised and structured questionnaire (For more information refer to Building and managing sustainable schools: The case of food waste [1]). The variables of the dataset include items relative to the canteen management system, the school sustainability profile and perceptions on food waste generation and management. Additionally, data on the level of implementation and interest on a wide range of potential initiatives to fight against food waste are provided within this article. School-level attributes (e.g. size, infrastructure) are also included.

Towards more sustainable food systems. Addressing food waste at school canteens.

Food Waste is a global significant issue for ethical, environmental and economic reasons, while its management is difficult due to its frequent low visibility. Individual choices and preferences are closely related to the generation of food waste although likely to be modified through education and awareness campaigns. In particular, school canteens are big generators of food waste and, at the same time, provide a great opportunity to improve habits regarding nutrition and education on sustainability, thus impacting the future of the food system. The end purpose of this research is identifying the causes of food waste and unveiling best practices towards its reduction. To achieve this goal, we have designed and developed a mixed methods research approach including semi-structured interviews with managers and staff in schools and catering firms and waste audits at four school canteens - measuring waste from over 10,000 pupil's trays. In order to avoid potential bias due to meal preference, the audit lasted three to five consecutive weekdays per school, thus comprising different menus. We estimated overall food waste between 60 and 100 g per pupil per day. Plate waste represented the highest source of waste, although a big disparity was found among the schools based on their different educational perspectives. Key food waste determinants found were: first, top management standpoint towards food waste and sustainability in general. Secondly, we observed relevant differences among the three catering business models studied, regarding the stages where food waste is usually produced. Finally, food waste was also impacted by the diverse resource availability among the schools. Despite this, the human factor arose as the most relevant one when aiming to minimise food waste.

The opportunity of tracking food waste in school canteens: Guidelines for self-assessment.

Reducing food waste is one of the key challenges of the food system and addressing it in the institutional catering industry can be a quick win. In particular, school canteens are a significant source of food waste and therefore embody a great opportunity to address food waste. The goal of our research is the development of guidelines for audit and self-assessment in measuring and managing food waste produced at school canteens. The purpose of the tool is to standardise food waste audits to be executed either by scholars, school staff or by catering companies with the objective of measuring and reducing food waste at schools. We performed a research among public and private schools and catering companies from which we obtained the key performance indicators to be measured and then pilot-tested the resulting tool in four schools with over 2900 pupil participants, measuring plate waste from over 10,000 trays. This tool will help managers in their efforts towards more sustainable organisations at the same time as the standardisation of food waste audits will provide researchers with comparable data. The study suggests that although there is low awareness on the amount of food wasted at school canteens, managers and staff are highly interested in the topic and would be willing to implement audits and reduction measures. The case study also showed that our tool is easy to implement and not disruptive.