Have you ever stood at a hotel breakfast buffet and looked out over an unwieldy selection of croissants, cheese, coffee, fresh fruit and more? The sumptuous breakfast buffet is sailed, flown and driven in from all over the world, and can be produced in the kitchen next door or on the other side of the world. Bought in bulk, as a semi-finished product and sold on the open market.
Going backwards through the buffet chain sounds demanding, but for Norwegian hotels and restaurants this is no longer the case. They have chosen to require traceability to ensure compliance with the ethical requirements that HORECA sets for suppliers of its products.
"The agreement we have entered into with Factlines gives us security and a much better overview of the sustainability requirements we set for our suppliers," says Morten Karlsen, Head of Procurement and Sales, NHO Reiseliv.
A boost for sustainability
The choice of Factlines will be a boost for the sustainability work for the entire industry, says Siri Engesæth, CEO of Factlines.
"At Factlines, we are very pleased that the major players in the hotel, restaurant and hospitality industry are now joining forces on an initiative to promote sustainability and ethical trade across the industry," she says.
Among the companies in the agreement is Norrek Dypfrys AS, which produces frozen food. They also believe that the agreement means that the entire industry must improve its sustainability efforts:
"We import around 8,000-9,000 tons of fruit and vegetables from all over the world. Quality is of course important to us, but the conditions at the different factories are equally important. This is especially true for the pickers. Now it's becoming more concrete, which means that it's not just "We", but that the whole industry needs to step up. We need to think about the end users, and the pickers who do the work. Factlines helps us to systematize this," says Hege Svendsen, Sales and Marketing Manager at Norrek Dypfrys AS.
Factlines integrated into Millum shopping portal
Millum is a shopping portal that handles almost NOK 9 billion worth of purchases per year for Norwegian food companies. Factline's solution is integrated into Millum's solution, making it easy and manageable to select products that meet ethical standards.
"We are now connecting our purchasing solution to the Factlines solution, which will make it easier to find information, and it will be natural to offer supplier information in the same place as we offer information about the products we are buying," says Susanne Hegg, Business Developer at Millum and Matinfo.
The solution has been implemented, and companies that buy from Millum or use the Factlines solution separately are now equipped for a future where requirements to ensure the right conditions in the production chain are becoming increasingly common.
In the future, customers in Norwegian hotels and restaurants can be sure that the production conditions are in order and can focus all their attention on where to start their buffet.
