Accor, Hilton, Four Seasons, Marriott International, IHG and others have teamed up with Vegan Hospitality to cut food-related emissions via plant-based dining.
Some of the world’s biggest hotel groups are turning to plants to curb their emissions and move closer to achieving their climate targets.
The World Sustainable Hospitality Alliance (WSHA), the largest hotel association globally, has partnered with US non-profit Vegan Hospitality, which works with industry members to expand plant-based dining solutions and meet evolving sustainability goals.
The alliance represents 35 leading hotel chains (including the top 11) and over 66,000 properties, such as Accor Group, Four Seasons, Hilton, IHG Hotels & Resorts, Hyatt, ITC Hotels, Jumeirah, Marriott International, and The Ritz London.
Through the collaboration, Vegan Hospitality will provide educational resources and live trainings for WSHA’s network of corporate leaders, sustainability directors, and chefs.
“Plant proteins will be a topic in our webinars and toolkits,” Meredith Marin, executive director of Vegan Hospitality, tells Green Queen. “We won’t just be helping hotels add vegan options, we are helping them reduce high-emission foods like beef and dairy.”
How Vegan Hospitality struck the hotel alliance partnership
Vegan Hospitality has been in talks with the WSHA since last year, given that it is leading the hospitality industry’s transition towards sustainable practices.
“They invited me to represent Vegan Hospitality at their summit in October 2024 in Texas, and I found myself in a room of 100 of the world’s top sustainable hospitality leaders,” recalls Marin. “I had the chance to network and learn a lot about sustainability certifications and the industry’s goals at large.”
At the event, WSHA released a white paper called Decarbonizing Hotel Food Systems, which revealed that if the hotel industry were a country, it would be in the top 25% of the biggest polluters. The document suggested that the best way to reduce food-related emissions is to focus on what’s on the plate, not waste or transportation.
“Food sourcing contributes to over 60% of a hotel’s food-related emissions, and reducing the highest offenders (beef and dairy) can significantly lower that percentage,” says Marin, who co-founded her consultancy with Hayley Cooper.
“I knew that Vegan Hospitality had to partner with the WSHA, and the feeling was mutual, so we set out to create a partnership. It took a full year to come to the agreement, which will kick off with Vegan Hospitality offering educational webinars to its network of hospitality leaders.
“We expect about 300 corporate leaders, corporate chefs, and sustainability directors to join the live webinars, and then the recordings will be sent out to the entire network of hotels.”
While the content of the webinars is still in the works, it will likely include an introduction to the link between food sourcing and climate change, and profitable menu engineering and recipe development strategies for plant-rich dishes. “We will also develop a toolkit that will help hotels move towards plant-forward menus more quickly and consistently,” outlines Marin.
“We will work with the alliance as a whole, and also with individual hotels. Currently, we are already working with one of the alliance’s active members, Iberostar Group, which is one of the leading sustainable hotel groups in the world, with their Wave of Change initiative,” she adds.
“We are helping them transition 30% of all menus to plant-based. We plan to work with more hotel groups over the next few years to help them achieve their menu transition targets.”
Hotels encouraged to use culturally appropriate plant proteins
A host of hotel operators have already set ‘protein split’ targets – denoting the ratio of meat to meat-free dishes – in certain markets. Among WSHA members, IHG Hotels & Resorts has committed to making 30% of its menus in the Philippines plant-based, spanning brands like Crowne Plaza and Holiday Inn.
And Accor, the parent company of Novotel, Raffles, Pullman, and Ibis, has pledged to turn half its menu meatless globally by 2030, as part of its Good Food Feels Great initiative.
The WSHA has recommended the hotel industry cut emissions by 30% by the end of the decade, down from the 185 million tonnes of CO2e it generates every year. “Action on sustainable sourcing is by far the most urgent, as it could yield more than half of the total potential reduction in emissions,” its white paper reads.
“The actions are not necessarily technologically complex, but do require behaviour changes for teams. Training will play an important role here,” it continues.
“That’s where we come in, as Vegan Hospitality will be a training partner to achieve this goal,” says Marin. “Without proper training on the impact of ethical food sourcing, we run the risk of hotels swapping beef for chicken or pork, which would result in lower emissions but more animal lives lost. For example, taking one cow out of the food sourcing supply would result in, on average, 167 chickens being used in its place.”
She adds, “Our end goal would be to sustain a lasting partnership to see through this 30% reduction and beyond. We know that it’s a win-win for hotels and for their guests. Hotels will meet their sustainability targets and mandates; in the best-case scenarios, they will even save money while doing it, and guests will have more diverse menu choices, making the industry more inclusive.”
The focal point of Vegan Hospitality’s suggestions would be to build plant-forward menus. “This will likely start with hotels making commitments to transition their menus to 30% plant-based. Some hotels will hopefully make even higher commitments,” says Marin.
“We will encourage the use of plant-based proteins such as tofu, seitan, beans/legumes, and alt-meat options that are regionally and culturally appropriate. We will also encourage hotels to make plant-based milks their default.
“We are excited to support hotels in making sustainable, ethical swaps, that align with their corporate values, so that we can move toward a more ethical supply chain overall.”
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