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Food waste represents a major sustainability challenge with environmental, economic, social and health implications. Institutions of higher education contribute to generating food waste while serving as models in championing sustainability solutions. An experiential learning project was implemented as part of two university courses in a buffet-style university dining hall with the objective to reduce food waste while building student capacity to contribute to transformational food system change.

Partnerships were developed with university dining services. Students were trained to conduct a needs assessment in a university dining hall through food waste measurements. Students were facilitated through the process of applying baseline data on food waste to design, implement and evaluate a multi-component food waste intervention that consisted of offering reduced portion sizes, use of smaller serving utensils and educational messaging. Participant reflections were elicited to evaluate the effectiveness of the experiential learning experience.

The food waste intervention led to a 17 per cent reduction in total food waste, with a large portion of waste attributed to post-consumer plate waste. While the reduction in food waste was not statistically significant, it highlights the potential for food service operations to address food waste through reduction techniques while providing students an experiential opportunity that meets multiple learning objectives including systems thinking, collaboration and motivation for leading change in the food system.

This study highlights the opportunity of building student capacity to address sustainability challenges through an experiential learning model for reducing food waste in an institutional setting that other educators can adapt.

In the recent past, academic researchers have noted the quantity of food wasted in food service establishments in educational institutions. However, more granular inputs are required to counter the challenge posed. The purpose of this study is to undertake a review of the prior literature in the area to provide a platform for future research.

Towards this end, the authors used a robust search protocol to identify 88 congruent studies to review and critically synthesize. The research profiling of the selected studies revealed limited studies conducted on food service establishments in universities. The research is also less dispersed geographically, remaining largely focused on the USA. Thereafter, the authors performed content analysis to identify seven themes around which the findings of prior studies were organized.

The key themes of the reviewed studies are the drivers of food waste, quantitative assessment of food waste, assessment of the behavioural aspects of food waste, operational strategies for reducing food waste, interventions for inducing behavioural changes to mitigate food waste, food diversion and food waste disposal processes and barriers to the implementation of food waste reduction strategies.

This study has key theoretical and practical implications. From the perspective of research, the study revealed various gaps in the extant findings and suggested potential areas that can be examined by academic researchers from the perspective of the hospitality sector. From the perspective of practice, the study recommended actionable strategies to help managers mitigate food waste.

The authors have made a novel contribution to the research on food waste reduction by identifying theme-based research gaps, suggesting potential research questions and proposing a framework based on the open-systems approach to set the future research agenda.

This study aims to determine and analyze the predictors of food waste reduction intention and behavior among higher education institutions (HEIs) using an extended version of the theory of planned behavior (TPB).

This study empirically tested an extended TPB model through regression analyses using data obtained through an online survey.

Attitude toward food waste reduction, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control and food waste knowledge predicted intention to reduce food waste. Furthermore, the intention to reduce food waste predicted food waste reduction behavior.

The results imply that extending the TPB by adding food waste knowledge significantly predicted food waste reduction intention and behavior.

The study identified factors that predict food waste reduction behavior and suggested ways to influence Filipino students in HEIs to reduce food waste.

The findings support the inclusion of food waste knowledge to the TPB in predicting food waste reduction intention and behavior among students in HEIs.