The international Louis Bonduelle Foundation’s call for proposals has become a support facility for participatory research. The three winning projects for a more plant-based diet all take into account the situation on the ground.
Thank you all for submitting projects. This year’s participatory research projects all revolved around working “Towards a more plant-based diet”. Our aim? To help finance international projects that improve the positive impact of a plant-based diet in the transition towards more sustainable eating habits.
Involving the academic world and citizens
To bring about sustainable change in eating habits, we at the Louis Bonduelle Foundation believe that joint knowledge creation is vital. That is why we have since decided to involve academic research teams as well as citizens’ associations in our calls for projects.
This year, we selected three winners. All three fulfilled the selection criteria that we find so important, and that we set out in our call for proposals:
- consistency with the theme “towards more sustainable food”
- strength of the research team – citizens’ association consortium
- quality of the project
- organisational quality
- scientific impact and impact in the field
The projects selected by the Louis Bonduelle Foundation
We selected three, diverse projects from the 29 ingenious subjects that were submitted. The first winning project is situated in Spain, while the two other projects are being rolled out in France.
All three projects succeeded in setting up multidisciplinary teams. The challenge was to strike the right balance between acquiring new scientific knowledge and identifying specific solutions on the ground, without losing sight of the theme, to evolve towards a more plant-based diet in our society.
Co-developing recipes to promote legumes
How do we reduce the portions of meat that are eaten in restaurants, in favour of legumes? How do we increase the consumption of plant-based foods among restaurant customers, without compromising on satisfaction and taste? That was the primary objective of the first winning project, which is called “LEGU+” and was submitted by the Research Center of the Institut Paul Bocuse, in Ecully (France).
The LEGU+ project aims to achieve this with the co-development of innovative recipes that take into account the motivation and barriers of chefs and consumers alike.
On a broader scale, promoting a diet that is rich in plant-based proteins is still one of the main avenues for action, for which the Louis Bonduelle Foundation offers support, to preserve our planet and assure food security for the world’s population.
A more plant-based diet for children
A consortium of researchers at the Centre for Taste and Feeding Behaviour (CSGA) in Dijon (France) partnered with the Eveil’O’Goût association for an ambitious participatory research project, called EduSensoNet.
It aims to test taste education for school children in city schools, in order to:
- increase children’s desire to taste plant-based foods,
- improve their appreciation,
- and increase the consumption of all plant-based foods.
The EduSensoNet project was developed around a taste education programme with “taste workshops” for children. This sensory approach to plant-based food families is based on the familiarisation effect, designed to develop the curiosity of school children. As such, the project’s mission is undeniably linked to the Louis Bonduelle Foundation’s ambition to get children to like vegetables.
A dialogue-oriented approach to promote plant-based foods
Improving the quality of the eating habits of the elderly with a plant-based diet is the ambition of the third winner of this year’s call for projects.
The Food Observatory (ODELA) team at the University of Barcelona (Spain) wants to conduct proactive research to promote the consumption of plant-based foods by senior citizens. How? By promoting a participatory and dialogue-oriented approach.
Their aim is to improve the eating habits of the elderly in a healthy and sustainably way, thereby improving their quality of life.