FOODWISE Kicks-Off: Making Circular Food Choices Easier Across Europe What if the most circular choice in a supermarket was also the easiest, most attractive, and most rewarding one? Across Europe, many citizens care about sustainability, food waste, and climate impact. Yet in everyday life, good intentions often meet busy routines, confusing information, limited options, or retail environments that still make linear consumption the default. “We see a clear opportunity here and that’s the starting point for our FOODWISE project, which we launched in June 2026. We want to work together with partners and relevant actors to redesign food systems so that circular choices become intuitive, accessible, and desirable.”, shares Nora Brüggemann, CSCP Senior Project Manager and Food Waste Expert. Addressing the (big) gap FOODWISE brings together 13 partners from six European countries and is focused at accelerating the transition towards more circular food systems by addressing one of the most persistent challenges in sustainable consumption: the gap between awareness and action. Food as a circular economy topic Food is sometimes less visible in circular economy debates than materials, packaging, textiles, or electronics. Yet food waste prevention is one of the most practical and impactful circular economy opportunities. Preventing edible food from becoming waste, improving redistribution and valorisation pathways, and helping consumers make better everyday choices all contribute to a system in which resources are used more responsibly and value is retained for longer. The FOODWISE approach FOODWISE will focus on this opportunity by combining behavioural science, social innovation, business transformation, policy work, storytelling, and digital tools. The project will work with citizens, retailers, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), municipalities, and policymakers to better understand consumption patterns and circularity gaps — and to turn these insights into practical interventions that can be tested, evaluated, and scaled. The CSCP role Building on a knowledge base in food waste prevention and sustainable consumption, the CSCP will lead the work on retail diagnostics, behaviour mapping, and co-designed interventions in retail and service environments. This includes analysing operational practices, consumer behaviour, existing circularity initiatives, and systemic barriers together with retail partners. The aim is to identify where targeted interventions can make circular food choices easier, more attractive, and more impactful. Testing promising approaches A key element will be the development and testing of approaches such as the Conscious Aisle, which reimagines supermarkets as places where circular choices become more visible and intuitive. Depending on the retail context, this may include interventions such as shelf labelling, product placement, loyalty incentives, digital prompts, pricing mechanisms, or storytelling campaigns. These approaches will be designed with partners and evaluated from the outset, linking behavioural insights with operational indicators such as uptake rates, waste reduction, and scalability. “At the CSCP, we are excited about the start of FOODWISE because it gives us the chance to build on existing circular economy and food waste knowledge and avoid reinventing the wheel. This is already our 12th project on food waste prevention, giving us a strong basis to help replicate and scale successful practices — always with impact creation in mind and together with great partners across Europe.”, says Nora. Reach out to Nora Brüggemann to engage with us on circular food! For further questions on the FOODWISE project, please contact Luca Sander.