Development and Validation of a Tool for Assessing Sustainable Social Practices in Food Services

Background: Food services have a high potential to promote the social dimension of sustainability. However, there are no specific instruments for implementing and evaluating socially sustainable practices in these establishments. Therefore, this study aimed to develop and validate the content of a list to assess sustainable social practices in food services. Methods: The pre-list of items was developed based on scientific articles about social sustainability published in the last 20 years and Brazilian legislations related to the theme. The content validity was assessed by ten nutritionists, in two phases, using the Delphi technique. The content validity index, Kappa statistic, and content validity ratio were calculated. Results: The list that was developed consisted of 130 items, which were organized into five axes: “organizational and managerial environment” (13 items), “community” (10 items), “employees” (62 items), “consumer” (33 items), and “suppliers” (12 items). Most items in the instrument (54.7%) were optional for the food services, and 45.3% were Brazilian legal obligations. After the second phase, sub-axes axes, axes, and the global instruments showed “excellent” content validity with an item content validity index ≥ of 0.8 (at minimum, 0.920) and Kappa > 0.74 (from 0.927 to 1). The content validity ratios of the items, sub-axes, and axes vary between 0 and 0.070. The instrument was considered easy to complete and useful for evaluating socially sustainable practices adopted in food services by 95.5% of the specialists. Conclusions: The instrument that was developed had its content validated and thus can help the managers and technicians responsible for the unit with social sustainability measures, thus ensuring the socially sustainable production of meals.