How our innovative patient services support people and planet 

Marking 10 years of targeted social impact  

Our Social Impact Pledge 2030 makes our ambitions clear. Launched in 2025, 10 years after our first set of ethical and sustainability commitments, this 2030 vision reflects our founding as an organisation dedicated to improving quality of life:  

• People: To lead the industry on social mobility, offering all our people inclusive environments and equitable opportunities for development  
• Planet: To put Net Zero 2040 within reach by reducing our absolute Scope 1 & 2 and Scope 3 (non-FLAG*) emissions by 55% 
• Places: To fight food insecurity through our Stop Hunger Foundation, supporting more than 12.5 million people across the UK and Ireland 
• Partners: To continue sharing our expertise with our supply partners, supporting sustainable practices and continued innovation  

From delicious and nutritious plant-based meals to technologies that reduce hospital emissions, see how our expertise in sustainable operations goes hand in hand with our support for patient wellbeing. 

The NHS became the first health system to embed its Net Zero goals into legislation and is now working hard to decarbonise. Collaboration with its supply chain partners is key, as together they contribute 60-70% of its total carbon emissions.

The NHS Evergreen framework, which was co-designed with the supply chain, is enabling its 80,000 suppliers to align their sustainability plans to the NHS Net Zero objectives. By sharing information on our progress against validated science-based targets, Sodexo has achieved Level 4 status - the highest maturity level.

For us, operating sustainably and inclusively is fundamental to business success. Our commitment to social impact is embedded in daily decision-making and supported by technologies that empower our teams to take action in complex healthcare environments.

From preventing waste to promoting sustainable eating and investing in Green Skills, here’s how we help our health and care clients to deliver planet-friendly patient services: 

Serving delicious, nutritious and sustainable food

Food systems account for the more than a third of the world’s carbon emissions, so we’re on a mission to make eating well more sustainable. And by integrating the principles of Culinary Medicine, we ensure that hospital food supports nutrition as well as Net Zero goals: 

• We’re aiming for our menus to feature 33% plant-based meals by 31 August 2025, nudging patients towards healthier diets that support their wellbeing and cut carbon emissions too. All our menus present the plant-based options first by default.
• We’re working towards 70% of our main meals being classified as low carbon by 2030 (a meal that generates 0.9kgs CO2e or less) and using the Carbon Scoring Initiative to inform our work.
• We tackle food waste by using the WasteWatch measurement tool, enabling real-time tracking to inform proactive waste prevention. 

Innovating safely and efficiently

We’re always on the look out for new ways of working that can improve wellbeing, building management and protect the environment too. It’s how we make a positive impact on hospitals both inside and out: 

• To promote staff safety and sustainability, we use WearerTech safety shoes, helping to reduce slip incidents while recycling and repurposing used footwear. So far, we’ve recycled more than 400 pairs of shoes, with 96 donated to Shoe Aid.
• Our exclusive Xempla partnership helps us to monitor and optimise hospital assets. So far, we’ve reduced energy consumption by 1.2 million kWh, saving more than 2,500 tonnes of carbon and preventing 83 critical outages.

Making sustainability feel effortless

As part of our award-winning Net Zero Supply Chain Engagement Strategy, which includes clear targets and support for SMEs, we are accelerating the decarbonisation of our own supply chain. We are also collaborating with clients, colleagues and the wider industry to explore the opportunities to go further, faster:

• We hold regular sustainability webinars to share expertise, empowering our clients and colleagues to work towards shared goals. We also collaborate with businesses of scale in multiple industries through our community of practice.  
• We’ve created Green Skills learning pathways for our colleagues. As an official IEMA Training Centre, we’re also able to share this knowledge with our clients and suppliers too.

Our exclusive partnership with Xempla, a Decision Automation System, makes emissions reductions easier too. Taking sensor data from building management systems, Xempla offers a holistic, on-time view of critical hospital assets. This enables Sodexo’s Health & Care team to fine-tune performance, investigate issues and proactively avoid asset failure while reducing energy consumption.

For one NHS Trust, Xempla covers more than 2,000 assets, with more than 12,000 data points streamed every 15 mins.

See Xempla in action at Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust

More about our Social Impact Pledge 2030 

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