Food service contracts and agreements

Incorporating A Better Choice requirements in contracts and tenders with retail and catering providers is an effective way to ensure that healthier food and drinks are available and encouraged at events and venues.

To help guide the type of food and drinks available, local sports clubs, recreation facilities, large venues and stadiums can include requirements in their contracts, agreements or tenders with external retail or catering providers.

When including requirements in contracts start by discussing the matter with the retail or catering provider, ideally during the negotiation phase.

What to include

Ensuring healthy food and drinks are accessible and encouraged can be as simple as inserting a requirement based on the A Better Choice Food and Drink targets1 in the contract or agreement.

Be specific

To assist with setting clear expectations with retail or catering providers and to monitor change, rather than using general wording it is best to set specific targets and timelines.

Don’t use general working such as,

The Supplier must provide food and drinks in accordance with the following:

(a) healthy food and drink options must be made available at all retail and vending outlets when Services are being provided.

Do use specific language, for example,

As part of this contract, [insert organisation’s name] requires [insert name of retail or catering provider] to meet the following requirements:

From 1 September 2023 all [insert name of retail or catering provider] retail outlets will:

1. Provide 50% or more food and drinks from the green category.
2. Provide 20% or less of food and drinks from the red category.
3. Provide no more than 20% intense artificially or naturally sweetened drinks.

From 1 September 2023 all [insert name of retail or catering provider] vending machines will:

1. Provide 50% or more drinks from the green category.
2. Provide 30% or more food from the green category.
3. Provide 20% or less of food and drinks from the red category.
4. Provide no more than 20% intense artificially or naturally sweetened drinks.

For information on the foods and drinks that sit in the green, amber and red categories refer to the A Better Choice Strategy for Sport and Recreation. A staged approach could be considered to slowly work towards meeting the targets, starting with lower targets, then increasing over time.  

Health and Wellbeing Queensland acknowledges the work of Queensland Health in developing content included in this resource.