Eating excellent food while doing something good for the environment: 1 October 2022 marked the first Swisstainable Veggie Day. With this day of action, Switzerland Tourism ST and industry partners GastroSuisse, HotellerieSuisse and Planted set a milestone for sustainable gastronomy. Over 1,200 restaurants participated nationwide, offering their guests a special menu of vegetarian dishes. ST CEO Martin Nydegger was enthusiastic about the commitment of the restaurateurs, who, after difficult years marked by the pandemic and despite the acute shortage of skilled workers, showed their dedication: “They were open to new things and wanted to take personal responsibility for making their own contribution to sustainability.”

The chefs were able to demonstrate that locally produced vegetables are much more than just a side dish – and that meatless substitutes can also deliver on great flavour when prepared well. A first taste of things to come was already available back in April 2022 in Arosa at the Switzerland Vacation Day 2022, where exclusively vegetarian dishes were offered for the first time.

The variety of businesses that participated on the actual campaign day was immense, ranging from gourmet restaurants to mountain huts, and from SBB dining cars and the SWISS galley to McDonald’s, Coop restaurants, the Swiss Youth Hostels, snack stands and even steakhouses. Supporters of the campaign were featured on the website set up especially for this purpose with a lot of additional information as well as facts about the topic.

Just one vegetarian day can make a huge difference

According to Statista, around 5% of the population in Switzerland eat a vegetarian or vegan diet – and the number of flexitarians is rising. Consciously giving up meat from time to time is becoming more popular. And the environment thanks you: because vegetarian food has been proven to produce fewer greenhouse gases and thus helps to achieve climate goals. A projection by Eaternity showed that this day of action alone saved around 75 tonnes of CO2. That’s as many emissions as 252,000 oak trees can absorb and store in a day.

Casimir Platzer, President of GastroSuisse, was enthusiastic about the day of action: “The successful initiative allowed establishments to put more focus on their creative and tasty meat-free offerings.” At the same time, guests could be sensitised to vegetarian cuisine and surprised with new dishes. “The aspects of regionality and seasonality are also important here, with which the businesses contribute to climate protection.”

Action on World Vegetarian Day

ST wants to continue to raise awareness with this campaign even after World Vegetarian Day, which was on 1 October 2022. This aims to make the desire for meat-free menus resonate with both guests and businesses in the long term, with an expanded offering or regular Veggie Days, for example.

Today, there are already 761 hotels and restaurants across Switzerland participating in the Swisstainable programme for sustainable tourism. Since the announcement of this day of action in April 2022, 62% more registrations have been received (as at September 2022).

Veggie Day was supported on social media, such as Facebook and Instagram. Nut roasts, pasta with mushrooms, vegetables with lentils – hosts and guests alike photographed their menus to make a sustainable statement. ST also received attention in traditional media worldwide for Veggie Day, or for vegetarianism in Switzerland. Media relations generated around 17 million media contacts, for example on India TV, Italia a Tavola, on French-speaking Switzerland’s Radio LFM or in the St. Galler Tagblatt. Of course, participating businesses were also keen to draw attention to the Swisstainable Veggie Day through their own channels.