Corporate Social Responsibility suggests that a company should be responsible for its activities in society in the form of social, legal and environmental aspects. This modern line includes three key features: achieving sustainable yields at the same time, reducing environmental footprints (planet), and balancing these goals with the people involved, from workers to society at large.

What is CSR?

CSR, also called Corporate Social Responsibility, is a set of ethics and duties that commit any company to analyze its impact on society and assess its responsibilities towards society and shareholders. In restaurants, CSR depends on the legal and functional duties that they have to perform for the benefit of society.

According to research:

Corporate social responsibility can be defined as: “The conduct of an organization that makes it profitable, legal and useful for society. (Carrol 1983)”.

CSR for a restaurant:

The restaurant industry is one of the fastest emerging service sectors in the world. This industry employs unskilled, semi-skilled and skilled people in different designations. It also allows building and enhancing personal skills by providing training to workers. In this way, they can create a perfect and friendly atmosphere and serve the community.

In the restaurant industry, CSR is still new thinking; there are a lot of multinational food chains that are involved in CSR related activities. There are many financial and social benefits to be found in developing a CSR policy within a hotel. The restaurant industry has carried out various voluntary actions to get involved in the development of society and owners. This initiative represents the restaurant staff and owner’s devotion to sustainable growth. You can also introduce different programs like quality programs, environmental improvement initiatives, benchmarking, etc. to play a vital role towards the welfare of society.

There are many problems for a restaurant such as waste, labor conflicts (equal pay, women’s rights and unions), energy consumption. Although restaurants are taking initiatives to step up their corporate social responsibility efforts, they still lag behind other businesses.

The restaurant industry may need to focus on the following if it has to formulate policies regarding CSR:

• Waste management

• Water consumption

• energy use

• Employment opportunities

• Training for workers

• Environmentally friendly activities, etc.

Some benefits of developing CSR policies are:

• Improves the reputation and brand image of a restaurant by ensuring that it is following legal and social conduct.

• It helps the restaurant to improve relationships with customers, as CSR encourages innovation and helps make products that are beneficial to all of society.

• It clarifies the purpose of the business and provides holistic data to restaurant owners, helping to create long-term relationships between staff and owners.

• Promotes labor rights, so that staff feel safe and perform well.

• It also helps keep the environment clean and friendly, which creates a good image of a restaurant for its customers.

• It works for the welfare of society in addition to increasing the profits of restaurants.

• Help a restaurant comply with legal, ethical and social duties.

The concept of CSR is new to restaurant owners and not so easy to understand. Research is needed to find the best practices that can be implemented in restaurants, so that they can meet the requirements of the CSR policy.