News & insights / News / 26.03.26

Why Baan Tepa Won the Sustainability Award at Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants

Located in Bangkok’s Bang Kapi district, Baan Tepa's ethos is deeply rooted in Thai culture and traditions, with a focus on presenting indigenous ingredients in newly imagined ways. Beyond the plate, operations here are guided by a shift from simple sustainability to a truly regenerative model, with the team consciously working to restore their natural environment rather than simply reducing negative impacts. By designing systems that actively return value to the environment, producers and people, Baan Tepa acts as proof that fine dining can be accomplished in responsible ways.

CEO of The Sustainable Restaurant Association, Juliane Caillouette Noble, said of the win, "Well done to the team at Baan Tepa! Their dedication to responsible sourcing is highly commendable, championing small producers in tangible ways and creating a market for traditional and heritage ingredients that support both regional biodiversity and local communities. Our team was also very impressed by their incredible efforts to embrace circularity, designing waste out of every part of their operations and proving that fine dining does not need to be wasteful.”

Read on for more details of these impressive initiatives, and more...

Responsible sourcing at Baan Tepa

Baan Tepa’s procurement strategy highlights how restaurants can support local communities, nurture biodiversity and keep traditional agricultural techniques, Indigenous knowledge and native ingredients alive into the future.

The team maintains direct relationships with over 70 small-scale producers across 36 Thai provinces, and has increased direct purchasing to reduce reliance on middlemen.
They use seasonal pre-order planning to give producers stable demand and reduce overproduction pressure.
Around 95% of ingredients are sourced domestically. Imported ingredients are limited to two menu components (caviar and Australian wagyu), used in small quantities rather than as centre-of-plate portions, lowering the overall embedded carbon footprint of the menu and supporting Thai producers.
Through long-term partnerships, several producers have shifted from volume-based commodity selling to quality-focused supply, improving income while reducing chemical inputs.
Their procurement strategy deliberately prioritises heritage and underutilised varieties, including native rice species, wild herbs, and traditional fermented ingredients such as Tua Nao from northern communities, helping create market value for biodiversity.
They’ve expanded their internal ingredient mapping system, which now tracks over 200 Thai varieties by origin, seasonality and producer, guiding menu design toward local and seasonal sourcing and reducing reliance on imports.
The restaurant’s ‘Baan Tepa On Tour’ field visits allow the team to build relationships, understand growing practices, and co-develop region-specific products.
They also organise an annual Baan Tepa Farmers Market, where 24 of their partner producers can sell directly to the public. This provides producers with higher-margin direct sales, increases consumer awareness of seasonal and regional Thai ingredients, and shortens the gap between producer and end consumer.

Social sustainability at Baan Tepa

Staff training, producer education sessions, and public-facing farmer markets position the restaurant as a platform for knowledge exchange and community connection, not only a place of consumption.

Over the past year, Baan Tepa has directly integrated producers into the restaurant’s internal education and public engagement, supporting producers in the community while also helping their team to connect with the ingredients they serve.
They host monthly in-house ‘Meet the Producers’ sessions where farmers, foragers and fishers visit the restaurant to present their ingredients and production methods to the entire team. These sessions improve staff knowledge, strengthen producer recognition and create direct relationships between those who grow food and those who cook and serve it.
Internally, all staff receive at least four hours of weekly training, including ingredient knowledge, sustainability practices and communication skills. Team members rotate between kitchen, garden and service roles to build understanding of the full food system.
Team members also have the chance to ‘job shadow’ other roles within the business and attend external training opportunities.
Staff on shift are provided with a healthy, wholesome meals.
The restaurant organises a company-wide volunteer day at least once a year.

How Baan Tepa reduces environmental impact

Baan Tepa is a fantastic example of how even high-end kitchens can take an active and successful approach to designing waste out of their systems. Outputs are measured daily, categorised, and redirected into secondary uses before composting. Organic waste is processed in-house, and materials are tracked to identify reduction and reuse opportunities.

They have implemented a fully 'in-house' circular food system that processes 100% of organic waste on-site.
All food-related outputs are weighed, recorded and separated daily into citrus, fruit, greens, eggshells, seafood shells and other by-product categories. Monthly reviews of this data help to guide reduction and reuse strategies.
They redesigned their kitchen workflow so that by-products are treated as ingredient streams rather than waste. To enable this, they created a dedicated in-house fermentation role and surplus R&D role responsible for transforming kitchen by-products into usable components. Fruit scraps are fermented into vinegars and kombucha, herb stems are processed into oils and powders, allium trimmings are turned into seasonings, and seafood shells are used to make stocks. Used cooking oil is diverted to biodiesel, and eggshells are repurposed for non-food applications.
Only materials that cannot be further upcycled are composted. Composting is treated as the final step, not the primary solution, and the compost is returned to the restaurant’s on-site garden, closing the nutrient loop.
By embedding this system into daily operations rather than running it as a side initiative, they have eliminated organic waste sent to landfill. This reduces methane emissions, disposal volumes and raw material demand, while driving behavioural change through data tracking and staff involvement.
Tracking highlighted that waste at staff meals was largely plate waste, driven by people taking more than they could eat. To amend this, the restaurant improved menu planning for staff meals and moved from buffet-style service to pre-portioned meals with defined ladle/portion guidance, with the option for staff to take more after finishing. This reduces over-serving while maintaining flexibility.
The restaurant is transitioning from mixed general waste disposal to material-based separation at source. Non-organic waste is sorted into 10 different categories on-site. Clearly labelled sorting stations have been introduced across kitchen and back-of-house areas, and staff training focuses on proper segregation and contamination reduction. Through a partnership with Waste Buy Delivery, these materials are then collected and directed into recycling and recovery streams instead of landfill. Monthly tracking of waste volumes allows them to measure diversion performance and identify high-volume streams for further reduction.
To reinforce behavioural change, revenue generated from selling recyclable materials through Waste Buy is allocated toward staff welfare initiatives. This allows the team to see a direct benefit from proper waste segregation, increasing engagement and accountability. By linking environmental performance with staff benefit, waste separation becomes a shared responsibility rather than a back-of-house task.
They work to reduce the impact of transporting raw materials through regional sourcing and order consolidation. They also operate a returnable packaging system.

Well done to the entire team for this well-deserved win.

Read more about Baan Tepa on their website. You can learn more about our work with 50 Best here.    

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