Food Waste Recycling Guide for Institute of Hospitality (IoH)

Published - Monday, 15 March, 2010

Abstract of the Cawleys Food Waste Recycling Guide for the Institute of Hospitality:

Did you know that:

• All your food waste can be recycled to generate electricity and fertiliser?
• It will become illegal to put food waste from catering into landfill. A Defra consultation currently taking place will lead to the introduction of a ban on catering waste to landfill.

Food waste is inevitable: no matter what type of food you work with, how skilled your chefs
or how delicious your menu, there will always be some waste. What is not inevitable is the
environmental damage caused by the release of harmful greenhouse gases as food waste
decomposes in landfill.

A range of environmentally-friendly and legislation-compliant alternatives to landfill already
exists. These include Anaerobic Digestion (AD), which has been hailed as the future of
food waste management by both WRAP and the UK Environment Minister.

Why should hospitality care about food waste? - Consumer Pressure!

Consumers care about waste. High-profile campaigns such as WRAP’s “Love Food, Hate
Waste” have stimulated increased awareness about food waste. The restaurant and food
service sector generate over three million tonnes of food waste each year. Consumers are taking steps to reduce food waste at home and they expect the hospitality sector to do the same.

An independent research report commissioned by Cawleys, investigated consumer attitudes towards food waste. The final report, entitled “Eco-Eating: consumer attitudes to commercial food waste”, found that:

• 94% of people try not to waste food at home
• 78% of people believe that where food waste ends up is as important as where ingredients come from when they dine out
• 69% of people care about food waste in restaurants and the workplace
• 44% of restaurant diners would be willing to pay more in a restaurant with exceptional environmental credentials
• Given a choice between restaurants of equal food reputation – 69% would opt for the one with the best environmental credentials
• 85% of people care about what goes on behind the scenes in restaurants

Conclusion

As the world's population grows and pressure on finite resources increases, we all have a responsibility to adopt the mantra “reuse, reduce and recycle” when it comes to resources
and waste. In the hospitality sector, some food waste is always inevitable but the massive
environmental damage caused by dumping waste food in landfill is not. Through the use of
green technologies like anaerobic digestion, our industry can avoid the emission of harmful
greenhouse gasses and make a positive contribution to environmental targets.