As part of WRAP’s Guardians of Grub campaign, September is dedicated to the Stand Up For Food initiative, shedding light on the £3 billion worth of food thrown out every year in the hospitality and food sector.
It’s becoming more common for people to eat out, with 35% of Brits doing it at least once a week. Often, people are unable to finish their food and fail to take their leftovers home. Uneaten food, such as potatoes, bread, and garnishes, account for one-third of all food waste from the hospitality and food sector.
The goal is to measure and reduce the amount of perfectly good food wasted on a daily basis. In fact, 75% of the one million tonnes of food wasted every year could have been eaten. Food waste can occur anywhere from purchasing and storage to preparation and leftovers. Supported by the government’s Food Surplus and Waste Champion, Ben Elliot, as well as famous chefs including Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Ken Hom, and Melissa Hemsley, Stand Up For Food month is about acting more responsibly with food and taking a stand against climate change.
With the Guardians of Grub campaign, businesses can reduce food waste by preserving food and giving it a longer life (such as freezing), keeping track and taking stock to avoid buying more than what’s necessary, as well as using food to its full value, such as using every part of a chicken or pig for meals.
Free resources to help combat food waste
Thanks to WRAP’s free resources, businesses across the hospitality and food sector can fight against food waste with the help of checklists, food tracking sheets, posters, food calculators, and so much more. With this guidance, businesses can review the amount of food thrown away and create an action plan for ordering, storing, and preparing food more efficiently. It takes a lot of time and resources to produce food, and when less quality food is thrown away, it means more profit and reduced operational costs for businesses. In one example, the Crieff Hydro Hotel in Perthshire was able to track, measure and act on food waste, saving 11.5 tonnes of food and reducing costs by 43%.
According to Peter Maddox, Director of WRAP, people don’t realise the effect food waste can have on climate change, “The reality is that we won’t stop temperatures rising if we fail to address the problems within the food system. We see no place for food waste on any UK menu, and I’m confident Stand Up For Food will be a great success, and an important moment in the war on food waste.” Maddox goes on to say, “This is the largest, most inclusive campaign we’ve ever undertaken with the hospitality and food service sector and the key has been recruiting the Guardians to make this happen in their own businesses, and arming those people with the right resources to help.”
Want to know more about what you can do with your business’ food waste? Talk to us today about our food waste collection services. Keep your food waste separate from general waste and save on collection costs. The food waste we collect from Westminster businesses is turned into energy (biogas) and fertiliser. As such, following true recycling principles, our food waste collection service ensures that what starts on the farm gets returned to the farm. A real closed-loop solution!
