Restaurants commended for action on waste
Winchester City Council’s Portfolio Holder for Environment, Health and Wellbeing has written to restaurants across Winchester as part of this year’s ‘Great Waste’ campaign.
Cllr Frank Pearson has commended some of the biggest restaurants in town for efforts they have made to store and dispose of their waste carefully. He said:
Restaurants generate a lot of waste, and often struggle to manage it effectively – particularly when they are operating out of historic buildings, or on frontages where there is little space for commercial bins. This can lead to rubbish spilling onto the streets or blocking narrow pavements, none of which is good for the people who live, shop or work here.
Our town centre neighbourhood service officers have been visiting premises regularly, and have been impressed by the changes that have been made over recent months.
The next step, comments Cllr Pearson, is to reduce the amount of waste that these businesses are producing to start with. The letter contains a number of basic tips about ways to go about this, which range from reviewing menus regularly to use leftover produce to training staff, and from improving inventory management to better separation of waste materials for recycling.
It is estimated that UK restaurants produce over 1.6 million tonnes of waste a year, around 600,000 tonnes of which is food. Sending good food to landfill is not just bad for the environment: it costs individual restaurants up to £20,000 a year in unnecessary food purchases and waste collection. Restaurants can improve their financial performance by reducing their food waste.
The Council is working in partnership with Winchester Action on Climate Change (WinACC) to deliver the year-long campaign, with the aim of reducing the amount of waste being produced across the city and the wider Winchester District, and to increase recycling levels.
Susie Phillips, Co-ordinator of The Great Waste campaign, added:
As with most ‘green’ initiatives, reducing restaurant waste is good for the bottom line as well as the planet. Food waste is in the media a lot at the moment, and many customers are more comfortable these days knowing that they are giving their business to an eatery which does all it can to reduce its environmental impact.
Cllr Pearson said:
Visitors are more likely to make a return trip to a clean bright city. We look forward to hearing from some of the restaurants about the innovative steps they are taking to reduce waste. And I’d encourage everyone to ask about more than the specials when they order their meal – we can all play our part in persuading businesses to do more for the environment.
To find out more about events and other initiatives which form part of the Great Waste campaign, visit the webpage at www.thegreatwaste.org , like it on Facebook at www.facebook.com/thegreatwaste or follow it on Twitter @TheGreatWaste15