How can we tackle food waste?

00;00;00;01 - 00;00;29;11

Speaker 1

Morning, everyone. I hope you're all well. And welcome to today's LinkedIn Live. Today, I'm joined by Eleanor Morris. She's the special adviser, false vitality and food services at Wrap. For those of you who may not be aware, Rapp is playing a key role in the fight against food waste. This is a fight that we desperately need to play our part in, too, with food waste having a hugely damaging impact on the UK both financially and environmentally.

 

00;00;29;11 - 00;00;51;29

Speaker 1

On a more global level, food waste and loss account for around 8% of human caused greenhouse gas emissions. Just think about that. We've got to hit net zero by 2050. If you could tackle food waste, you take almost 10% of the problem away. So it's a really, really important topic and one that we all need to interact and engage on.

 

00;00;53;02 - 00;01;30;23

Speaker 1

If food waste were a country, it'd be the third largest emitter in the world. I hope you're getting some ideas. If you didn't already have it off the scale of the problem, but the opportunity that exists that we can take and put things right, an ecological transformation, maybe as the earlier would describe it. With that in mind, Eleanor is going to talk to us and tell us about how we can all take steps to tackle food waste and reduce its impact, both globally and on a local scale.

 

00;01;30;28 - 00;01;42;07

Speaker 1

And we're going to focus because it is such a big topic, we're going to focus really on the hospitality and food services sector to start with. Eleanor, would you like to introduce yourself to the world?

 

00;01;43;20 - 00;02;03;21

Speaker 2

Thanks, Martyn. Good morning, and thank you for the opportunity. My name's Eleanor. I work for Rapp and we are an NGO based in the UK, but we operate globally and our ambition is to tackle climate change. So we do that in a number of ways, one of which is food, which is what I'm looking forward to discussing with you today.

 

00;02;04;28 - 00;02;30;22

Speaker 1

Yes, food. Food. Glorious food. I'm going to start. And the format as regular viewers and listeners will understand is that I'm going to ask you a few questions. We've got the channels open. So if people want to ask or suggest questions I could ask you if that's available to them. And there will be resources and information in the comments section underneath this video.

 

00;02;30;22 - 00;03;00;05

Speaker 1

And the video will be available to watch again and again and again if you so wish. On LinkedIn linked in afterwards, I'm going to start with a question, Eleanor, about the damaging effect of food, and food waste, both in terms of cost and sustainability. Can you quantify that to us in terms of how much food is actually wasted in the UK and the impact of that in the UK?

 

00;03;00;23 - 00;03;26;04

Speaker 2

Yeah, absolutely. So wrap is an evidence-based organisation. So we gather data and analyse that. For the UK, the hospitality and food service sector equates to about 12% of the overall UK food waste. That means around a million tonnes of food is wasted every year by the sector, which is around £3 billion. And of course, that is increasing as the price of food increases.

 

00;03;26;11 - 00;03;47;28

Speaker 2

And the staggering fact is that 75% of the food that ends up in the bin from the hospitality and food service sector could have been eaten. And of course, that's something that we're really trying to tackle in terms of understanding where that waste of food is coming from, but also taking action to reduce that. And one of our mantras is feeding people, not bins.

 

00;03;47;28 - 00;03;51;12

Speaker 2

So that's really what we're trying to focus on in the campaigns that we're running.

 

00;03;53;03 - 00;04;10;15

Speaker 1

Wow. So I'm going to have to. It's normally question three before I go off-topic, but I can't let 5% disappear. That's an amazing stat. So is that food production to a plate? or is that just from the kitchen to plate? Where are we? Where is that waste occurring?

 

00;04;10;27 - 00;04;34;01

Speaker 2

And it's a really good question, and that varies massively depending on what sort of operation you've got, the business model and so forth. So everything that we've got in terms of tools, free resources that are available, helps identify exactly where that is happening so that the teams on the ground can understand and make the changes. Because at the end of the day, you know, this is an incredibly creative and innovative sector that has all the answers already.

 

00;04;34;01 - 00;05;04;22

Speaker 2

It's just that visualising and seeing food when it's wasted, it's quite invisible with many of the systems that we have. So simply seeing where it's arising is a really powerful tool and it's also with the current cost of living crisis and the pressures on the sector. This isn't a straightforward, swift way of addressing cost savings. So some of the other stats that we've got, the 18% of the food that's thrown away, sorry, that's purchased, that ends up in the bin, which is huge.

 

00;05;04;27 - 00;05;27;08

Speaker 2

So 13% of food that's purchased that ends up in the bin could have been eaten. So any changes to that mean profit straight or bottom line. And again, a lot of the tools that we've got help you quantify that and give you the value in finance, but also in carbon as well because we recognise the importance of the net zero journey and how food contributes to that.

 

00;05;28;17 - 00;05;50;10

Speaker 1

Thanks for that. I'm now looking around my fridge in my head and thinking you know that that kind of sounds about right but I'm wondering who the big villain is and by that I live in a household and certainly if you put a courgette as it were, I mean, he doesn't live with us anymore. It's grown up and moved out.

 

00;05;50;18 - 00;06;06;02

Speaker 1

But if you put a courgette on the plate in front of my little lad that isn't going to get eaten, it doesn't matter what you do, you put broccoli on it. He’d eat broccoli all day long. In fact, even now he won't watch this. I can say he calls it a broken tree from being tiny. He’s called it a broken tree.

 

00;06;07;13 - 00;06;20;09

Speaker 1

But anyway, the other one is peas. There's a person in my household who will not eat peas or anything touched by a pea. But I don’t think they are the big villain. Is there a sort of food type that's a real problem if you think of foods?

 

00;06;21;02 - 00;06;59;13

Speaker 2

Yeah, it does work with households in manufacturing supply chain retailers as well, but consistently across households and within hospitality, it's potatoes and chips and, you know, our good friend the potato. And we've got some really great examples on some of our resources. It's an illustrative example. But basically, if you take 100 potatoes that are grown in the field, obviously different stages of that lifecycle of the potato before it gets on our plates, it varies massively, but by the time it gets to say a hotel setting, actually the bulk of the wastage happens at that point.

 

00;06;59;13 - 00;07;29;12

Speaker 2

And by the time it gets eaten of your hundred potatoes, only 25 of those get eaten again. It's an illustrative example, but it is based on some of the research that we've done. So it shows that we all have to work together across the whole piece from where food is grown, how it's grown, the specifications right through to how we talk about food when we're in the front of house, sitting within a hospitality operation, you know, how are people presented with that food?

 

00;07;29;12 - 00;07;40;22

Speaker 2

What portion size options is the skin kept on, you know, that's a big area of waste and KFC have done a great example of keeping their skin on fries, which has lots of advantages.

 

00;07;41;29 - 00;08;00;13

Speaker 1

I can see. Yeah, I was trying to say that. Yeah, I did 100% of the volume of the potato and I was getting all Yorkshire then. 100% of your potatoes by the time you peeled it. Chopped it. Yeah. You can see it. But an obvious quick easy solution here is to leave the skin on. Fabulous. 

 

00;08;00;17 - 00;08;19;28

Speaker 1

Well done. Other sources of deep fried chicken are available. I wanted to look at what the impact is, though, on businesses? When we tackle what you just discussed there, what is the real impact? Because we've got to show it tangibly to people before they can change. So can you talk about that a little?

 

00;08;20;21 - 00;08;42;00

Speaker 2

Yeah. So the tools that we've got with we've got a campaign called Guardians of Growth, which is focused right on the hospitality and food service sector. So wherever you are, whatever your operation, if you're eating at home, then that falls within the sector that we look at and the tools that we've got help identify where that's coming from and the cost associated with it.

 

00;08;42;00 - 00;09;03;19

Speaker 2

So as teams start to track where the food waste is coming from, they can quantify it. Let's say for weeks. We've got a really simple Excel calculator. We've got courses that are freely available. 15 minutes to get you started and to talk you through how to take action on that. But ultimately, as soon as you start measuring, then you start saving.

 

00;09;03;19 - 00;09;11;18

Speaker 2

You start visualising and questioning what's going on and not accepting that things have to stay the way they are.

 

00;09;12;12 - 00;09;36;03

Speaker 1

And that's the important thing, is it's questioning this and just checking in and understanding.  I'm really already enjoying the conversation greatly and plumbing changes myself. So I hope it's not all you know, we've talked about the carbon impact. We've talked about some of that wastage that's happening. That is, you know, we have to question that and challenge that ourselves.

 

00;09;36;03 - 00;09;55;03

Speaker 1

But it's not all doom and gloom, is it? You know, and I know that we've got a relationship of the earlier with Retford for a long time on Guardians of Growth is something we are very, very keen to help and we are engaged with some of our existing customers and in our work with that and hopefully new customers.

 

00;09;56;15 - 00;10;12;17

Speaker 1

But can you sort of help me understand and help people listening and understand, you know, what's being done already and what initiatives have already been launched by RAP and other organizations? Let's let's not limit ourselves here. And what sort of success has been achieved.

 

00;10;13;15 - 00;10;38;29

Speaker 2

Yeah, there's a huge amount of work going on in this area and we obviously align everything that we're doing with the Sustainable Development Goals that the United Nations have set. There's one specifically on food waste 12.3, which is around reducing food loss and waste by 50% by 2030. But 2013 is not that far away right now. So it's really important that we accelerate that pace of change.

 

00;10;39;11 - 00;11;19;15

Speaker 2

But sometimes it's really hard to, you know, that's a global goal. So what are the practical things that we can do on the ground and that has got the Courtauld Commitment 2030 which looks at not only food waste but also greenhouse gases associated with producing that food and water as well. Looking at how water is used to produce food, we also have to deliver that, that roadmap, sorry, the food waste activities, the UK Food Waste Reduction Roadmap which gives all food and drink businesses within the UK the tools to measure, track, understand exactly what's happening and we report on that regularly.

 

00;11;19;23 - 00;11;42;25

Speaker 2

We do regular press releases and you can see lots of information on the website about that. And we're also involved with the Government Hospitality Sector Council, a number of partners and organisations, organs are involved with that. There's a sustainability subgroup that looks at all of these aspects, particularly one on food waste as well. So there's lots of activities going on.

 

00;11;42;25 - 00;12;12;16

Speaker 2

There's a lot of work on redistributing surplus food as well. That's an area that Rapp has been working with and supported during the COVID emergency as well. We managed some grants to support that, but we've also been looking at developing, you know, part of this journey, part of this change is getting people on board, empowering teams to be able to look at their spend the time to look at things, understand what they can do about it, and empower them to make those changes.

 

00;12;12;26 - 00;12;35;15

Speaker 2

There was some research by the World Resources Institute a few years ago on hotels and restaurants and catering that identified that there's a fantastic return on investment. When you look at food waste prevention, it's about for every dollar or pound you spend, there's a £7 dollar return, which is fantastic. But those returns only happen when you empower people.

 

00;12;35;15 - 00;12;57;24

Speaker 2

There is no point in reporting numbers for numbers sake because you need people to be engaged. They're motivated by making a difference. And it really contributes to those too, you know, making us feel as if we can make a difference at a global scale. Only if we're all working together, sharing those ideas, and we work across the board with so many fantastic organisations, they're all making an enormous difference.

 

00;12;57;24 - 00;13;18;11

Speaker 2

There are too many to name, but there's a lot of incredible work going on there. We do try and share that through our networks and make sure that people are aware of that. Some of the things particularly that are achieving savings, to your point, Martyn, and what's making a difference, we've been piloting some training, hope, becoming a champion, and we've seen some fantastic savings.

 

00;13;18;18 - 00;13;38;21

Speaker 2

What we're doing is combining learning so upskilling the teams, but also that visualisation of what is the waste, where is it coming from? And in a four, six or eight week period, what the changes that we can make and we've had some really great examples and you'll see Oxiteno restaurant of how people have really seen those changes happen.

 

00;13;39;13 - 00;14;01;17

Speaker 1

It's amazing. It is quite positive, isn't it? You know, this is a real it feels like it's a really positive campaign and with the history of it and with the examples you've just given, you know, this is something that anybody who's not yet involved can safely engage in and know that it's going to have a positive impact.

 

00;14;01;29 - 00;14;10;11

Speaker 1

They just have to, as you say, make it real and show the impact. Once you've done that, it changes people quickly, doesn't it?

 

00;14;10;29 - 00;14;43;01

Speaker 2

Well, it does. I do think, you know, obviously, the sector is having continued incredibly challenging times. And so there are so many firefighting issues going on across the board for the hospitality and food service sector. However, we know that this is a motivational activity for teams and staff and it does make savings on the bottom line. So we have sort of three elements that we like to consider, which is people, planet and profits, because we think all of those aspects are covered by looking at food waste reduction and engaging with Guardians of Grub.

 

00;14;43;12 - 00;14;50;14

Speaker 2

Everything is free to engage with. So we'd really encourage people to take part and see how they can get involved.

 

00;14;50;14 - 00;15;10;04

Speaker 1

Try and let's kind of give you the opportunity to make sure that people don't misunderstand where we're where you're aiming at here from a map in terms of, you know, when you talk about the sectors, who's involved in that? Are you just talking about restaurants or is there a wider context here that maybe is not obvious?

 

00;15;10;12 - 00;15;34;06

Speaker 2

It's absolutely everywhere that is not in your home. So whether you're in hospital, at school, university, wherever you are, if you're not in your home, you are in a definition under the hospitality and food service sector. So as you say, it's an enormous range of different types of styles and businesses. But everything we have identified can be tailored to those sectors.

 

00;15;34;06 - 00;15;35;28

Speaker 2

There's a relevance to every sector.

 

00;15;36;29 - 00;15;47;01

Speaker 1

Fabulous. So what do I mean? You know, two out of home. Yes, I guess that's the workplace, that's hospitals. Schools. Yeah. These are included in that because yeah.

 

00;15;47;01 - 00;15;48;26

Speaker 2

It's a kind of thing.

 

00;15;49;14 - 00;16;11;18

Speaker 1

As anybody who knows me well knows that sometimes you have to hit me three times with it before I'll actually understand what we're saying here. So yeah, we're talking about eating outside of the home to repeat it again. And it could be everywhere from a fast food restaurant to your fine dining to a hospital education establishment anywhere that's eating outside.

 

00;16;12;01 - 00;16;40;00

Speaker 2

Yeah. Yeah. So plenty of opportunities, to get involved. And, we have lots of representatives from various trade bodies and membership organisations, too, to help support and cascade and engage all aspects. And we also have case studies on the Guardians of Growth website, and we're increasingly recognizing ambassadors who are committed to raising awareness of food waste prevention and reduction and sharing those resources with others.

 

00;16;40;00 - 00;16;48;09

Speaker 2

So from a peer to peer perspective, so again, I encourage you to look at our Wall of fame, to see who we've got involved. And we're always keen to welcome more.

 

00;16;49;07 - 00;17;10;11

Speaker 1

Excellent. Right. So we've got some wall of fame people that we can aspire to be like and I guess hopefully people, you know, we've heard those statistics at the start and the details you've given of the impact that this is having. Also the benefit that could be achieved. I'm gonna have to go back. Did you say that?

 

00;17;10;11 - 00;17;14;00

Speaker 1

£7 for every pound, so could you give me that?

 

00;17;14;11 - 00;17;39;21

Speaker 2

So that was a global piece of research that the World Resources Institute, in fact, did, and it was identifying what return on investment investing in food waste prevention activities is, a really insightful piece but and lots of relevant you know there's one on hotels one on restaurants one on catering. So there's relevant specific advice around all of those.

 

00;17;39;21 - 00;18;04;27

Speaker 2

But the common factor is understanding where it's coming from. Get empowerment for your staff and build into your business operation. Make it business as usual. Not separate at all. That's nice to have. This is about making sure and valuing the resources that your business is dependent on. So it's all about risk and resilience at the end of the day and we're keen to accelerate that and support it where that's possible.

 

00;18;04;27 - 00;18;30;04

Speaker 1

Resilience, I think it's a big word and a key word here, but anything that can be done that's going to save one in or increase that whole sorry, reduce the number of potatoes that are lost. Anything that's going to give you £7 for every pound you give, invest and is going to help reduce that carbon impact. So we've got decarbonisation, we've got a profit benefit.

 

00;18;30;25 - 00;18;54;22

Speaker 1

This is it almost seems like it'd be crazy not to get involved and engage, especially when it's including everywhere there is an eating at home. The footprint is massive and the impact and the effect everybody needs to be involved. And if they're not, please see me after school and we'll have a discussion about it.

 

00;18;54;22 - 00;19;15;18

Speaker 1

I just wanted to touch on a couple more questions, if I can. I'm interested. Like a lot of people in our industry, in the resources and waste strategy and how it's developing, how is it developing in relation to food waste proposals? And so specifically for mandatory food waste and surplus food reporting? What's your position there?

 

00;19;16;14 - 00;19;39;08

Speaker 2

Yeah, so that consultation ended earlier this month and Wrap's position we have submitted our response which is publicly available and one of the options is around reporting in line with the UK food waste reduction roadmap, which obviously we would support. I think this is also presenting a business opportunity. At the end of the day, there's savings to be made.

 

00;19;39;21 - 00;20;06;24

Speaker 2

We're an increasingly challenging environment and people are interested in food waste. The Food and Food Standards Agency directed a tracker on consumer interest in after food safety, food waste is the next most relevant topic to consumers. So it's on everyone's minds and I think people want to see businesses walking the walk as well. So we've got lots of fantastic signatories to the roadmap.

 

00;20;07;09 - 00;20;12;23

Speaker 2

We would love to see more and be excited to see what the next steps are for the consultation.

 

00;20;14;06 - 00;20;41;28

Speaker 1

Yeah, we all will and we'll watch that. And obviously, if people want to keep engaged with our own links on our Veolia LinkedIn channel, we publish policy news policy updates. And I know on the website too, you know, there's a lot of information and resources available to that point. There's going to be resources from both Veolia and Unwrapped that we'll make available in the comment section of this video.

 

00;20;41;28 - 00;21;06;04

Speaker 1

So please feel free to engage with those if you want to. And I'm sure just like Veolia, you'll be welcoming any questions or any comments about this. Eleanor, I've got to say, it's been a fantastic 23 minutes where, you know, to be engaged in a conversation with somebody who is so enthused by it. He comes through in the way you answer the question.

 

00;21;06;04 - 00;21;18;03

Speaker 1

So I would ask you one more question, because I reckon you've got an answer to this one. I think there's a next step. I don't think you've finished your plans to tackle food waste. So what's next?

 

00;21;18;16 - 00;21;41;26

Speaker 2

I think that's absolutely right. And we're very keen to accelerate and recognise the brilliant activities that have been happening in the sector and really embrace that across the sector. So I mentioned we've got ambassadors and we have champions and guardians. I mean, we'll be launching a social network really soon. So we really want to see the whole sector becoming a community.

 

00;21;41;26 - 00;22;08;22

Speaker 2

It's really owning this agenda and working together, sharing ideas so that we can all collectively make a massive difference. And I feel all the better for it because like I said at the beginning, you know, this is about feeding people, not bins. And that's a really motivational piece, particularly at the moment. It's so important with everything that's going on that we value the food that we eat and that we're managing it as effectively as possible so that we reduce the impact.

 

00;22;08;22 - 00;22;14;09

Speaker 2

But also we recognise the role that people have and that it plays with profits and the planet.

 

00;22;16;04 - 00;22;43;10

Speaker 1

Thank you all. And I think nobody listening, watching could feel that they are now not enabled to take action and to tackle this project for themselves, for their businesses, for society. How I think and I can only thank you for your time, Eleanor, and for painting a real true picture of the impact of food waste and highlighting some really useful resources for businesses out there to tackle it and take this on.

 

00;22;43;10 - 00;22;58;23

Speaker 1

So I think we might drop at this point moonwalk backwards off the stage and say, it's over to you guys. We've given you everything we can come and help you. Do you think? Excellent. Thank you for your time. I've really appreciated it.

 

00;22;59;07 - 00;23;00;03

Speaker 2

Thank you so much.

 

00;23;00;26 - 00;23;24;26

Speaker 1

As I've mentioned a couple of times now, what advertisement is that? We'll be attaching resources from both Rap and Veolia that will help you start your journey, progress your journey, or help you understand. And I'd like to invite you to join me for our next Linked in life, which is the second advertisement. And the next Linked In Line is going to take place on the 12th of October.

 

00;23;24;26 - 00;23;46;06

Speaker 1

And I'm going to be speaking to Mark Smith, who is the director of permitting and environmental control at Veolia. And we're going to be talking about a subject that I really enjoy talking about. There's a lot of things I enjoy talking about, but this is one that I really do like. It's the importance of boosting biodiversity on our site.

 

00;23;46;24 - 00;24;07;08

Speaker 1

Biodiversity is one of the areas of our multifaceted performance at Veolia. It's an area we have KPI set against and it's going to be interesting to learn from Mark how we're doing and how all the businesses can benefit from what we've learned. So thank you for your time today. I look forward to seeing you next time. Goodbye.