Around one third of all food produced globally is lost or wasted each year. That’s enough to feed millions of people worldwide.
Wednesday 29 April is Stop Food Waste Day, a global campaign raising awareness of this issue. At BU, we’re supporting the initiative by sharing practical ways students and staff can reduce food waste and explaining what BU do to help on our campuses.
What is BU doing to tackle food waste?
BU’s Sustainable and Ethical Food Policy is part of our EcoCampus ISO14001 commitments. This requires our catering contractors and SUBU to reduce the food wasted during food preparation and to avoid wasting unsold food by donating it where possible.
Our catering contractor, Chartwells, use an electronic food waste system to weigh food waste during food preparation. This helps keep track of kitchen waste and adjust kitchen processes, reducing waste at the source. Unsold food is redistributed through the ‘Too Good To Go’ app, donated to the SUBU Community Kitchen, or shared with the local night shelter. Some of the catering food waste from the Fusion Building is also processed using our on-site composter on Talbot Campus, reducing transport emissions and producing compost for the SUBU Community Garden. Remaining kitchen food waste is sent for recycling by anaerobic digestion along with all other campus food waste. As reported in our annual CECAP progress report, in 2024-25 BU produced 25.7 tonnes of food waste which was recycled through anaerobic digestion and a further 1.6 tonnes was processed in our Talbot Campus composter. A total of 2,625 meals were redistributed through the ‘Too Good To Go’ app.
Throughout this week, visit our campus catering outlets to collect free used coffee grounds. These can be used in your garden or home as compost, a pest repellent, cleaning scrub or skin exfoliant. Chartwells will also be selling coffee-ground brownies. Yes, they’re edible!
How can I reduce food waste?
Busy lives and supermarket promotions can make reducing your food waste challenging, however simple changes can make a big difference.
Plan ahead: Make a shopping list and stick to it
Be wary of supermarket deals: Consider whether you really need two for the price of one
Use your freezer: Leftovers, bread, fruit and vegetables can all be frozen. There’s not much that can’t be frozen!
Organise your fridge: Keep it tidy so food doesn’t get forgotten
Trust your senses: Use by dates matter, but best before dates are just a guide. Look and smell before throwing food away.
What should I do with food waste?
Food waste sent to landfill produces methane, a powerful greenhouse gas. That’s why food waste should never go in a general waste bin.
Food waste recycling bins are available across all three BU campuses. If you live locally, Bournemouth and Poole have recently introduced household food waste collections under the Simpler Recycling legislation. Collected food waste is sent to an anaerobic digestion facility, where the methane is captured to and fed into local gas networks to heat homes.
The remaining material, known as digestate, is then distributed to farms to be used as fertiliser.
You can read more about how we manage food waste on campus on the BU website. Or for more information about home food waste recycling visit the BCP Council website.
