J&B Recycling Knowledge

Food waste is an extremely common problem here in the UK throughout homes and businesses. For many UK households, food waste causes stress on disposable income, especially with the increasing cost of living. Food waste also heavily impacts commercial businesses as producers often struggle to keep up with demand, as well as supermarkets attempting to balance food waste with ensuring the shelves stay stocked.

2017 saw the introduction of Stop Food Waste Day. But what do we know now about food waste and how to recycle food to reduce the impact it has on our planet?

Below are some of the most important facts about food waste and why it is such a concern for the environment and our economy:

• Ending food waste would save the same CO2 as taking 1 in 4 cars off the road.
• Households in the UK throw away, on average, 4.5 million tonnes of food a year. This is enough waste to fill 38 million wheelie bins.
• The hospitality industry in the UK generates roughly 1.1 million tonnes of food waste a year, 75% of which could have been eaten.
• The total yearly cost to the hospitality and food service industry in the UK is £3.2 billion.

UKHospitality found that nearly half of Brits in 2021 didn’t know the difference between the dates listed on our supermarket foods, meaning that 10% of domestic food waste across the country was thrown away while still being perfectly edible, just because the ‘best before’ date had expired.

Commercial Food Waste

Many businesses often face the issue of how to dispose of commercial food waste as they are often subject to regulations which require them to dispose of their food waste using reliable disposal services, to not only protect the public they serve but also the environment. Here at J&B Recycling, we offer commercial food waste collections and recycling services across the North East of England. If you are looking for support with commercial waste, don't hesitate to get in touch.

Domestic Food Waste

Almost three quarters of UK food waste is produced by domestic households. On average, a sixth of the food that we buy is thrown away, which includes the 5 million tonnes of food that may have been perfectly edible, estimated to be around £15 billion.

At home, we can all do our bit to help reduce the amount of food waste we produce by being level-headed about what we purchase and what we use. Try making simple changes, such as resisting multi-buy offers if the product won’t be used in time, or freeze any ingredients if they won’t be used before expiring.

Adopting a first in, first out strategy when putting ingredients into the fridge/freezer means the older ingredients will be used first. Creating new recipes out of the ingredients that are due to be tossed is a great way to add variety to your daily meal plan.

J&B Recycling provide waste management solutions for local authorities and business across the North of England. Our main Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) is based in Hartlepool and we have a second site in Middlesbrough, making us ideally placed for collections across Teesside (Hartlepool, Stockton, Middlesbrough and Darlington). We also have a site in Washington and we operate established collection routes throughout Durham, Gateshead, Newcastle, Sunderland, North Tyneside and Northumberland. Please don't hesitate to get in touch if we can help with your waste collection.