Repurposing Waste Streams: Lessons on Integrating Hospital Food Waste into a Community Garden

Assessment and Solutions to Food Waste at Congress Events: A Perspective of the MagNuS Project

Addressing global food waste is a formidable challenge, requiring comprehensive efforts across the food supply chain, particularly in sectors prone to waste like HoReCa (Hotel, Restaurant, and Catering). In MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conventions, and Exhibitions) tourism, where gastronomy is a major attraction, overlooked meal services during working meetings contribute significantly to food waste. The MagNuS (Magnitude, Nutritional value, and Sustainability) project aims to assess and address food waste during conference events at the Valencia Conference Center in Spain. This study quantifies waste, categorizes it by food groups, estimates the potential number of individuals that could be fed with discarded food, and assesses energy and nutritional values. Across three events, 104.4 kg of food waste was documented, with cereals having the highest wastage, followed by legumes, fish, and others. Acknowledging potential underestimation due to reliance on cooked values, this study suggests using residues for vermicomposting or composting as sustainable waste management alternatives. These findings have implications for future initiatives, advocating diverse strategies to minimize food waste during congress events, aligning with the Sustainable Development Goals. The MagNuS project contributes valuable insights to sustainable practices in MICE tourism, informing policies and operational decisions to reduce the environmental impact of food waste.

From Food to Gods to Food to Waste

The present global food waste problem threatens food systems sustainability and our planet. The generation of food waste stems from the interacting factors of the need for food production, food access and availability, motivations and ignorance around food purchase and consumption, and market constraints. Food waste has increased over time. This is related to the change in how humans value food through the generations and altered human food consumption and food discard behaviors. There is also a lack of understanding of the impacts of current food production, processing and consumption patterns on food waste creation. This review examines the cultural, religious, social and economic factors influencing attitudes to food and their effects on food waste generation. The lessons from history about how humans strove toward zero waste are covered. We review the important drivers of food waste: waste for profit, food diversion to feed, waste for convenience, labeling, food service waste and household food waste. We discuss strategies for food waste reduction: recovery of food and food ingredients, waste conversion to energy and food, reducing waste from production/processing and reducing consumer food waste, and emphasize the need for all stakeholders to work together to reduce food waste.

Investigating Food Waste Recycling in Local Food Service Businesses: A Case Study from a Local Government Area in Australia

Worldwide, over 1.3 billion tonnes of food goes to waste each year, and much of this is disposed of in landfill, which is costly to the economy and the environment. This study targeted food waste management in local food service businesses as the third largest producer of food waste and a sector that has received less academic attention than other food waste producers (such as household food waste). Questionnaires and interviews were used to investigate current food waste management practices within food service businesses in a Local Government Area in Adelaide, South Australia. Twenty-two respondents completed the online questionnaire and three of these businesses also participated in an interview—two in-person at their business premises and one via an online teleconferencing system. It was found that 54% (n = 12) of these businesses have practices in place to recycle their food waste, while 46% (n = 10) do not. Insufficient kitchen space and the difficulty of separating food waste from non-compostable rubbish were reasons given for not recycling food waste, and the single most important factor that would encourage food waste recycling cited by businesses was the provision of a free, green organics bin. Motivations for recycling food waste included compassion for the environment and the desire to divert waste from landfill. These insights may help local government implement solutions to reduce food waste from entering landfill.

A Qualitative Study Exploring Hospital Food Waste From the Patient Perspective

OBJECTIVE

To study the perceptions, beliefs, and expectations of patients related to food waste during their hospital stay.

DESIGN

A qualitative study using semistructured interviews and thematic analysis of transcripts.

SETTING

Four hospital wards across 3 hospitals in 1 large health care network in Melbourne, Australia.

PARTICIPANTS

Forty inpatients, 10 each from oncology, maternity, general medicine, and subacute wards.

ANALYSIS

A coding framework was developed by researchers; this framework was tested then applied across all interview transcripts. Codes were grouped and summarized to identify and analyze patterns of data.

RESULTS

Historical experiences influenced participant perspectives on food waste; cost was the primary motivator to limit food waste at home. The following contributors to hospital food waste were identified: patient interest in food/appetite, food quality and quantity, and the foodservice model. Three overarching strategies to address hospital food waste emerged: modify the foodservice system to decrease waste, adopt multimethod food waste management strategies, and reduce and manage nonfood waste. Contamination was identified as a barrier to waste management. Participants reported that the aggregate amount, management, and implications of hospital food waste were invisible to them.

CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

The inclusion of service users in both future studies and the practice of food sustainability is encouraged. Multiple approaches (system modification, multimethod food waste management strategies, and reduction of nonfood waste) could be adopted in practice to reduce hospital-related food waste.