Stevenage Borough Council aims to support residents to reduce the amount of avoidable food waste produced.
WR2Reduce and Manage Food Waste
Progress
On time
- Discussion
- Not started
- Initial scoping
- Planning stage
- Underway
- Continuous
Description
According to the charity Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP) the UK produces around 6.6 million tonnes a year of household food waste - enough to fill Wembley Stadium. This accounts for 25 million tonnes of CO2 emissions, 5.4% of the UK's overall emissions. WRAP said 4.5 million tonnes of that wasted food could have been eaten and is worth approximately £14bn.
Producing food requires significant resources including land, energy and water. If food waste were a country, it would be the world’s third largest emitter after China and the USA.
Using leftovers, plan meals and freezing food can help to minimise the generation of food waste. All unavoidable food waste, such as tea bags, banana skins etc, that is collected as recycling from homes can be turned into fertilisers for agriculture or converted into natural forms of energy as an alternative to fossil fuels.
Currently, SBC provides a green kitchen caddy to be used as resident's own indoor container, and a brown wheeled bin to collect all food and garden waste.
Besides recycling food waste through the council's services, local residents can also buy discounted compost bins through WasteAware to transform kitchen and garden waste into a valuable and nutrient rich food for the garden. Find out more at Home Composting (stevenage.gov.uk).
Read more
- Hertfordshire Waste Partnership: Worth Saving
- Love Food, Hate Waste: tips and recipes
- Hertfordshire Waste Partnership: advice on home composting
- Hertfordshire Waste Partnership - are you freezing enough?
Tasks
What are we doing?
- 31/03/2025
Separate weekly food waste collections
What has been done?
- 26/10/2023
Promote the Worth Saving Campaign
SBC are working in conjunction with the Waste Aware group to promote the campaign aiming to reduce edible food waste by 20%, saving 10,000 tonnes of food from wastage.
- 03/04/2023
Promote Love Food, Hate Waste Campaign
Promote campaigns aimed at providing information and advice about how residents can reduce food waste and save money.
Summary and contacts
Timeline
Continuous
Responsible organisations
Portfolio Holder
Strategic Themes
Engagement type
Information updated 02/12/2024
The Government's Resource & Waste Strategy is likely to require the implementation of separate weekly food waste collections to households. The Council has already started preliminary planning for this new service requirement.