Food waste prevention and measurement

Source reduction 

We design dining hall environments to make it easier for students to take only the amount they need and want to eat, and to make it more difficult to generate waste. One example is trayless dining, a widely used best practice throughout many college dining programs in the nation, for its proven ability to reduce food and water waste.

Sodexo uses WasteWatch, a data-driven food waste prevention programme. The WasteWatch powered by Leanpath Programme prevents on average 50% of food wasted. Using the programme, Sodexo teams can rapidly and easily capture food waste data, giving clear insights into what is being wasted in their kitchens and why. With this new understanding, teams can implement targeted operational and behavioural changes to help end avoidable food waste, whether food waste generated in the kitchen or consumer food waste. Sodexo tracks and reports daily food waste using a tablet and a weighing scale, to take reduction actions based on data that make a difference.

Measurement 

Filled bins of wet and dry waste are taken from the dining halls and moved to dedicated garbage rooms where the waste is recorded after each meal. The measurement is carried out thrice a day and we keep track of the average monthly waste as a part of our plan in place to move towards 30% waste reduction in a year.