School catering firm launches campaign to cut food waste
To draw students' attention to the issue of food waste, nearly 80 school cafeterias up and down the country are weighing the amounts of food waste generated over the course of a week.
The drive also has a competitive element to it – the school whose pupils produce the smallest volume of food waste will be declared the winner.
Around 1,900 tonnes of food gets thrown away each year in school and kindergarten canteens in Estonia, studies show.
Around 80 percent of this comes directly from the students' plates, ie. food and drink they ask for, or are given, but don't end up eating.
Ene Veski, head of Daily chain of canteens, Estonia's largest school caterers, also organizing the campaign, said: "Students, like the public in general, unfortunately tend to eat with their eyes. So perhaps, yes, portions are larger than what we can actually finish."
As might be expected, the amount of waste tends to vary from day to day at any given school.
Veski said: "On 'soup days,' it is simply the case that older students may have certain eating habits which mean they tend to either avoid soup altogether or at least are not big soup eaters, while younger elementary school pupils are bigger soup consumers."
Veski noted that they encourage children to take only as much food as they can eat, emphasizing at the counter that they can always return for more if needed.
Toomas Kink, principal of Raatuse school in Tartu, with approximately 650 students, says that schoolchildren like simple and clean flavors, though, ultimately, you can't please all the people all of the time when it comes to school meals.
What children are accustomed to at home also has an influence.
Kink said: "When cooking is no longer done at home and fast-food places are often visited, then that mentality follows the child. We try to break it, but unfortunately, we can't do it all ourselves."
An average of around 20 kilograms of food per day remains uneaten at the Raatuse school. The leftovers currently go into a bio-waste container.
To reduce food waste and raise awareness, the amount of food waste generated in close to 80 school will be weight each day this week; at the end of the week. This is the fourth year Daily has organized the project.
On day one, 13.7 kilograms of food from the plates of Raatuse school pupils ended up in the trash – a somewhat lower figure than average.
--
Follow ERR News on Facebook and Twitter and never miss an update!
Editor: Andrew Whyte, Aleksander Krjukov
Source: 'Aktuaalne kaamera," reporter Jane Saluorg.
