Eradicate food waste in colleges

At the end of year 2014 the Lozere Department engaged in a territorial plan of waste prevention.

Among the different actions, the Department has implemented an action in three pilot colleges to fight food waste in the canteens. The ambitious and transversal program involved actors at all levels in the college: Director, Manager, kitchen team, teachers, students and their parents.

The action was organized around several phases:

• creation of a project team and a referent by the college;
• diagnosis of waste in each institution and for all categories of waste produced
• analysis of the results, including already existing kitchens personnel practices to reduce food waste
• identification and choice of actions, different for each institution
• follow-up of the implementation of the actions

In practice, the actions implemented in the three pilot colleges addressed:

• awareness of students in the social, environmental, and food waste
• economic impact the involvement of students in the development of the menus and the adjustment of quantities (for example with a tailor-made “hungry” or “great hunger” system)
• immediate reinvestment  ‘on the plate’ with better quality and locally sourced food