A new campaign has been launched by the Mayor of London to help businesses in the capital reduce their levels of food waste and redirect surplus food to useful projects. It is hoped that more than £360,000 will be saved through the campaign.

The FoodSave initiative, launched by Boris Johnson on Tuesday (12 November), will provide support to London businesses involved in the food industry over the next 18 months. During that time, it expects to help 240 small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) cut down on the amount of food they throw away and prevent more than 1,000 tonnes of food waste being sent to landfill.

According to recent figures, food waste is growing problem in the capital, with WRAP’s Love Food Hate Waste (LFHW) campaign finding that London residents could save £79 million by reducing the amount of food they waste. Further still, LFHW has found that of the 15 million tonnes of food and drink discarded in the UK every year, four million tonnes comes from businesses involved in the food supply chain.

In response to these trends, FoodSave has been launched by the Mayor of London to try and cut down on food waste and achieve savings of more than £360,000 for London businesses.

Funded by the Mayor in partnership with the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the London Waste and Recycling Board (LWARB), the campaign will provide various forms of business support:

• identifying where food is most wasted;
• providing advice on how to reduce food waste;
• helping businesses send food to people in need through organisations that redistribute food;
• helping businesses to direct food waste to feed animals such as pigs;
• and, for unavoidable food waste, supporting composting and renewable energy generation

Business Eligibility

Speaking about the new campaign, Matthew Pencharz, the Mayor’s Senior Adviser on Environment said: “’FoodSave is a brilliant initiative that can help businesses reduce their food waste disposal costs and become more efficient. I encourage as many businesses as possible to get involved and both save money and help the environment.”

FoodSave will be delivered by the Sustainable Restaurant Association (which will work with restaurants, hotels, pubs, quick service restaurants and canteens) and Sustain: the alliance for better food and farming (which will work with businesses involved in food retail, food manufacturing and preparation, food growing, farming, catering, street food, market stalls and wholesale markets).

To be eligible for support, businesses must work in the food industry and be located in one of the 33 London boroughs. They must also qualify as an SME which means they employ fewer than 250 full time employees, have a turnover of less than €50 million (£419 million) and are no more than 25 per cent owned by a larger company (although this restriction may be relaxed in some instances).

The coordinator of the campaign, the Greater London Authority (GLA), said it is hoping to hear from local authorities, business improvement districts, food charities, and ‘other organisations’ that can add value to the project.

Businesses and groups interested in taking part in the scheme should contact Victoria Moorhouse at SRA or Charlotte Jarman at Sustain.

Find out more about FoodSave or read more about Love Food Hate Waste.