14,000 plated meals saved in a year
Dubai hotel claims to have slashed food waste by 5.6 tonnes
Anew pilot programme is helping a Deira hotel slash food wastage that costs the UAE $4 billion (Dh14.69 billion) every year.
Estimates show that 3.27 million tonnes of leftover food from homes, institutions, hotels and eateries are bulldozed into landfills every year in the UAE.
Enter Pullman Dubai Creek City Centre Hotel and Residences, where chefs claims to have slashed food waste by an estimated 5.6 tonnes, or in food-preparation parlance, “14,000 plated meals” a year.
The pilot programme is being undertaken in cooperation with London-based Winnow Food Waste Management — now in 15 countries. Nishan Silva, Pullman general manager, said: “So far, the programme has witnessed a reduction in food waste by almost 70 per cent in the initial months. AccorHotels are looking to roll out the programme gradually in all their UAE properties by 2018.”
Marc Zornes, Winnow cofounder, said in an earlier interview with Gulf News that his firm is working with hotels in Dubai to identify the amount of food waste they accrue daily.
The system allows chefs to use a tablet app to identify the types of food they’re throwing away, and, combined with data collected from an electronic scale, the smart meter tells them the value of what’s being binned.
“The daily reports kitchens receive give an accurate insight into what is being wasted — and the value of that waste — that prompt chefs to improve production processes,” Zornes said. ach dirham donated to the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) is enough to provide a child with a nutritious school meal.
Supporting this programme to fight child hunger, Choithrams supermarket chain in Dubai has concluded its second-year partnership with WFP, donating Dh1.3 million to deliver nutritious school meals to children in the Middle East and Africa.
Carrying out a four-month in-store campaign in 20 of its stores from September to December 2016, and encouraging customers to donate at the till, the supermarket chain collected contributions amounting to 20 per cent more than the previous year.
“One of the programmes we carried out last year was using the bar code, where shoppers were invited to make a donation that we would then match. We had a good validation process to ensure customers that their donation went to the point of need, by using technology to send the amount donated to the WFP headquarters in Rome and Milan, which was then uploaded and sent to Jordan and Benin and redeemed by refugees through a card at their supermarket,” said L.T. Pagarani, chairman of Choithrams.
Last year, the company also donated Dh1-Dh4 to the WFP — the equivalent of one to four WFP school meals — every time a customer purchased selected Goodness Food products during the campaign. The in-store donations, which amounted to Dh424,920, will support the WFP’s school feeding programme in Jordan.
“Food is one of human beings’ most basic needs, and it is every child’s fundamental right to get a nutritious meal. Malnutrition and hunger rob people of the potential of a healthy future,” said Pagarani.
He explained the company made their yearly corporate contribution of Dh918,287, which will fund the distribution of locally-made school meals to 2,100 children in the region of Atacora in Benin and 7,800 children in Jordan.
The meals provided by the WFP work as a powerful incentive for poor parents to continue sending their daughters and sons to school. “For some children, this school meal is the only meal they have all day. So it has an additional win-win motive of getting children to go to school, and having a healthy meal full of vegetables, rice and lots of protein,” said Pargarani.
Thanking the supermarket’s staff and customers, Abdallah Al Wardat, Director of the WFP office in the UAE, said a world free of hunger is possible within our lifetime. “Investing in zero hunger is the right thing to do and is fundamental to creating a safer, more prosperous world in which all seven billion people can be active, fulfil their potential and support their community.”