To find out exactly how much food gets wasted, the French hotel chain Accor Hotels teamed up with Winnow food waste management system to measure the waste their restaurants create, and provide data to chefs on types and times of wastage.
“Very useful data, that helps the team to optimise production and engineer menus according to guest preferences,” said Sheeba Tharayil, Accor Middle East’s quality and sustainable development manager.
The pilot project began last July at Pullman Deira city centre and the Novotel World Trade Centre hotels in Dubai, and is now being rolled out across most of Accor’s 132 hotels in the region.
“The results so far have been very positive, with a reduction of over 50 per cent in total food waste, and a 2 per cent to 8 per cent reduction in food purchasing costs,” Ms Tharayil said.
“It’s led to an estimated 5.6 tonnes of food being diverted from landfill.”
But not all hotel food waste ends up in landfill.
About 36 per cent of those who participated in the Masdar survey said they composted their food waste.
At Mina A’Salam Hotel in Madinat Jumeirah, the compost machine, which was introduced last year, can convert up to 800 kilograms of wet kitchen waste into compost.
The hotel gardeners use the compost to nourish the lush greenery around the resort.
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