Reducing Food Waste through Sustainable Solutions

Reducing food waste in healthcare settings requires a comprehensive approach that considers patient-related factors, service disruptions, and the duty of care to provide adequate nutrition for recovery.

FREMONT, CA: Food waste has a significant environmental impact, accounting for up to 10 percent of global emissions. Food waste in landfills contributes to methane emissions, consumes land mass, and poses a risk of groundwater contamination. Twenty-two percent of all food waste occurs in the food supply chain, which includes households, the food service industry, and the retail sector. In response to this issue, world leaders, governments, and environmental organizations have committed to reducing food waste and diverting it from landfills. One crucial step towards achieving this goal is moving food waste and surplus food up the food recovery ladder.

The food recovery hierarchy is a framework that outlines the most to least desirable approaches for managing food waste based on social, economic, and environmental considerations. According to the hierarchy, the primary goal is to avoid food waste altogether. While this is an ideal outcome and a necessary aim, the reality is that some contexts and populations inevitably generate food waste. It becomes important to examine what happens to food waste. The hierarchy recommends utilizing surplus food for human consumption (through food donation), redirecting food waste to animal feed, recovering energy (via anaerobic digestion), and composting. The least preferred option is disposing of food waste in a landfill.

Studies have shown that in line with the hierarchy's guidelines, other types of waste, such as plastic, paper, and metal, should also be diverted from landfill or incineration. Each approach within the hierarchy, including food donation, anaerobic digestion, and composting, has distinct environmental, economic, and social implications and associated challenges and facilitators. Donating to non-profit food rescue organizations is often cost-free for the donor and may even qualify for tax deductions. It does not guarantee food consumption. Anaerobic digestion generates biogas for energy conversion and digestate for composting, but it requires significant transportation, infrastructure, and operation investments. Composting involves the biological breakdown of organic materials under aerobic conditions to produce a soil amendment, but challenges related to food waste composition may arise. Despite their differences, each method can potentially divert significant volumes of food waste from landfills.

Hospitals present a specific challenge when it comes to food waste management. It is estimated that 50 percent of the total waste generated in healthcare institutions comes from food, including both non-edible organic material and edible food suitable for human consumption. Food waste in hospitals arises from various factors, including patient-related health conditions, length of stay, appetite, food quality and quantity satisfaction, and menu diversity. Additionally, hospitals influence food waste through service disruptions and the patient environment, which can impact food consumption. Resolving these setting-specific issues is challenging, as hospitals, food services, and dietitians have a duty of care to ensure patients have ample opportunities to consume sufficient food for their recovery.

Understanding how food waste management strategies are implemented in hospital food service settings is essential for benchmarking current practices and guiding future actions toward sustainable healthcare. Nutrition and dietetics professionals play a crucial role in effective food waste management. Developing key performance indicators for acceptable production waste and plate waste levels can guide different states and help address the issue of food waste in hospitals. While completely eradicating food waste in healthcare settings may be unrealistic, efforts can be made to minimize waste and implement sustainable practices through translational research.