119 Madeira Consorcio Meeting 26.62021
Jun 27, 2021 at 12:20 pm | Posted in Posts | Leave a commentTags: dumpster diving, Portugal
The topic was Dumpster Diving.
We watched a talk by a youngster who learned of dumpster diving in the USA and then started it in Kopenhagen:
Additional info is here:
and here
https://life.dn.pt/comida-lixo-desperdicio-alimentar/comportamento/350232/.
“Too good to go” also has a website in Portuguese, and we have some restaurants who participate, to avoid leftovers going to the dumpster here
The intention of the participating restaurants is to attract more business during normal hours, by showing the clients what they have after hours.
We talked about the food rubbish situation in Europe.
In some countries, it is forbidden; in others, it is in a grey zone.
France has a law that forbids supermarkets with more than 400m2 to dump food into containers, they have to donate it to charities or to companies who produce animal feed from it.
In our supermarkets, it seems that the problem of dumpster diving does not arise because the rubbish containers are in the supermarket back area, and outsiders do not have access to it.
Foodstuffs close to the expiry date are offered in Pingo Doce with an orange label for sale at reduced prices, this reduces waste (provided the buyers then eat it all).
Food waste in landfills produce a hight amount of Methane
Cl. said that the problem arises because we produce too much food for the demand. The supermarkets price in a loss of around 20% of foodstuffs due to expiry dates and freshness. Then they don’t mind that they have to throw food away. The consumer would have to accept that food is only produced in the quantity that will be needed (based on experience and sales numbers) And the food prices should be higher, to give an incentive to the consumer to buy only what he needs. But the consumer would not like to have less of a choice and would to go other shops.
It should be possible to have more of an in-time-delivery system for foodstuff as in the automotive industry, to avoid that food gets too old to be sold.
It will help that the state, in order to get more money, will add higher taxes on processed food which contain too much sugar, salt and fat.
The cost of transport is another waste-of-energy factor.
Farmer get subsidies in Germany if they leave a filed unfarmed, in order to curb overproduction in the country. Cl. said that farmers should even have to plant forests on the land, in order to offset the CO2 problem.
Quinta B doesn’t have a buffet, they serve the breakfast to order. Fruit that is not consumed gets turned inti delicious marmalade.
The Buffet in Quinta do Furão (the “leftover” from the Hotel guests) is offered to local guests at a reduced price, in order to avoid waste. The client do not get to serve themselves; the staff hands out the food and cooks eggs to order, so that what ends up on the plate, gets consumed.
Plates in general, should be smaller.
The homeless used to get “leftover” food from hotel buffets until this had to be cancelled due to Covid. Now a simple meal is offered in “CASA” at night, and “Sopa Cardoso” offers soups at lunchtime, and food bags which people can pick up. CASA and Caritas collect food in the supermarkets and pack baskets for needy families (these families have to register to be included)
Other stuff:
Freshbio (with happy chickens laying happy eggs) is at
http://www.freshbio.pt/index.php?route=information/information&information_id=19 .They deliver of baskets to your home and if somebody has a composter, they also collect fruit peels etc for composting.
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