With the April 2026 deadline only a year away, Local Authorities are bracing for the introduction of a weekly food collection for all households. While Government funding has been allotted, many will still be scrambling to plug budgetary gaps.
The Issue of Food Waste
As a country, we produce astonishing levels of food waste year on year. WRAP put it into perspective beautifully:
“If food waste were a country, it would be the world’s third largest emitter (of greenhouse gases) after China and the USA.”
DEFRA Funding
DEFRA confirmed a total pot of £295 million to be shared among local authorities - to cover the cost of supplying a weekly food waste collection to all households. Many authorities believe this amount will not cover the true cost of supplying an effective, efficient service.
Approaching Landlords for Food Waste Enclosures for Flats
With many Local Authority Recycling Officers facing financial difficulties, some innovative thinking is coming into play. For those servicing block of flats, smart and clean external enclosures with foot-operated bins for touch-free access and guaranteed lid-closure are the most logical option to encourage residents to recycle their food waste.
Since few Councils will have built the funding of this infrastructure into their New Burdens funding bid, some are approaching Landlords for funding. Nigel Deacon of MetroStor, a provider of food waste bin enclosures, such as those pictured, says,
“We have been able to access funds outside of the Council’s own waste budgets, from Housing Landlords across the country.”
Landlords are already tasked with keeping their properties clean and safe, and the introduction of food waste collection legislation effectively extends this responsibility to providing safe and appropriate receptacles.
Unlock Revenue Savings from Optimising collection routes.
Integrated Skills’ team of routing consultants are busy providing route optimisation for authorities across the country. Any authority wanting to optimise its food waste routes using our software, RouteSmart, should expect to find an additional 10-15% efficiency saving over a paper-based exercise. These optimised routes can be exported to our next generation in-cab system, SmartSuite, where crews can record service information, such as non-serviced addresses and streets and also, participation reports, which can be displayed on reports and maps within the back-office system. Integrated Skills is also developing innovative reporting technology for food waste to monitor participation out of the view of the vehicle, where caddies are decanted into service bins.
Integrated Skills is happy to provide a FREE one hour food waste route consultation with one of our experienced consultants. Contact us today so we can help take the headache out of planning for vehicles, routes and reporting.
