Food waste & hygiene

Since 6 April 2024, there has been a ban on all workplaces, including hospitals, from disposing of food waste to sewer including via the use of macerators, de-waterers or other similar food waste disposal technology.

There are guidelines on food waste to help you dispose of waste properly to meet the existing waste Duty of Care law (www.naturalresources.wales)

The Food Standards Agency (www.food.gov.uk) also provides guidance to premises on how to safely handle your food waste:

• Store food waste in sealable containers which are:

  • Solid, and strong enough to hold food waste,

  • In sound condition – i.e., without breakages or splits that could enable pests to access waste or cause leaks; and

• Easy to clean and disinfect;

• Remove food waste and other rubbish from areas as soon as possible and

• Have enough waste storage facilities to store and dispose of food waste and other rubbish to keep them clean.

Ensure any changes you make are incorporated into your Food Safety Management Systems.

If your food waste collector allows you to use compostable liners, ensure that your liners are BS EN 13432 compliant. This means that all the food waste is sent for commercial processing to meet the right standards.

Under the law, food waste must be collected separately from other waste. It must then be sent for recycling (via anaerobic digestion or composting).

It must not be disposed of down the drain to sewer to avoid overload of the sewage system, blockages and the loss of valuable energy recovery and nutrients. Food waste collected for recycling will be sent to anaerobic digestion plants to generate renewable energy and produce digestate and fertiliser products.

The definition of food waste that must be separated for collection and recycling, and must not be disposed of to sewer, is contained in paragraph 4.13 of the Code of Practice.

Drink is excluded from the definition and so can be placed down the sewer. In addition, the definition of food waste does not include food waste that is mixed with water having been used to clean any place or equipment used in processing or preparing food or drink. This means that food waste, including liquid food waste such as soups, that is washed down the sewer as part of the process of cleaning out leftovers from bowls, cups or pans is also excluded.

However, if you are regularly producing liquid food waste for disposal outside of the cleaning process exclusion mentioned above, then you will need to separate this out for collection and onward recycling. You should talk to your food waste collector about whether they can accommodate your liquid food waste in their regular food waste collection service. If not, you may be required to arrange a specialist liquid food collection service.

In addition, if you are regularly producing large quantities of food waste, including soups or other liquid food, you should review the Food Waste reduction roadmap toolkit or the Guardians of Grub resource to see how to reduce food wastage in line with your responsibilities under the food waste hierarchy (see section 2 of the Code of Practice for more information).

Refer to our guide for the Hospitality and Food service sector guide which will provide more information on collecting food waste for recycling.

Hospital Caterers Association – provides a range of resources for hospital caterers including sustainability and food waste management.