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Food Processors Go Green: Green initiatives in the UK

By Diane Toops, News and Trends Editor

FoodProcessing.com

Part of our Green Cover Story series

In London, 21 food manufacturers joined together under the auspices of the Food and Drink Federation (www.fdf.org.uk) pledging to help the environment by cutting carbon dioxide emissions and packaging, improving energy efficiency and saving water. Successful initiatives include: United Biscuits reduced the weight of packaging it uses by 6,800 tons per annum in 2006 compared with 2003 by adopting a reduce, recycle, reuse philosophy in line with the waste hierarchy. It is also starting to use simple symbols on its recyclable packaging to make it easy for consumers to recycle, reuse or compost waste packaging; Nestle UK reduced its landfilling of surplus food and its packaging by about 95 percent between 2005 and 2006, and its disposal costs by about 40 percent per pallet, Walkers cut its water consumption by half, and Mars Snackfood UK cut water used in cooling chocolate by 40 percent by using new technology.

For other successes see https://www.fdf.org.uk/environment_casestudies.aspx