Committed, green actions to combat food waste

Being a sustainable development partner at the leading-edge of innovation also means doing business in a socially responsible way. For this reason, at a time when a third of food produced is wasted, SITA France has committed to the French Federation of Food Banks to combat waste. “Sort better to eat better” is a commitment that is more supportive than ever.

 

In France, households throw away on average 1.3 million tons of food per year, representing 20 kilos per household, 7 kilos of which concern products that have passed their sell-by date. To this is added 600,000 tons of food thrown away by medium and large supermarkets. The purely logistical mission of food banks is to recover as much of this food as possible free of charge, to avoid this food being considered as waste. Every day, these food banks inspect, collect, sort and store food products before redistributing them free of charge to those in need, and in so doing, play an essential role for associations.

 

Optimized sorting and food storage

To help the French Federation of Food Banks in its day-to-day work, SITA France has committed, via the “Sort better to eat better” program, to pay it €1 per ton of packaging resulting from selective collections to finance the creation of sorting rooms for the food collected. Optimizing food sorting and storage will bring about the long-term improvement in the quality of food redistributed to the under-privileged. SITA will also contribute its skills to training food bank volunteers to improve the quality of sorting food supplies. “Over three years, this should represent several hundreds of thousands of euro” explained the CEO of Sita Recyclage, Hugues Percie du Sert.

 

Committed action with limited environmental impact

This partnership started with a skills transfer via a study to assess the environmental impact of the action of food waste. In June 2011, the study conducted with the Bas-Rhin Food Bank using the Ademe Bilan Carbone® GHG assessment tool confirmed that the Food Bank’s action had saved 1,770 tons of carbon equivalent per year, equal to the annual electrical consumption of a town of 7,700 inhabitants. “With this innovative partnership, we can create a virtuous cycle of improvement in the quality of food saved thanks to the waste avoided. SITA therefore becomes a Food Bank Supporting Company”, states Alain Seugé, Chairman of the French Federation of Food Banks.

This year again, SITA France will work alongside the Food Banks for the donation days on 25 and 26 November.