Heathrow challenges airside restaurants to cut food waste
The airport has teamed up with Sustainable Restaurant Association (SRA) to release the UK’s first sustainable restaurant guide for air side food businesses.
More than 60 per cent of passengers passing through the airport visit a restaurant, café or lounge, and the SRA is challenging businesses to cut energy consumption by 10 per cent per cover by 2017.
Heathrow currently recycles 48 per cent of its 28,000 tonnes of food waste, and it is asking restaurants to help meet its aim of recycling 70 per cent by 2020.
It also urges businesses to ‘meet higher living costs’ by considering paying staff the London Living Wage and to give employees 100 per cent of their tips with no hidden charges.
Restaurants will also encourage staff to take up car sharing schemes, donate to charity and enforce the ‘Mystery Shopper’ auditing scheme.
Jonathan Coen, retail director at Heathrow said: “Heathrow is a small city, hosting over 400 companies, 76,000 employees, and serving 190,000 passengers every day. An operation the size and scale of Heathrow relies on collaboration with our partners to ensure our sustainability ambitions are realised.”
The guidelines form part of the Heathrow 2020 programme which aims to enhance the economic and social impact of the airport in a sustainable way.
Simon Heppner, founding director of the SRA, said: “The public’s appetite for a sustainable dining experience is increasing significantly – wherever they are eating out. So for Heathrow to put sustainability at the heart of the passenger experience is a very welcome and positive move.”
