Tons of food ends up in landfills every year. Food waste includes leftover food, spoiled produce, and the parts of vegetables and fruits that could otherwise be repurposed or eaten.
While you may think that you aren’t harming the environment by throwing away edible items, you’re actually contributing to the greenhouse effect.
It’s pure wastage of natural resources that can be prevented!
Is There A Correct Way of Disposing Food Waste?
To reduce your contribution to environmental damage and wastage of natural resources, you should first try to reduce the amount of food waste you produce.
If that’s not possible, you should ensure that you’re properly disposing of food waste at home. The correct disposal can make many things better for you and the environment.
Not many people know the correct way to dispose of food waste at home.
If you simply dump your food waste in the bin and leave the trash bag on the street for the local waste truck to pick it up, you’re doing it wrong.
This blog post will help you understand the correct way of disposing of food waste at home.
Why is Disposing Food Waste at Home Properly So Important?
One mistake we’ve all been making is not thinking twice before dumping food waste in the bin. We don’t think we’re doing anything wrong.
After all, it’s the food that’s wasted, right? What else can be done with it other than throwing it away? That’s where we’re all wrong.
Disposing of food waste properly is extremely important. Below are some reasons why we stress properly disposing of food waste.
Financial Impact
Excessive food waste has a significant financial impact. If your household produces a lot of food waste, it means you’re buying and cooking more food than you need.
Not only does that mean you’re putting your hard-earned money in the bin, but it also means a lot of natural resources are also going to waste.
The food on your table comes after a long process where the food is first harvested, processed, packed, and then made available to you.
When food is wasted, there’s a direct impact on the entire supply chain, and the financial impact goes far beyond just your home.
Environmental Impact
Food waste has a serious impact on the environment. The more food that is wasted, the more food that will have to be produced.
With increased demand, more water and energy will go into processing the food to meet the growing demand. All of these processes have a direct impact on the environment.
That’s not all. When the food waste ends up in landfills, microorganisms feed on it to decompose it and produce methane gas during the process.
Methane is a highly potent greenhouse gas that affects the environment more than carbon dioxide.
Social Impact
The food that you’re wasting so recklessly can feed less privileged households. Food wastage means the food that people can use is being wasted.
Not many people think about the social impact of food wastage when they should.
How to Dispose of Food Waste at Home
Now that you’ve got a reality check of what food wastage means, you might want to know how to dispose of food waste at home to reduce your contribution to environmental damage.
Donate Leftover Food to Those in Need
If you’ve got untouched food that you won’t use anymore, you can always donate it to those in need.
You’ll see many people who could use food if you look around. It could be your house help, your child’s caretaker, watchman, mailman, or anyone who can’t afford fresh meals daily.
Feed Animals
If you’ve got animals at home, you can simply feed the leftover food to your goats or pigs.
You can’t feed them everything that’s left, but this will definitely reduce the amount of food waste you produce every day.
Dump in the Compost Bin
A single household produces approximately 474 pounds of food waste every year. One of the best ways to dispose of food waste at home is to dump it in a dedicated compost bin.
Composting is an eco-friendly and non-demanding way of disposing of food waste at home. Collect all the food waste in a compost bin and use it in the garden.
Food waste is organic in nature and makes an excellent fertilizer for plants.
Dump the greens from the vegetable and fruit scraps, weeds, coffee grounds, tea bags, nutshells, eggshells, and other food waste in the compost bin.
Place the bin in a dry spot in your backyard that doesn’t receive a lot of sunlight. Make sure the bin is placed near a water source where it receives plenty of moisture.
If you feel like the waste isn’t moist enough, moisten it yourself regularly till the food waste takes the shape of dark, crumbly, dry matter.
Once the food waste has decomposed and taken the form of dry and dark matter, add it to the soil of your kitchen garden. This is highly nutritious feed for your plants!
Don’t add any form of high-fat food waste like meat in the compost bin because that would increase the chances of pests and odors. Also, make sure the bin is well-aerated.
If you live in an apartment and don’t have a backyard or outdoor space, you can start with worm composting.
In this procedure, you dump the food waste in compost that’s nutritious and then add worms to it. These worms will feed on the food waste and produce castings that are rich in nitrogen.
Nitrogen-rich compost makes an excellent fertilizer for plants in your kitchen garden or indoor plants.
You can also collect the food waste in a separate bin and have a local composting facility pick it up from your home, or drop off the food waste yourself where it’ll be put to good use.
Donate Food Waste to Livestock Owners
Another way to dispose of food waste at home is to dump it all in a separate bin and donate it to livestock owners.
Livestock owners can use the wasted food to feed their animals. It’s one of the safest and most effective ways of recycling food waste and ensuring that the least amount of food ends up in landfills.
Keep in mind that not all types of food are suitable for animal feed. Salty foods, dairy, and meat products can harm the animals and are, therefore, to be avoided.
It’ll be best if you contact the waste recycler of your neighborhood and enquire about the types of food waste that you can donate to the zoo or a farm.
Donate Food Waste to Plant Nurseries
If you don’t have a home garden where you could use the compost made from food waste, you can always donate the food to plant nurseries in your neighborhood.
Gardeners can use the food waste to make organic compost that makes an excellent fertilizer for plants.
It’ll save them the money they’ll have to spend on fertilizers and reduce the amount of food waste that ends up in landfills.
Donate Food Waste to Biogas Facilities
Did you know food waste has the potential to produce energy? You read that right. Food waste can be used to generate biogas.
As we mentioned earlier, when food waste is decomposed, it produces methane gas. The methane gas damages the atmosphere, if let out, but if this methane is captured, it can be used to generate electricity.
One way to dispose of food waste at home is to collect it and donate it to a biogas facility where it can be used to make biogas.
Call a Food Waste Disposal Company
If disposing of food waste at home yourself feels like too much work, you can always get in touch with a food waste disposal company.
These professionals know what to do with food waste. They won’t dump the food waste they collect from your home into landfills. Instead, they’ll put it to good use.
Some waste disposal facilities have their own food waste processing units where food waste is processed to form compost.
Some companies serve as middlemen between you and the right facilities where the food waste belongs.
The benefit of hiring a food waste disposal company is that you don’t have to worry about anything. It’s the company that has to take care of the proper disposal of food waste.
Bottom Line
No contribution towards the betterment of the environment is too small. You can start taking responsibility for the waste you produce and start from home.
If you dump leftover food in the bin and do not care where it ends up, now’s the time to start thinking about the trail.
Most of the food waste you dispose of ends up in landfills, where it decomposes and produces methane gas that contributes to the greenhouse effect.
You may think that you alone can’t make a difference but just know that you can! It all starts small and slowly and gradually leaves a big impact!
So, starting today, make sure you’re disposing of your food waste responsibly and carefully!
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