Zero Waste Minstead Project

Join us in our journey to becoming #zerowasteminstead

Throughout the academic year of 2019/20, we are on an exciting journey to transform our kitchen into a ‘zero waste’ kitchen – the UK’s first study centre to do so! Not only does this further showcase our commitment to sustainability and our love for the environment, it will also act as a guiding example to our visitors, demonstrating how their own domestic & school kitchens could operate in similar ways to produce as little waste as possible!

Why?

Over the past decade, the consideration of what we throw away has rightfully become a crucial topic within contemporary environmental education. Figures commonly estimate that over one third of the food produced globally is unnecessarily lost or wasted. Across our entire food supply chain it’s not only the nutritional value that we discard, but the energy, time, labour, land and financial costs every step of the way; growing, storing, processing, packing, transporting, marketing and preparing our food too. Now add the frightening volume of packaging that is repeatedly produced and wasted to suit our globalised food system and our fast food/food-on-the-go culture. This packaging is so often made of non-recyclable, single-use plastic, so the total cost of food industry waste on our planet is unfathomable.

As a proactive environmental education centre, we feel it is vital to confront such an ecological issue quite honestly, through both our curriculum and our own practices on the ground. By going ‘zero waste’ this year, we are consciously addressing the impact of how we shop, store and prepare our ingredients, as well as what we do with our leftovers. We will explore methods that work and, undoubtedly, methods that don’t, and will share our findings with followers. The statement ‘zero waste’ should not be taken too literally – we do not fail if we throw something away, we brainstorm how best to prevent it next time. What this transformation represents at MSC is our team committing to exploring, trialling and showcasing as many sustainable, resilient solutions to kitchen waste as possible.

How?

Our zero waste project aims not only to change what happens here at the Centre, but also to change practices in home and school kitchens around Hampshire.

Our centre

With sheep, chickens, successful composting systems, a permaculture-inspired garden and an extremely passionate team, we already have robust foundations in place to pioneer some new eco-friendly, waste-free alternatives. We aim to:

- Further connect our menu to our own edible garden to use package free produce, actively practicing the permaculture principle ‘generate no waste’

- Bulk buy where we can to heavily reduce the amount of food packaging that we purchase

- Replace our disposable materials and single-use plastics with reusable items

- Develop relationships with Hampshire farms and producers, ordering more of our ingredients locally with far less waste attached to them

- Purchase new kitchen equipment that will aid us to process and preserve seasonal gluts

- Enhance our composting systems to ensure all edible food waste (including cooked plate scrapings) are repurposed to feed the next generation of plants in our garden

Once a term, we measure how much waste we are producing in our kitchen - measuring plastic (non-recyclable waste), recyclable waste (plastic, card, paper and glass), foil, and compost. Over the course of the year our aim is to steadily reduce the amount of waste we generate - and we will record, track and share our progress.

Kitchens around Hampshire

Each year our centre is visited by around 2500 primary school children. Throughout our academic program, all groups are encouraged to think about what’s on their plates, considering where our food comes from, how it gets there and what happens to any surplus. As part of the zero waste project, we will be introducing our visitors to our very own waste-reducing practices, teaching them simple steps they could apply at home to throw less into their kitchen bins – be that food or packaging. Our cook, Louiza, will also be running a series of outdoor food education sessions during weekends in the summer term. These will have a food waste theme and be offered to KS2 children across 8 Hampshire schools that do not already attend Minstead Study Centre. Through this we hope that our zero waste tips and tricks will reach even more kitchens across the county.

We will post regular updates on this website and also use Instagram, Facebook and Twitter to share our progress - clink on the links below using the hashtag #zerowasteminstead to find posts related to this project!