LUXURY HOTELS IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES ARE FIGHTING TO REUSE FOOD WASTE

The developing countries have a poor agricultural system and are trying to become more advanced economically and socially, whereas the hotel in these countries where travelers spent time in tropical hotels or all-inclusive resorts in sunny climes, the food waste increases every year.

 

Mexico’s Velas Vallarta on 4 beachfront hectares bordering Bahía de Banderas bay, is a refined, all-inclusive resort, a 10-minute walk from Marina Vallarta Club de Golf and 2.3 km from Aeropuerto International Licenciado Gustavo Díaz Ordaz. There is a massive amount of food waste in this resort due to so many visitors, and each day the food ends up getting dumped into the trash. The dumped food is eaten by the hogs and the remaining is get composted on site and then finally made a full circle and used to fertilize that same resort’s overflowing gardens. According to a report from the Natural Resources Defense Council, “Forty percent of food in the United States is never eaten, amounting to $165 billion a year in waste, taking a toll on the country's water resources and significantly increasing greenhouse gas emissions.”


The World-Wide Fund for Nature is an international non-governmental organization founded in 1961, serving in the field of the wilderness preservation, and the reduction of human impact on the environment. It is measured that 40% of the food waste begins with the hospitality sector in the US. To help this industry in fighting against food waste, World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the American Hotel and Lodging Association (AHLA), with aid from The Rockefeller Foundation, designed this toolkit to challenge the industry to prevent food waste, donate what cannot be prevented and divert what remains. Hilton, Hyatt Hotels Corporation, InterContinental Hotels Group, Marriott International, Hershey Entertainment & Resorts, Sage Hospitality and Terranea Resort also participated in this project. “This project demonstrated that hotel staff can establish new approaches to cut food waste, which in turn reduces food preparation and disposal costs,” said Pete Pearson, director of food waste at the World Wildlife Fund. “Collaboration and leadership by sectors like the hospitality industry will allow us to implement prevention strategies and solve problems faster.” “Hotels are more committed than ever before to reducing food waste,” said Katherine Lugar, president and CEO of AHLA. “We are encouraged by the findings of the demonstration projects and are excited to be able to share the tools we have developed with our broader membership. By partnering with WWF and The Rockefeller Foundation, we can share new tools and resources to build on the success of this program and propel the industry to a new level of commitment around food waste reduction.”


The food waste issue is very serious for the developing countries where the agricultural problems are its peak. Beyond the AHLA project, many hotels came forward and take the issue of food waste seriously. Aria Resort and Casino in Las Vegas is plush casino resort on The Strip is 2 miles from McCarran International Airport and 15 miles from Shadow Creek Golf Course where the travelers are seen more often. In 2015, the hotel had 7 million pounds of leftover food which was sent to a hog farm where it became food for animals. The Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge, set in Jasper National Park and 3.1 km from Highway 16, is an iconic, high-end lodge resort beside Beauvert Lake. The lodge gives waste vegetable oil to a local organic farm to fuel the delivery truck and on-farm generator, while the Fairmount Waterfront in Vancouver is working hard to become a zero-waste hotel in the coming years. AccorHotels. which is a French multinational hospitality company that owns, manages and franchises hotels, resorts, and vacation properties plans to cut down food waste by a third by reducing menu offerings and planting vegetable gardens at 1,000 of its nearly 4,000 hotels by 2020.