TEAM HERALD
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PANJIM: Considering that hotels and restaurants in Goa generate around eight tonnes of food waste every day, half of which is fit to be consumed, the solid waste management practitioners here feel that high penalties need to be imposed on hoteliers, based on the amount of waste they generate every day.
The practitioners also lamented that since the living standard in Goa is relatively high; there are no takers for the left-over food(which is not garbage but cooked food which is not consumed), which the hoteliers like to give away.
The garbage experts were speaking at a panel discussion held on the World Environmental Day organized by Goa State Pollution Control Board (GSPCB). The theme for this year is –Think-Eat-Save.
Addressing the gathering, the Corporation of the City of Panaji co-opted corporator Patricia Pinto suggested categorizing hotels based on the amount of waste they generate every day. “Based on this, very high fines can be imposed,” she said. “But more importantly, there is need to have coordination among the hoteliers and the civic body to solve the issue of food waste,” Pinto said.
Goa Institute of Management Dr Parulekar pointed out the lack of infrastructure and food storage facilities in the state and country which leads to large scale wastage of food items every day.
Parulekar said that on an average eight million tonnes of food waste is generated by hotels in and around Panjim. He said that during a survey carried out by GIM, it was brought to the notice that many hoteliers prefer to feed their internal staff with leftover food while on many occasion they offer it to poor people. “But there are no takers. They like to give it to orphanages. This food is not garbage but the food which is excess and consumed at lower side,” he said.
GIM has currently covered only seven hotels and aims to cover at least 100 hotels.
