Pilot-project on reducing food waste launched in city of Pula

The hotel sector is one of the most important stakeholders in tourism, said the fund's deputy director, Alenka Kosisa Cicin-Sain, adding that it significantly impacts the environment, making its transformation to green business inevitable.

We in the fund have been tackling waste management for years. Croatia has obligations it has to meet in accordance with EU and national legislation - by 2022, we will have to separately collect 40 percent of mass of produced bio-waste," she said.

The pilot-project, implemented in cooperation with the ministries of economy and tourism, is aimed at reducing food waste and proper collection and waste disposal.

She said that an appliance to reduce food waste, which has been temporarily donated by a Korean company, will be used during the pilot-project in Pula's Park Plaza Histria Hotel.

Attending the launch on Wednesday, Korean Ambassador Kim Dong-chan said that he supported all the projects that Croatia was implementing with regard to environment protection.

South Korea exporting food waste recycling machines

Food waste is a big problem in South Korea, where 15,000 tonnes of food waste is produced every day, accounting for 30 percent of all waste. Combined measures to reduce food waste that were introduced by the Korean government have led to an increase in the rate of recycling from two to 95 percent and has had a great impact on the awareness of consumers, and the environment, said the ambassador.

Instead of being dumped at landfills, he added, today food waste is turned into compost, fodder, biomass, and biofuel.

He stressed that in 2020 the value of the Korean food waste recycling machines market amounted to $1 billion, and household appliances made up ten percent of that 90 percent went for commercial use such as restaurants and hotels.

Korea exports its food waste recycling machines to Europe, the USA and Asia.

The pilot-project wants to raise awareness among hotel guests and remind them of the importance of environment protection, emphasising they can change their eating habits by putting only as much food on their plate as they can eat, because any leftovers are doomed to be thrown out.