WASTE NOT, WANT NOT
Many cash strapped students and graduates are saving money on grocery bills by making the most of free food that would otherwise go to waste…….
Harry Peters regularly gets his evening meal from a Sainsbury’s supermarket in Edinburgh. But unlike other shoppers, Harry doesn’t go through the store’s front door. Instead, he goes round the back of it and salvages packed sandwiches, ready meals and other essential food items from a giant bin.
Bin raiding makes economic sense to Harry, a student at a Scottish University.
“It’s a fairly safe way of saving money as I’ve never got food poisoning from rummaging through bins. I’m one of these students who looks to save as much money as possible.
“I’m also motivated by the fact that our consumer culture produces so much waste. I’m taking that waste and making it useful.”
Harry is a freegan. Freegans aim to protect the environment by reducing waste. Rescuing discarded food is one way they achieve their goal. Freeganism attracts a cross section of the population – from doctors and lawyers on six figure incomes to students and families struggling to make ends meet.
“Freeganism is a proactive movement,” says Alf Montagu, an Oxford graduate and spokesman for UK Freegans. “There is reason and logic behind what we do. Landfill sites emit harmful gases and toxins into the atmosphere, such as methane and so if you can recycle a percentage of this you’ll be reducing the damage done to the environment.”
It is reckoned that supermarkets, restaurants and the rest of the food industry dumps 17 million tonnes of food in UK landfill sites, every year. Some four million tonnes of this is fresh food that has not yet reached its sell-by date.
Sainsbury’s donates most of its food that is beyond its display date, but within its use-by date to charities such as the Salvation Army and zoos, says a spokesman for the company. Tesco says that it has a policy of donating food to charities as long as the food is fit for consumption.
Despite these claims many freegans manage to go weeks without stepping into supermarkets to buy food, because they can get adequate supplies round the back of stores for free. Fresh fruit, vegetables, organic breads, packets of smoked salmon, nuts and bottles of water are among some of their most desirable finds. Alf, once found an MP3 player and DVD player, both in good working order.
“When you see the [quantities of food and household items in these bins] you become quite angered at the injustice, because what you see is wasted wealth that someone else can use,” he says.
Alf and his friends have been caught bin diving by supermarket managers a few times. “The reactions we’ve got have been varied from the irrational, ‘hey you can’t steal my rubbish, put it all back instantly to ‘OK that’s fine” after we’ve explained ourselves.”
Salvaging food from supermarket dustbins is not a new trend. “When my parents were students in the 1970s , they used to go round the back of shops and help themselves to food and household goods that had been thrown out,” says Saskia Stainer-Hutchins, who graduated from Durham with a degree in English, last year.
Saskia, 22, caught the bin diving bug and went on her first spree at 15. She rummaged through a skip and found a pair of jeans which she still owns.
“I come from Stroud in Gloucestershire, a rather hippy part of the country and most of my friends salvage clothes and stuff from skips. There is an element of fun to it. It looks cool and is about making a statement.
“From my experience supermarkets have made sure you can’t get hold of their food by putting locks on their bins, but with friends I tend to make it through festivals by getting food this way.”
Montagu salvaged some pretzels from a supermarket container just two hours before contributing to this feature. He’s been on numerous bin diving sprees since and luckily has found more than just pretzels. Montagu reckons freeganism will become more popular as increasing numbers of people become aware of the damage unnecessary waste does to the environment.
