Waterloo Food Festival tackles food waste by hosting Exotic Excess
Last Saturday a merry band of Exotics held the fort and fed over 500 people tropical fruit surplus salads, complete with edible glitter made from fruit that otherwise would’ve been wasted. A huge thank you to all our volunteers who spoke about food waste for 8 hours, while dressed as tropical exotics! A very special role indeed.
Throughout the day, Exotics offered the public tastes of how delicious industry food waste actually is, we collected over 100 Say no to food waste pledge cards, while informing people about what they can do in the form of an Activist Menu.
This is Rubbish aims to raise awareness about the 50% of food that is wasted before it even reaches people’s homes. We do this by feeding the public with delicious food that was destined for the bin. For this event we worked sourcing our food from Tesco and Morrisons, making sure that the food fed bellies not bins.
We were commissioned by the Waterloo Quater, and were part of their month long Food Festival, that takes place throughout July. Further details about Waterloo Quarter food festival events in July are available at www.wearewaterloo.co.uk
The event was wrapped up by our Rubbish queen, Exotica, who led the masses into a participatory fruit surplus salad toss. Fruit was chopped and lobbed and tossed, and served up to the public, after they helped prepare their own rubbish desert.
For more information on how to bring an end to supply chain surplus, check out our Activist Menu.
This is Rubbish at Waterloo Food Festival 5th July: Press Release
Join This is Rubbish on 5 July as they take on the scandal of surplus food in a tropical café experience in the heart of Waterloo. Part of this year’s Waterloo Quarter Food Festival the EXOTIC EXCESS CAFÉ promises visitors a totally unique food experience whilst demonstrating the tragedy of global food waste and excess. Globally we waste between 30-40 per cent of all food grown and produced – and This is Rubbish works towards changing that.
Located on the Lower Marsh Plaza in SE1, open between 11am-4pm, and free to attend, the EXOTIC EXCESS CAFÉ will include a ‘help yourself’ fruit bowl, ‘place mat pledges’ and a ‘menu of activism’. The place mat pledges – with either community or personal pledges against food waste – will be hung in the café on the This is Rubbish washing line for all to see. Walkabout performers will be mingling with shoppers along Lower Marsh – serving tropical fruit jelly and chatting about food waste. From 2pm This is Rubbish will perform a ‘communal fruit salad toss for the masses’. Members of the public are invited to take part and trade in a ‘place mat pledge’ for some free fruit salad and marvel at the glittering Exotic Excess tropical fruit installations aimed at highlighting the tragedy of food waste and excess.
Caitlin Shepherd, This is Rubbish Co Director, said: “This is Rubbish are delighted to be joining the Waterloo Food Festival this year, and on Saturday the 5th of July, will be there in style with an Exotic Excess Cafe.Tropically adorned, a troupe of This is Rubbish volunteers will be serving fruit surplus salad jelly, and demonstrating that the majority of UK industry food waste is too good to chuck out! Come down to sample the delights of surplus, learn about food waste and take part in a large scale fruit salad toss.”
Helen Santer, CEO of Waterloo Quarter, the organisers of the Food Festival, said: “This is Rubbish tells thestory of waste and excess via fun food waste events and experiences. Food waste is a really important global issue – so we are really excited to be bringing this event to this year’s Food Festival. I’m anticipating a really unique event and hope Waterloo comes up trumps with lots of pledges against unnecessary food waste.”
This is Rubbish sources its food mainly from supermarkets and large-scale fruit markets in London. As part of their Corporate Social Responsibility schemes, most supermarkets are beginning to choose to give this surplus away rather than simply send it to landfill, which has been common practice thus far. Most surplus supermarket food is still perfectly fine for human consumption but because the rules and regulations behind how food should look (perfect and blemish-free) much of it ends up in landfill for no good reason.
Generally, a whole box of goods can be discarded simply because a barcode is faulty, or one of the containers within a whole shipment is damaged.
To find out more about the EXOTIC EXCESS CAFÉ visit www.wearewaterloo.co.uk
The Waterloo Food Festival runs throughout July with a mouth-watering programme of events and offers showcasing the vibrant mix of food and drink venues to be discovered in the SE1 area. Waterloo’s many restaurants, pubs, cafés, bars and specialist food shops will be hosting exclusive events, tastings and demonstrations including an Evening Food Fair opposite the Old Vic theatre on 3 July, a Spanish & Latin- American Street Party on 17 July, the Chateau Marmot demo & tasting on 19 July, the Waterloo Beer & Burgers Festival on 24 July and a Waterloo Charity Bake-off on 31 July.
More information about the Festival can be found at www.wearewaterloo.co.uk. To take full advantage of all the special offers, foodie competitions and events pick up a FREE Gastro Passport at participating retailers or by emailing info@waterlooquarter.org
-ENDS-
For further information and images please contact Sarah Harrison, for Waterloo Quarter Food Festival, on
07768 372892 or email sarah@sarahharrisonpr.com
Notes to Editors
The Waterloo Food Festival
Now in its sixth year, the Waterloo Quarter Food Festival is a month-long celebration of food and drink organised by the Waterloo Quarter Business Improvement District, Waterloo’s business-led organisation committed to improving the area of Waterloo. Unlike many other food festivals it doesn’t take place in a tent or marquee but in the street and within individual bars, restaurants, pubs and shops. Visit
www.waterlooquarter.org to find out more.
A political feast; why skipping is a necessary evil
Today’s news told the story of three citizens being taken to court for the act of skipping. That is taking food from commercial bins, that is good to eat but would have otherwise been thrown away.
On the 25th October 2013, a member of the public called the police to report three men climbing over a wall at the back of an Iceland store in London. The three men were subsequently arrested, and faced prosecution for theft. Police arrested the men who were charged under the obscure 1824 ‘vagrancy act’, for stealing. However, later in the day it was reported that the Crown Prosecution Service decided to drop the charge. Nonetheless, this case raises very important questions about where responsibility for reducing food waste, and for reducing the increasing levels of food poverty in the UK.
Time to toss for change, join the surplus salad toss @ the Give or Take event
On Saturday 28th September This is Rubbish, an anti food waste campaign focusing on the enormous issue of industry level food waste will be running workshops at an FRP Give or Take Event in Walthamstow.
One two – we’re off to cloud cuckoo!
This is Rubbish are off to the second event of the summer, to share stories of creative campaigning to bring a policy led end to current levels of food waste occurring in the industry. We will be drawing on our 2011 Feast tour and the recent IFWAP report, that we launched in Parliament back in May. We will also be staying true to our participatory roots, and hosting a mass This is Rubbish salad toss.
An overview of IFWAP’S Counting What Matters media coverage
It’s that time again, where end of project reports must be written and further funding applications worked up and submitted. While evaluating impact, we thought it might be worth sharing some of the media coverage that we got off the back of our Parliamentary Counting What Matters Launch.
Tesco pledges action on food waste
https://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2013/may/23/tesco-pledges-action-food-waste
The industry must act on auditing food waste
https://www.sharnoffsglobalviews.com/food-waste-065/
Food industry should audit supply chains, say waste campaigners
https://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/may/15/food-industry-waste-campaigners
Calls for industry to audit food waste
https://www.resource.uk.com/article/Futurevision/Calls_industry_audit_food_waste-3082
Changing More than Lightbulbs
https://www.energyroyd.org.uk/archives/8364#more-8364
Food-waste agency faces further cuts to its funding
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/foodwaste-agency-faces-further-cuts-to-its-funding-8612400.html
Protestors Rubbish the Belgium GM potato trial
The trial against Belgium activists, now under heavy criminal charges for targeting a GM potato field in Belgium two years ago, has restated this week.
On 9 May 2011, 400 activists attempted to replace a GM test filed with organic potatoes, in an act of civil disobedience to rubbish the destructive GM trial and highlight the long term damage this could mean for sustainable agriculture.
11 people, of the 400, were arrested (some with and some without probation) and are now under criminal charges without any of their witnesses having been heard. This conviction poses a dangerous precedent for all forms of civil society action.
Bart Staes, Member of European Parliament for the Greens and one of the 91 voluntary defendants in the trial, told the court: “For 25 years I have been fighting for a fair food production system. We all have the right to healthy food and freedom of choice. This GM potato trial is part of industry’s efforts to push for a very specific agricultural model. “
The day before the trial, This is Rubbish showed their solidarity with activists in Berlin, who strung banners in front of the Belgian Embassy, distributing informative flyers and attempting to be hear by the embassy staff, who were alas a bit shy. “Social movements are not criminal gangs,” read one of the banners “Campaigning for Sustainable Agriculture…Is that Criminal?” read another.
“It is incredible that the opposition to this clearly inhumane industry has such draconian punishments,” Erasmus Müller, from the Berlin action on Monday.
La Wasterie and The Gleaners Voyage at Walthamstow’s Appetite Festival
This is Rubbish are delighted to bring you their first pop up Feast since the People’s Millions funded Feast tour of 2011. We are embarking on journey’s a new, and have been devising many a new activity and journey into the world of preventable food waste.
On the 22nd and 23rd June, the This is Rubbish troupe will be running La Wasterie workshop saloon at Walthamstow’s Appetite food festival. Come join us in La Wasterie, to learn about food waste through participatory and hands on workshops, waste crusaders puppet making session, chuck out chain food waste games and the opportunity to engage with food waste on a policy level, by pledging to support the This is Rubbish policy change asks.
For more information on Saturday’s La Wasterie and Sunday’s Gleaners Voyage Feast read on below. The Feast is ticketed, and tickets can be purchased here.
La Wasterie – Saturday 22
The Green Space, Walthamstow Town Square
Activities run between10am – 4pm
Be prepared to be filled by a rich menu of food waste activities and workshops. We invite you to join us in our arts led educational saloon, La Wasterie. Here you will learn about industry food waste, where it happens and what can be done to stop it. Activities suitable for all ages.
Amuse Bouche: The Gleaners Quest – A treasure hunt whet your appetite for rubbish. Suitable for all ages. Starter
Starters: The Wastelanders – A serving of fantastical puppets served from your own imagination. Mains
Main: Chuck-out Chain Game – An interactive taste of the supply chain with a dressing of discovery. Mapping skipping sites?
Dessert: Just Dessert! – Join us in baking a Cake for Change, where each ingredient represents policy change and when we reach the total amount of ingredients for a large cake, we will bake it and invite you to eat it with us, to collectively call for policy change.
Counting What Matters Report
Launched today our report, Counting What Matters explores the potential for food waste audits to significantly reduce waste in the food supply chain.
Households are usually blamed for the UK’s food waste mountain, but the reality is that the food industry is responsible for generating over half of the 18-20 million tonnes of food wasted every year. Attempts to control waste associated with the production, processing, transport and sale of food have been hampered by lack of transparent data on where, how and why waste happens in the supply chain.
We believe a requirement for large food businesses to audit food waste would close this knowledge gap and strengthen preventative policies and action. Our research shows that there is more support for the proposal from the industry than previously believed.
Industry food waste is an issue in need of urgent action, yet report findings show there is a need for further research into the shape and implementation of audit. In light of this, We make three key recommendations for immediate action;
• Strengthen existing voluntary agreements, including Courtauld Commitment 3 – apply separate targets for industry food waste, implement a pathway to whole supply chain engagement and longer-term reduction targets in line with the EC’s call to halve food waste by 2020
• Pave the way for regulation if voluntary agreements fail – the government needs a transparent back-up plan if industry fails to deliver
• Strengthen citizen engagement and improve debate – there is a need for wider more participative discussion on where responsibility for food waste lies and what steps different actors should take in reducing it.
Creating Rubbish – Calling all ye illustrators, graphic designers and artivists – come and share your skills with This is Rubbish
Dear Creatives,
This is Rubbish is hopping and a skipping on tour this year to a few events running a
food waste cafe, La Wasterie and afternoon feasts, with a 3 course menu of rubbish and
educational activity on offer.
This is Rubbish’s La Wasterie
Hungry for change? Drop into This is Rubbish’s La Wasterie cafe to feast on industry
food waste and glean insight into the world of edible excess. Dedicated to learning by
doing, La Wasterie will be running a mouthwatering menu for both belly and mind.
We are looking for an inspired menu artist to design the typography and artwork of our
menu’s of activity. These will be painted onto A frame Blackboards, and turned into B&W
promotional posters to be put around the communities within which we are delivering our
workshops and feasts.
We have a large marketing and media list, so you’re work will be widely publicised, and
you will become known for working with the best rubbish in town!
Nearer the time we will be calling for a troupe of characters who want to help serve up
the ‘rubbish’, maybe sing a song, recite a story and generally help make the feasts a
theatrical spectacular.
Everyone involved is invited to the This is Rubbish team working weekend to create all
the games, props, costumes etc, and of course have some wonderful gleaned meals,
Friday 7th – Sunday 9th June.
If you are interested please contact poppyflint@gmail.com by the 17th May 2013, with
prior examples of your work, link to your website etc.
The first event is Saturday 22nd June at Appetite 2013 in Walthamstow.