Restaurant food scraps and horse manure key to soil farmers' success

3 months ago by zero_gravitas to c/newcastle

While diners enjoy their seaside meals, Andrew Collins is happily outside chasing the scraps.

In short:

Two farmers from the NSW Upper Hunter are on a mission to stop city food waste from going to landfill.

They are collecting tonnes of scraps from restaurants and cafes in Newcastle for compost, then using worms to turn it all into liquid fertiliser.

What's next?

All businesses that sell or handle food in NSW will need to comply with new FOGO mandates by July 2030, with those with the largest bin volumes targeted first from July 1.

arbilp3 2 points 3 months ago

This is great news and we should have been doing this work at scale ages ago, all over Australia. There have been other projects but never at scale (that I know of). We'd be dealing with various challenges all at once. Anyway, I really hope businesses, councils and state govts get together and start systems that can be followed in all cities and towns.

"As far as going to a greener future, with the price of fertiliser this is just the best way to do it as far as soil health, keeping it natural, organic.

"It all comes down to healthy soil, healthy humans, healthy community."

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