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What to do with

Food waste

Please note that recycling collections and facilities may be affected by the COVID-19 situation. Please check with your local authority for updates about services. Read more

Check if you can recycle food waste at home
Enter your postcode below to find out if your local authority offers a food waste collection.
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How to recycle food waste

  • If your local authority has given you a kitchen caddy to collect food waste, you can usually recycle any cooked or raw food scraps 
  • Make sure you remove all packaging from your food waste, especially plastic

The collected food waste can be treated in several ways. In some areas (where food and garden waste are mixed together) it is often commercially composted at a local facility. This compost is then used in agriculture, landscaping and horticulture. Where food waste is collected separately it is usually treated using a method called anaerobic digestion, which produces green electricity.

Which items of food can be recycled

Yes pleaseNo thanks
All uneaten food and plate scrapingsNon-food products including nappies
Tea bags and coffee groundsPackaging of any kind
Out of date or mouldy foodAny material that is not food waste
Raw and cooked meat, including bonesLiquids such as milk - these may leak causing spillages when transporting the food waste
Raw and cooked fish, including bones
Dairy products such as cheese
Eggs and egg shell
Rice, pasta, beans
Baked goods such as bread, cakes and pastries
Fruit and vegetables including raw and cooked vegetables and peelings

Food waste - how is it recycled? Anaerobic digestion

How food waste is recycled using the anaerobic digestion method

Food waste - how is it recycled? In-vessel composting

How food waste is recycled using the in-vessel composting method

Other food waste uses

Make compost at home. You can add the following items of food waste to your home composting bin:

  • Fruit and vegetable peelings, seeds and cores
  • Tea bags
  • Coffee grounds and filter papers
  • Paper towels or tissues (not if they have touched meat)
  • Egg shells

You cannot compost: cooked food, fish, meat or dairy products.

How to combine a food waste collection and home composting

To ensure that you recycle as much of your food waste as possible, both methods work effectively together.

  • Meat, fish and dairy products together with any cooked food can be put into your food waste collection and must not be composted at home as they may attract unwanted visitors to your garden
  •  All fruit and vegetable peelings can be composted at home

More information to help you compost at home

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Related content

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The Waste and Resources Action Programme (which operates as WRAP) is a registered UK Charity No. 1159512 and registered as a Company limited by guarantee in England & Wales No. 4125764.

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