What happens to your food waste

Find out how we recycle your food waste, other ways to recycle, and get advice on how to reduce your food waste at home.

What we do with your food waste

We'll collect the food waste from your outside bins. We'll then process it at a facility near Lewes that also treats our garden waste.

The food waste will be turned into:

  • compost, that you can buy at our Household Waste Recycling Sites
  • soil conditioner, available to local farmers

You can watch a video of how the composting process works below:

 

Other ways to recycle your food waste

You may already compost at home or use a separate community composting scheme such as the one run by the Brighton & Hove Food Partnership. You can recycle even more by placing your plate scrapings, leftovers, cooked and fruit and vegetables, meat, fish, bones, dairy, bread and rice into your food waste caddy collected by us.

Find out about community composting with the Brighton and Hove Food Partnership.

Reducing food waste

Reducing food waste and recycling as much as you can helps to reduce both environmental impacts and your daily living costs. National figures show that, on average, food waste costs £260 per person each year or £1000 for a household of four. (Household food and drink waste in the United Kingdom 2022 - WRAP, 2025)

Less food thrown away means less impact on the environment from:

  • food production and distribution
  • the collection and disposal of food waste

To reduce food waste you can:

Plan your meals

Meal planning is one of the most effective ways you can save on your food bills and reduce waste. A meal plan will encourage you to think about the food you cook and help you only buy what you need

Use what you have

Keep track of your fresh food and leftovers and eat them before they go bad.

Check your fridge temperature

Your fridge temperature should be set between 0 and 5°C. Storing food at a lower temperature can significantly extend storage lives, giving you more opportunities to use fresh food.

Use your freezer

Most food, raw or cooked, can be frozen without a problem. Freezing food before its use-by date can save you money and reduce waste.

Measure your portions 

You can reduce waste by only cooking the amount of food you need. Try the Love Food, Hate Waste food portion calculator for recommended average portion sizes.

Visit the Brighton and Hove Food Partnership website for more tips on reducing food waste.

More information

This food waste collection project is part funded by UK Government.

If you have any more questions, contact us online.