BANGKOK — Having set itself the ambitious target of sending zero food waste to landfill sites, Bangkok Marriott Marquis Queen’s Park has successfully achieved the goal at its main all-day dining restaurant, Goji Kitchen + Bar.
From September to December 2018, this hugely significant initiative reduced the hotel’s wastage by 27.4 tons of food. Bangkok Marriott Marquis Queen’s Park is now planning to roll out this program to all of its restaurants and food-related departments.
The food waste crisis is one of the world’s most pressing concerns and tackling it is part of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). As a hotel renowned for its sustainable and environmentally-friendly focus, Bangkok Marriott Marquis Queen’s Park is committed to helping eliminate hunger and malnutrition, promoting sustainable production and consumption of food, and reducing global climate change caused by food waste.
The hotel’s waste reduction initiative, which was overseen by LightBlue Environmental Consulting Company, helped to shed light on the significance of food waste practices and create awareness among the hotel employees. Implemented by 80 hotel associates from a range of departments, including kitchen, catering, finance and human resources, this program also led to the initiation of the “Clean Our Plate” campaign in the staff canteen.
In the three and a half months since the program was activated, Goji Kitchen + Bar has successfully reduced its food waste by 27.4 tons, or 294 kilograms per day. The practice has also saved 68.4 tons of CO2 emissions during the whole period.
In addition to its in-house program, Bangkok Marriott Marquis Queen’s Park is also partnering with SOS (Scholar of Sustenance Foundation Thailand) to manage its surplus food. Through this initiative, the hotel now contributes 37.5 kilograms of food per day from Goji Kitchen + Bar to the SOS network, which serves over 3,000 daily meals to underprivileged people in Bangkok.
“Throughout the three months of the program, our entire team was determined to reduce food waste, starting from Goji Kitchen + Bar – our biggest outlet. With this determination we have proved that we can achieve this, and we significantly reduced our food waste from 0.679 kg. to 0.490 kg. per plate, which increases food value by 10 percent. This is a very promising outcome,” said Michael Hogan, Executive Chef of Bangkok Marriott Marquis Queen’s Park.
Bangkok Marriott Marquis Queen’s Park is now moving ahead with plans to reduce food waste in all of its restaurants and food-related outlets, starting with Pagoda Chinese Restaurant, Akira Back and M Club Lounge from January to April 2019, and followed by its catering department from April to August 2019. Through these efforts, Bangkok Marriott Marquis
Queen’s Park is striving to become the first urban five-star hotel in Asia Pacific to be awarded The PLEDGE* certificate, and first urban five-star hotel in Southeast Asia to achieve zero food waste to landfill.
*The PLEDGE™ is an independently verified nine-point food waste prevention standard that is designed to reduce food waste and costs.
