What Do Hotel Buffets Do With Their Leftovers? - Tasting Table

"The hotel buffet is built on abundance: rows of chafing dishes endlessly topped up, live counters for stir-frys and sizzles, dessert counters that never seem to run out, and the promise that you can always go back for more. It creates the sense that food is limitless. But once the service ends and the dining room empties, that same abundance leaves behind a quieter question: what happens to everything that's left over?"

"In America alone, this adds up to an estimated 108 billion pounds of food, or roughly 130 billion meals that are tossed each year, amounting to over $408 billion in lost value. Environmentally, this waste carries a hidden cost: each kilogram of food thrown away generates almost two kilograms of carbon dioxide and equivalent emissions and consumes nearly three tons of natural resources, contributing directly to biodiversity loss."

Buffet abundance encourages overproduction and a perception that food is limitless, leaving substantial leftovers after service ends. Nearly half of all buffet food is discarded, and in the United States this totals about 108 billion pounds—roughly 130 billion meals—worth over $408 billion. Food waste has a large environmental footprint: each kilogram discarded produces almost two kilograms of CO2-equivalent emissions and consumes nearly three tons of natural resources, driving biodiversity loss. Globally, roughly one-third of produced food is lost or wasted. Hotels are adopting tracking systems to better match supply with demand and are redirecting leftovers to farms for compost and to charities and food banks for donation.

Read at Tasting Table