A package of measures to make world better - Cat Hay

Achieving a more environmentally sustainable Scotland is a top priority for our food and drink manufacturers. Despite the impact of the pandemic, these businesses continue to make progress on key sustainability targets.

The pandemic highlighted just how important it is to make sure the food our manufacturers make gets to people’s plates and avoids becoming waste. The food and drink supply chain is working together to minimise waste throughout our supply chains. By working together through the Food Waste Reduction Roadmap, thousands of tonnes of food made it to people’s plates instead of ending up as waste last year.

But it’s not just food waste that is high on our industry’s agenda. The Food and Drink Federation’s latest update report on food and drink manufacturers progress against sustainability targets shows a 55 per cent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions – five years before the target was due to be reached. In the same period, the volume of water used to make a tonne of product reduced by 44.5 per cent.

The Scottish Government recently published its updated Climate Change Plan. We should all welcome the Scottish Government’s legally binding target to be net zero by 2045, but I was struck by the sheer volume of policy contained within the plan. We need policy and policy makers to avoid creating too many complex targets and initiatives and to work with the food industry on the areas where we can have the biggest impact in tackling the climate emergency together.

Here are two examples of how policy makers can help Scotland’s food and drink manufacturers in our collective journey to net-zero.Firstly, create a bespoke, long-term energy transition fund for food and drink producers. This fund would enable our industry to transition from using gas to electricity and hydrogen. With the majority of food and drink producers being small or medium-sized businesses, this fund would need to provide funding for lots of small scale projects to have an industry wide impact.

Secondly, more needs to be done to put in place a more effective recycling infrastructure and consider how we capitalise on a more circular economy.

This will support the efforts of our food and drink businesses who continue to look at how they can make their packaging more sustainable. We know from recent consumer research produced by Levercliff that over a third of consumers frequently consider the impact of food packaging on the environment. Food and drink businesses are working hard to address this. Recent examples include Quaker Oats removing plastic lids from its Oat So Simple range of porridge pots or ingredients manufacturer Macphie moving to plant-based packaging for their ready-to-use dessert and sauce ranges. If Scotland is to become a world leader in tackling the climate emergency, we must all work together – value our food and those who produce it, value our resources and value Scotland’s natural capital.

We look forward to working with the next Scottish Parliament to ensure support for food producers is at the heart of these important policies. If you would like to find out more about our work on environmental sustainability, get in touch.

Cat Hay, Head of Policy, Food and Drink Federation Scotland