THE UNIVERSITY Caterer’s Organisation (TUCO) is proud to support the 2014 Go Green Week initiative (10 – 16 February), which sees universities up and down the country commit to developing environmentally-friendly policies across campus.
The aim of Go Green Week is to promote sustainability, raise awareness of environmental issues and celebrate the brilliant work universities and colleges are doing to demonstrate their green credentials. Many TUCO member universities have already adopted a number of sustainability programmes and integrated a green ethos into their catering operations.
In the last year, TUCO has teamed up with a number of renowned organisations such as the Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP), Footprint, the leading source of information on sustainability for the foodservice supply chain, and the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) to help its members establish and advance individual site sustainable sourcing policies and reduce carbon emissions and food waste.
The partnership with the MSC, formed last July, saw the launch of a fast-track way to put MSC certified fish on their members’ menus. This new system allowed MSC certification to become simpler, quicker and less expensive for members demonstrating support for sustainable fisheries.
Julie Barker, chair of TUCO explained the importance of the MSC partnership: “As sustainable sourcing of all ingredients, particularly fish, is such a key issue for the foodservice industry, we felt this was a strategically important move for our members, and set up a working party led and coordinated by our contracts officer, Jane Eve.”
She added: “Each of our partnerships are essential to all our members as they ensure university caterers are actively contributing to tackling environmental issues and initiatives. Campaigns such as Go Green Week are fantastic because they demonstrate just how important it is for schools, colleges and universities to get involved.”
Go Green Week is run by People & Planet and coincides with Valentine’s Day, encouraging people to ‘dump the fossil fuel industry’ on Fossil Free Friday.
TUCO members across the UK have a week full of activities and events planned to help win the fight against fossil fuels, including The University of Wales Trinity Saint-David which is hosting an open invitation to a Fossil-Free lecture.
For further information please visit: www.tuco.org and http://www.peopleandplanet.org/gogreenweek
