ANALYSIS OF FOOD WASTE IN UNIVERSITY DINING HALLS: A CASE STUDY FROM TURKEY

Food is wasted all along the food chain. An estimated 35 percent of wasted food occurs at the consumer level. It is an increasingly important consideration for consumers, food services, governments, as well as international organizations and institutions. Only limited studies of food wastes have been published during the recent years. The purpose of this research was to investigate the amount of lunch plate waste and to find a solution for the reduction of food waste in university dining halls, used by students as well as administrative and academic staff. For this research, the food waste at the Çukurova University's dining halls in Adana, Turkey was examined, incorporating 54.987 meals from 3 dining halls of the University. The results show that, according to weighing, about 10,7% of the served food is going to be wasted. When focusing on the different groups and the periods of the study, it was detected that there were differences among the groups and periods. From the three groups examined in this study, the students produced the most plate waste. It was also discovered that this group has the lowest sensitivity about waste of food as well. As a result, it can be derived that strategies for the reduction of food waste of the different groups have to be diverse. As detected during this research, students are not interested in the bulletins, adverts, and visual aids.