CATERING SERVICES WORKING TOWARDS A BETTER ENVIRONMENT

 Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust Catering Department.

Service Profile

• Service split between 2 sites with meals distributed to over 40 locations

• Serve over 3000 meals daily• GRH is a traditional production kitchen, CGH is a frozen

prepared meals offer.• Provisions budget of £1.7m with £1m spent at CGH.• Retail generates a turnover of £1.1m• Employ 140 staff • Approximately 30% of expenditure is with local suppliers

Supporting local trade  

Sandwiches from Cheltenham

Fruit and vegetables from Herefordshire

Cakes from Lydney

Bristol——Beverages, Disposable wareChilled foodsFrozen foods

NHS supply chain (Bridgewater)

Frozen and chilled produce Cardiff

Health foods from Aberdare

Ice-cream from Wiltshire

Frozen Patient meals from Wiltshire

Bakery Items from Stroud

Sausages and chilled meats From Stonehouse

Milk from Gloucestershire farms

Groceries from Staverton

Fresh meat sourced from farms within Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Somerset borders

What is sustainability

• Local producers• Local suppliers• Jobs and the economy • Reduced food miles• Carbon Footprint• UK food production• Seasonal Foods

What is local?

Prepared meal offer at CGH

The central production team GRH

2002 THE START OF THE SUSTAINABILITY JOURNEY

• Start with an audit• Identify opportunities with national and

local purchase contracts• Is there a cost or operational issue• Get on with it.

The Barriers

• By 2007 we achieved all we could that was cost neutral• Business case rejected to increase spend on meat• Level of spend on ready prepared meals from suppliers

outside our region• Volume of food from outside the UK for the catering

trade• Reduction in average spend on patients meals

The focus changed

Reducing food miles from suppliers and within the trust• Development of central delivery hub for catering• Multi Temp delivery vehicles (ambient, chilled and frozen)• Reduction in delivery frequency's from suppliers from daily to 3 times a week• Reorganisation of internal delivery schedules

Reduction in suppliers packaging • Contract specified the requirement for re useable plastic crates• Fruit and Vegetables suppliers to remove cardboard boxes

Carbon reduction • Equipment specifications and life cycle costs • Reduction of cleaning chemicals • Recycling of card, plastic and cooking oil• Reduction of food waste to landfill.

Floor cleaning at GRH

Recycling at GRH

Refrigerated storage area

Progress with food procurement

What’s new• Marine stewardship fish products• Eggs from cage free flocks• Increased fair trade and rainforest alliance products• Worked with local food company to develop and improve

their patient frozen meal offer, increasing the annual spend locally.

• Worked with and supported local suppliers to tender for framework contacts.

• More national and local suppliers buying UK produced foods because of the exchange rates and transport costs.

The future

• Retain an interest and focus on sustainable food • Work with national procurement agency to influence the

local food agenda• Prepare CGH patient meals in-house at GRH subject to

the business case.• Reference site for the Soil Association to promote

sustainability in health care environment

 

Reducing our Carbon Footprint

We have encouraged suppliers

to use reusable plastic delivery

crates. Some cardboard

packaging is also collected for

re-use all other cardboard

packaging is recycled