You’ve just finished your Big Mac. Like any conscientious consumer, you separate your waste and recycling before heading out. Feel like you’ve done your part for the environment? Those leftovers you put in the recycling might end up in the landfill.
Some fast food restaurants in Halifax, such as McDonald’s and KFC, are not recycling their organic waste section, violating Nova Scotia’s Environment Act.
According to workers, restaurants either have no intention of recycling or only recycle when bins have not been contaminated with improper materials, which one worker says happens “95 percent” of the time.
“In the back it’s all separated in different” sections, says Virginia Raftus, manager of the KFC on Quinpool Road, who starts speaking of the food preparation area when asked about not sorting in the storefront. She says they sort through the recycling twice daily.
Her employee, Dylan, says differently. (Restaurant employees’ names have been changed.) “At this point it’s the same bags,” he says. “We don’t have a different bin for the compost. We have a green bin for [compost out back] but for the garbage and stuff [out front] it just goes in the same spot.”
Quinpool McDonald’s is still using different bags, but “if one piece of garbage is in with the other stuff, we’re just supposed to throw it in the dumpster,” says Kurt.
Kurt’s manager, who declines to give her name, denies these claims, saying that the restaurant recycles twice daily.
Dylan says KFC sorts the waste in its kitchens, but doesn’t sort garbage that consumers generate in the storefront. That’s illegal under Nova Scotia’s Environment Act, says Cindie Smith, acting manager of education for the Resource Recovery Fund Board. “These are materials which are banned from disposal in any Nova Scotia landfill regardless of where it originates.”
Can fast food restaurants throw out compostable items, even if it’s just from the front section? “Absolutely not,” answers Smith.
The act states “(a) business or operation shall provide receptacles for litter and receptacles for recyclable materials in appropriate and easily accessible locations, and shall service, maintain and empty the receptacles.”
The act also provides a list of materials banned from deposit sites, including compostable organic material and newsprint, meaning putting any compostable material in waste is against the law.
In Canada, KFC is owned by Yum Restaurants. Spokesperson Deb Quinn says that recycling within stores is still in its testing stages. Yum is “currently piloting a number of waste reduction programs across Canada and we’ll be evaluating which ones are the most effective over the next few months.”
McDonald’s refused to be interviewed.
Dylan says the real issue is that customers “just don’t care” about their waste, making sorting the organics section impossible.
But many customers do care, and feel their efforts to sort are going unappreciated.
“So what’s the point of having an organics section?” asks environment student Nicole Dugandzic, who always sorts.
Jill Langeigne, a cook at Salty’s, is frustrated some restaurants aren’t sorting. She also thinks “organics” bins have an ulterior motive. “They’re capitalizing on the whole ‘We seem to be green and eco, but we don’t actually care’ thing,” says Lanteigne, who adds at Salty’s, “We actually do compost everything. I think it is a responsibility of owners to comply with that kind of stuff.”
Rob Hamilton eats out four times a week and doesn’t blame fast food employees for not sorting. “If you get hired as a janitor, you know you’re a janitor,” he explains. “If you get hired to work cashier at a fast food place, then you won’t know that it’s also up to you to pick through garbage. Are you going to do that for minimum wage? I know I wouldn’t.”
This article appears in Dec 2-8, 2010.
Big deal, NOT.
You live in a city that has an above-par recycling program. One that’s committed to being as environmentally friendly and responsible as possible. You strike me as one of two things.
A) Someone who doesn’t care enough to recycle in the first place
B) A public relations representative for a fast food chain who, instead of fixing the issue, makes dumb comments on legitimate articles.
Either way, maybe you shouldn’t slam a reporter willing to put their name to what they write when you don’t show the same courtesy.
Great article, and definitely worth the read.
Jordan Parker
Maybe the government should hire inspectors to make sure McD’s is sorting their garbage. As a matter of fact, maybe an inspector should ride with every garbage truck to make sure homeowners aren’t cheating and throwing plastic bottles into garbage bags. Why not!?
I think that in the grand scheme of things, all this composting and recycling is relatively new. As such, time is a massive factor in people including it in their everyday lives to the point where it’s just common practice and one of those laws that only morons break ala public exposure.
I respect what this article was trying to point out, that perhaps the restaurants most globally well-known for their lack of quality as justification for its price not quite being up to par in terms of health standards (anyone surprised?), but honestly taking into consideration how relatively sudden this green-awareness is, the fact that these restaurants posit their commitment if not fulfilling it to the letter and spirit of the law speaks volumes to both sides.
I think attacking someone for pointing out how far-fetched it is to expect gold standard sanitation and disposal from KFC and McDonalds shows that you simply hate authority and love attacking ignorance, despite your skill in recognizing it. Sarcasm, too.
I heard a lot of criticism but no solutions. What would you have them do?
The problem here is not the restaurant staff, and it’s not most of the customers – it’s that 10 or 25 percent of customers/people who don’t give a shit. They’re the same ones that toss litter out of cars, don’t compost, and wouldn’t think twice about pouring nasty stuff down their toilets. You’ll never get them to change their minds either, so you need to think of a solution that can handle their behaviour.
Pretty simple fix: don’t let *any* of the customers throw stuff away – not garbage, not recyclables, not compostables. If it’s a fast food restaurant oriented towards use of trays, provide tall tray racks where dozens of trays can be stored until a store employee processes them. The tray racks are on casters so they can be wheeled into a back area for the sorting; replace with an empty one when you do that.
I don’t think many store employees would object to doing sorting if they had trays to start with – I just don’t think they want to rummage through garbage bags, and I don’t blame them.
I do not recycle or compost regularly… I do not at home… if there is a bin nearby, ill do my part. But have zero faith in our government and world governments to do anything.
Currently the Harper gov’t has made cut backs to envrionment, and canned scientists that they didnt agree with or were too critical. In addition, reduce the regulations for corporations.
So why the hell does a plastic bottle or compost matter? on the grand scheme of things it does very little.
I watched the staff at the KFC on Wyse Road in Dartmouth empty the “compost” bag into the “garbage” bag and haul it outside to the garbage bin.
I don’t know why they bother asking the public to separate the 2 if they won’t.