Plastic waste created because people are ‘afraid of cooking and rely on convenience food’, says councillor
A cultural shift has left some people “afraid” of cooking at home and led to an increase in single-use plastics from convenience food, a councillor has warned.
Cllr Dr Shrobona Bhattacharya (Con, Cambourne) called for more to be done to “bring people back into their own kitchen” to tackle the plastic waste problem.
Speaking at a meeting of South Cambridgeshire District Council’s climate and environment advisory committee on June 6, she said: “I am always emphasising the use of food plastics - the single-use plastics that come from food packaging, like many sandwich boxes and drinks.
“Thirty years ago we did not have this problem, because the food used to come from our own kitchen, and we used to pack our own food from our home.
“This type of convenience food, it was not there before 20, 30 years ago; we never talked about this plastic choking our oceans, our rivers, or anything.
“I think we need to really discuss how we can reduce that.”
She added: “People are cooking at home much less than people used to cook 30 years ago.
“People are also even frightened, afraid, of thinking of cooking stuff in their kitchen. That frightening stuff is actually taking them to the big superstores and grabbing lots of convenient food to go home and reheat and eat; that fear, it is a cultural shift.”
Council officers explained that the council had taken a two-pronged approach to reducing single-use plastic waste, including through a review of the authority’s own waste and encouraging members of the public to make changes.
Effort is also ongoing, they said, with businesses that the authority collects waste.
Meanwhile, the committee was updated on the council’s progress to achieve its target of reaching net zero carbon emissions, and ‘doubling nature’ in South Cambridgeshire, by 2050.
A report said the authority was “largely on track”, completing 65 actions.
Some areas were seeing delays, including work to retrofit homes to improve their energy efficiency, while the increase in the district’s population had effectively “cancelled out” some gains.
Cllr Pippa Heylings (Lib Dem, Histon & Impington) pointed out that three electric waste collection vehicle had been purchased.
The impact of these, and trials using hydrotreated vegetable oil fuel, will not be seen until next year’s data.
Officers said a “big piece of work” will be presented to the committee once completed on the progress towards net zero and areas that need focus.
Cllr Paul Bearpark (Lib Dem, Milton and Waterbeach) highlighted that transport was one of the biggest sources of emissions and said it was “disappointing” the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority had not approved its Local Transport and Connectivity Plan as anticipated.
The Combined Authority board deferred a decision on the plan at a meeting on May 31 after opposition was voiced by some members.
