Biffa helps food giant Panesar go greener with novel recycling solution

Tipton-based Panesar Foods is a leading manufacturer of cooking sauces and condiments with three factories in the West Midlands. Many of these are ‘white label’ products manufactured to the exacting standards of the UK’s leading supermarket chains, while Panesar’s own brands include Indi Grand, Mexi-Grande, Golden Tiger, Global Choice and Spice Magic.

The company was previously putting the vast majority of its waste into a general waste compactor. This included jarred products that had not passed the company’s stringent safety and contamination testing procedures. However, with the high cost of general waste disposal and the potential for recycling of glass, Biffa presented Panesar with a more environmentally friendly and cost-effective solution.

Biffa’s dedicated account manager looked into a number of options, among them a trial which involved sending the waste to an anaerobic digestion (AD) facility where it could be transformed into useful energy while reducing the cost.

As AD facilities can only process food waste rather than glass or metal, the waste needed to be sieved to remove any glass or metal lids before the waste could pass into the AD processor. However, once separated, the glass and metal waste could also itself be separately recycled,

Following the success of the trial, this approach is now being adopted company-wide, drastically reducing the quantity of waste being sent to landfill from Panesar’s facilities. With the processing of food waste through AD costing around half that of general waste, the commercial benefits to the company are clear.

Panesar Foods director Jas Panesar explained: “We are a major employer in the area and have a long-standing partnership with Biffa who have always provided a high-quality, responsive service. Our aim through this exercise was to maximise the quantity of waste we recycled to reflect our status as a responsible manufacturer. Biffa came up with a novel solution which has done just that and, as we seek to further expand the business, we know we are doing all we can to cut our environmental footprint.”

Jason Burrows, regional account manager at Biffa, added: “Panesar Foods is a company which takes its environmental responsibilities very seriously but the nature of the waste produced by the company necessitated a different approach. However the separation process to remove the glass and metal from the food waste and then process that food waste into energy via AD has enabled Panesar to reduce its waste disposal costs and make a contribution towards sustainable energy generation too.”