The University of Manchester’s 3-Star Sustainability Story

The University of Manchester’s 3 Star Sustainability Story

A campus-wide reusable cup system, a community fridge scheme, local sourcing, healthy menus and a food waste campaign are some of the initiatives operating within the University of Manchester’s catering service. Their dedication has resulted in the university achieving the highest accreditation in the Food Made Good Standard Awards from the Sustainable Restaurant Association (SRA).

Sustainability at the Heart of Campus Catering

The three-star rating is applied across the university’s catering service, including the Unicafe outlets, Food in Residence (food served in halls of residence) and HospitalityOnCampus, which provides event and dining catering services across the university estate.

Laura Blandy, Head of Hospitality and Events Marketing from The University of Manchester, says “Sustainability sits at the core of everything we do and every decision we make. It isn’t an afterthought, but ingrained in our business practices, and the award is testament to that. It is an incredible achievement and gives us guidance on how to move forward and evolve.”

Her advice to other universities is to set up a sustainability working group with cross-departmental meetings. “Universities are huge organisations and often great work is done in teams or departments in isolation. A sustainability working group ensures everything is joined up and is as cohesive as possible,” says Laura.

Instigating regular two-way communication and engagement with students and staff on sustainable food and drink is also important for students to understand what the university stands for and supports. One of the ways the university does this is by appointing sustainability ambassadors – encouraging students to advocate for other students. There’s also an annual Sustainability Fair which showcases suppliers and their sustainability credentials. “It’s a great way for students and staff to have detailed conversations directly with our suppliers,” Laura says. “We also carry out surveys to see what matters most to staff and students.”

How Manchester’s Reusable Cup Scheme Became a City-Wide Success

One of the most successful initiatives is the Bee Cup, a reusable cup scheme that encourages students to borrow reusable cups via the Vytal app, returning them to participating cafés to be washed and reused. The scheme has been so successful it has been adopted by Manchester Metropolitan University, the University of Salford and Manchester Central Library. “We hope it will become a city-wide initiative and a blueprint for other universities and cities,” says Laura. The team are now introducing the Bee Bowl for takeaway food.

Further reducing waste is the university’s community fridge scheme. Surplus food is collected daily from Unicafe outlets and put into a community fridge in the Students’ Union, available for free to all students.

The catering team are keen to use local suppliers where possible, and there are between 250 and 400 catering staff (depending on the time of year), who attend sustainability training. This includes the “Guardians of Grub: Becoming A Champion” learning programme that trains staff on how to reduce food waste safely. They also support the No Time To Waste campaign, which aims to reduce waste and promote sustainable behaviour across the campus via a rewards platform. Students and staff can log actions such as recycling, eating plant-based meals, shopping second-hand, or attending wellbeing events, resulting in points that can be exchanged for prizes.