Shopping Mall in Brazil recycles all food waste by growing vegetables on its roof

The vegetables are then harvested and distributed to the mall's employees

The vegetables are then harvested and distributed to the mall's employees

Since 2012, the Eldorado Shopping Mall in Sao Paulo, Brazil uses food waste to grow vegetables on a rooftop farm. The remains of 10,000 meals served each day at the mall’s food court (approximately 400 kgs/900 pounds of organic waste) are turned into compost, which is then used for growing completely pesticide-free crops of lettuce, peppers, tomatoes, eggplants, onions and basil. Some of the produce is served in the mall’s restaurants, while the main volume is harvested by employees to take home at no cost.

The project is run by the mall’s employees, who separate food waste from inorganic waste, and then send it to the recycling center where it is weighed. “We notice that people waste a huge amount of food. So beyond our objective of creating organic compost, we use this to create new food. It is a cycle in which we make food out of food. This is what it means to be sustainable,” said Cicero Evangelista, in charge of recycling at the shopping mall. Cicero’s team adds enzymes that eliminate harmful bacteria, reduce humidity and accelerate decomposition. ‘This is how we turn organic waste into organic compost’, he adds.

Source: Chicago Tribune

Source: Greenpeace