New commercial food waste legislation in the UK will be in place from the end of March 2025. It means that from this date most businesses will have to separate food waste from other rubbish streams. Companies must store food waste in separate bins and arrange collection by licensed waste carriers.

However, according to a new survey, 93% of hospitality leaders are concerned about the impact the upcoming ‘Simpler Recycling’ legislation will have on their businesses.

From 31 March 2025, the legislation, being brought to England under the Environment Act 2021, will require all businesses with 10 or more employees to separate dry mixed recyclables and food waste from their general waste, prior to collection from their premises.

The survey of 250 hospitality businesses, conducted by a leading waste and recycling manufacturer showed that while 88% are already separating some waste for recycling, only 34% are currently separating food waste.

The leisure and hospitality industry is set to be one of the sectors most impacted by this new food waste recycling mandate.

In addition to the anticipated challenges, the results of the survey found that just 62% of hospitality SMEs (<250 employees) were aware of the planned changes, compared with 92% of larger hospitality business (250+ employees) and 78% of SMEs in other sectors.

For large hospitality businesses, the top concern was the timescales to make the changes (55%), followed by cost (51%) and lack of knowledge (49%). Restaurants in particular are worried about timescales (72%), while bars showed concern about a lack of knowledge (64%), and catering companies (55%) and fast food restaurants (54%) said they are most worried about reputation.

While SMEs registered a lower level of concern than larger businesses – 78% versus 97% – (with lower awareness of the legislation), the top concern for these respondents was the cost to implement the changes needed (36%). 31% were worried about the timescales needed to make the changes, with over a fifth saying they thought they’d either miss the 31 March deadline or they did not yet have a planned timescale to make the changes.

The new legislation aims to improve the quality and quantity of waste collections, and to support the circular economy.

The new rules do not apply to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, which have their own arrangements.