All parliament constituencies urged to save surplus food via retort system

All 222 Parliamentary constituencies in the country are encouraged to cultivate the practice of storing surplus food including surplus at hotels through the 'retort' method to help the needy in the food bank programme.

Food Bank Malaysia Foundation chief executive officer (CEO) Abdul Wahab Long said, according to data obtained from the Solid Waste And Public Cleansing Management Corporation (SWCorp), 17,000 tonnes of surplus food was produced in a day.

"Of these, 3,000 tonnes is a good food... untouched... such as food at a feast, which is served and not finished and there is more in the kitchen. If we throw all this food it will be wasted. So we thought it would be best if we used the retort technique to save excess food.

"I would also recommend that this retort technology be introduced in every Parliamentary constituency ... this machine costs between RM30,000 and RM40,000 only and if it can be done, the saved food can be distributed to those in need and it can last up to a year and some can last up to five years," he said here today.

He said this in his speech at the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the Food Bank Malaysia Foundation and the Johol Law Foundation, which was represented by its CEO Md Ghazali Md Yasin and witnessed by the Undang Luak Johol Datuk Johan Pahlawan Lela Perkasa Setiawan Datuk Muhammad Abdullah.

-- BERNAMA