The COVID-19 pandemic has badly hurt the world economy as people are forced to stay at home to curb the spread of the contagious disease. The prolonged closure and lockdowns in Malaysia have hit the restaurant industry, both in negative and positive ways.

Although restaurants lost customers due to the one-time ‘no dine-in’ prohibition during the movement control orders (MCOs), food delivery services have surged. Digital platforms such as foodpanda and GrabFood have served up much help and convenience to the restaurants as well as customers.

More and more Malaysians are becoming familiar with the online food delivery services and their applications, and are getting used to utilising the services fully even more now. Undoubtedly, the demand for food delivery services has risen since 2019 in Malaysia, thus offering a great opportunity for the restaurants to survive in the market.

Food delivery services require great utilisation of ‘take-away’ containers, cups, straws and trays which are mainly made of plastic or are paper-based layered with plastic. Plastic is sturdy enough to support the food and drink from spilling during delivery. It is being used widely in Malaysia, and will continue to be used due to its flexibility.

Unfortunately, however, the accumulation of food packaging waste during the pandemic has risen drastically in the environment. Even without scientific research, it can be seen that the amount of plastic waste from food delivery has been piling up in the environment.

For example, imagine that you order food delivered to the home for two persons. Have you ever wondered and observed how much of food packaging waste from plastic is generated for a meal? The packaging for the drink and food containers is double the quantity in comparison to that when you eat at the restaurant.

During the MCOs, a majority of Malaysians used the food delivery service, and everyone has generated the same amount of waste. This eventually creates a huge pile of food packaging waste compared to the situation before the pandemic.

Action of customers concerning

While the amount of food packaging waste from the delivery services since the implementation of the MCOs in Malaysia has been increasing, the action of customers has been more concerning.

Food packaging waste, mainly plastic, can be easily found on the streets or in open drains and eventually will cause blockage in the sewers and trigger floods. ]

The action of the irresponsible customers in littering the environment with discarded food packaging materials is the cause of the worsening pollution in the country.

Some food delivery service customers do not heed the local council notification on the garbage collection times; they simply put out their household garbage at any time, leaving it outside the house.

This action has attracted stray animals like cats and dogs which rip off the garbage bags, thus exposing the solid waste which exudes foul odour and contaminates the neighbourhood. This situation had been more intense during the MCOs whereby council trash collection schedules changed due to limited number of workers permitted to work to safeguard their health.

Waste management at infancy stage

Waste management in Malaysia is still in the developing stage and much of the municipal waste like used food packaging usually ends up in the gazetted landfills. The excess food packaging waste will be disposed through incineration. Consequently, air and water pollution will increase as the by-product of the incineration leaking from the landfills through water or soil or air to the neighbourhood.

Most restaurant owners are slowly changing their packaging to more sustainable materials made from biodegradable, disposable and 100 per cent paper but, if the disposal infrastructure is still at the infancy stage, it would be impossible to handle the excessive accumulation of packaging waste besides burning it.

Overall, food packaging waste is not a new problem just in Malaysia. The whole world is still combating this problem with heavy investment. The problem was aggravated when the pandemic struck and the food delivery services became the only safe option for the people and restaurants.

Need to discard trash responsibly

Nevertheless, this problem will begin shrinking when all the parties – customers, restaurant owners and local authorities – are able to play their respective roles as responsible partners.

Malaysia needs more citizens who discard trash responsibly, an industry that packs food in more sustainable material containers and enough infrastructure to manage and dispose the garbage. With God’s will, as long as we try, the better result will be forthcoming, eventually.

-- BERNAMA

Dr Nur Hafizah Muhammad is a senior lecturer at the Faculty of Hospitality, Tourism and Wellness, Universiti Malaysia Kelantan (UMK).