Rome Mayor Roberto Gualtieri has launched a new initiative aimed at reducing food waste in the city’s restaurants. The “Tenga il Resto” (Keep the Rest) project encourages restaurants to provide customers with recyclable aluminum trays, allowing them to take home any leftover food instead of discarding it.
The city’s goal is to promote concrete actions to combat food waste, and the initiative is a collaboration between Rome’s environment department and the CIAL consortium, which is responsible for the collection, recovery, and recycling of aluminum packaging. The project also has the support of trade associations whose members include restaurateurs.
Restaurants participating in the Tenga il Resto scheme will display a sign informing customers that the service is available on their premises. While the concept of doggy bags is common in many countries around the world, it has only recently begun to gain acceptance in Italy.
Attitudes towards doggy bags are slowly changing in the country, and earlier this year, the center-right Forza Italia party filed a bill to make doggy bags compulsory in Italy’s restaurants, describing the practice as a “mark of positive civic sense.”
The Tenga il Resto initiative is a step towards reducing food waste in Rome’s restaurants and promoting a more sustainable approach to dining out. By providing customers with the option to take home leftover food, restaurants can contribute to the fight against food waste while also encouraging a shift in cultural attitudes towards doggy bags in Italy.
