Photo Via Compass Group Canada

Winie Coulanges

Editor-in-Chief

In early April, Dawson received its platinum certification from Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE), meaning it’s a global leader in sustainability. In fact, Dawson is one of the 15 institutions in the world that is certified platinum. This isn’t surprising, given the many eco-friendly initiatives the school offers like gardens and compost bins. Eva Helmes, an environmental technician whose responsibility is to track waste at Dawson, describes the process : “We’re a Living Campus because of the gardens that we have; not only around the campus, but on the rooftop. We have seasonal gardens where we grow herbs and tomatoes and rooftop beehives. There is a water filtration system in the E parking lot between the B and the E wings and plants around the college. The vermicompost can be considered part of the Living Campus as well.” 

This certification had been in the works for a while.  Hermes says the process is very thorough since AASHE verifies each claim made in the report Dawson provided. In May of 2020, Dawson announced that their campus was fair trade, meaning all events catered by the cafeteria offered fair trade coffee and food sourced from 150km radius. Being a zero waste school has also been a badge of honour that Dawson has worn for many years. In fact, the college encourages faculty and students to make sure their events are eco-friendly by providing a Zero Waste checklist on their website. On April 4th, The Plant got the chance to see a medium-sized book of food that was destined to be thrown out at the end of the day. The box contained various items including pastries, onion rings, pasta salad, chickpea salad, and sushi (pictured below). While a majority of the items were expiring over the weekend, some of the items were still good until Monday. Jake, a 19 year old student, had been given the box because he had a good relationship with the cafeteria staff. Afterwards, he decided to distribute the food to unhoused people around the campus. Upon hearing this, Helmes said“ What we define waste is a variety of things and our goal is to keep things out of landfill. Things in landfill can affect not only the land but the water source as well. So that food being distributed is fulfilling the food’s purpose. It’s feeding people, it’s being used, it’s not being wasted. But we are not aware of what Chartwells does.” While it’s true that the food did not end up in a landfill, this doesn’t erase the fact that originally the food was going to end up in the garbage. This begs the question, how does the cafeteria fit into Dawson’s 2024-2029 mission of sustainability which includes goals such as diverting 90% of waste away from landfills and attracting 1,000 species in a 1,000 days? 

Chartwells (the company that is responsible for the cafeteria) is an independent contractor and The Plant tried to obtain an interview with the manager of Facilities & Management responsible for the waste portion of the contract with Chartwells but was unsuccessful.

Other educational institutions, like York University, offer a detailed overview of food waste within their cafeterias on their website. However, the relationship between Dawson’s Living Campus and Chartwells is unclear. On one hand, the Office of Sustainability is responsible for the sale of fair trade coffee and chocolate in the cafeteria yet they don’t have information on if the cafeteria is disposing unsold food in a sustainable manner, for example in compost bins. If the cafeteria disposes of a large quantity of food on a weekly basis, why don’t they follow the model of other businesses like Metro INC, who markdown items when they are close to their best-by date to reduce food waste?

Maybe the answer lies in the many controversies of Chartwells, a company under the global umbrella of the Compass Group. CBC reported that Chartwells exposed inmates to listeria in Ontario’s correctional facilities. In Europe, Reuters reported that they found small traces of horse DNA in their beef burgers without proper disclosure. In the early 2010s, Jeffrey Mills, executive director of the Office of Food and Nutritional Services for DC Public Schools sued Chartwells for overpricing their school meal programs and serving expired food. Phillips and Cohen, the law firm that handled the lawsuit, settled for 19.4 million dollars. In 2021, the BBC found that Chartwells grew their profit margins by 2.1 percent while being accused of distributing unsatisfactory meals to children who were entitled to free food support. One mother claimed that the food parcel she received was advertised to be worth 30£ but only contained about 5£ worth of food. 

With Chartwells’ blatant disregard for wellbeing for all, they may be out of place on Dawson’s Campus