9. Why are cucumbers wrapped in plastic?

James Piper: Hello. Welcome to Talking Rubbish, a weekly podcast delving deep into the world of recycling and discussing the truth behind snappy headlines and one sided stories. In this episode, we will discuss different types of plastic, find out why cucumber needs to be wrapped in plastic, whether pouches are rubbish or not. And we have a listener question about shredded paper. I'm James Piper, author of the rubbish book, and I'm joined by Robbie Staniforth, my far from rubbish friend. Good morning, Robbie.

Robbie Staniforth: Morning, James.

James Piper: Ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to grumpy Robbie. Oh, don't laugh. No one's going to believe me now.

Robbie Staniforth: Oh, no, I am feeling a bit grumpy this morning.

James Piper: I literally walked in and said, how are you feeling, Robbie? And you were like, oh, I'm not on for this. Here we are. You're going to do it?

Robbie Staniforth: I'm going to, yeah. Push on through and try to show some resilience to our listeners out there.

James Piper: All in the name of the podcast. Thank you, Robbie. We really appreciate you coming on, even when you're feeling a bit tired and not really up for talking rubbers.

Robbie Staniforth: No. I'm hoping, as I said to you before we came on, that this is going to improve my mood. So over to you, James, to entertain me for the next half an hour, 45 minutes.

James Piper: I'll do my very best. But remember, you're the funny one, so you're meant to be entertaining me.

Robbie Staniforth: I think that was one review that said I was the funny one. I think the other hundred probably say something different.

James Piper: You have no idea how many listeners we have.

Robbie Staniforth: I don't. How many reviews do we have, James? Do you have reviews? We have lots of reviews.

James Piper: I think we're on, like, 40. do you know what? This is such a great call up because you're meant to do all this stuff at the beginning and we never do. So let's just say if you're on Spotify or Apple now, just, like, pause us for a sec. We'll wait. We'll just wait a minute and, just load up your Spotify and apple and just go into the review section and leave us a little five star review. And again, as we said in episode one, if it's one star, please email us so that it doesn't skew our stats. Right, Robbie, let's just.

Robbie Staniforth: One to four stars, give us an email. Five stars. Put it in a public forum.

James Piper: Yes.

Robbie used Taylor Swift's bracelet to weigh coffee scales

Okay. Let's pause there for a few seconds. Let people do that. And Robbie, I have big news. this has been such a saga. My coffee scales. You know, we've talked about coffee scale.

Robbie Staniforth: Yes. The pods to weigh the pods and the coffee grounds. Yep.

James Piper: So I bought some coffee scales for episode two to weigh coffee in, and we talked about it so much because then I used it. What did I use it to weigh? Oh, the Taylor Swift, the batteries bracelet.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, that was it.

James Piper: And then, literally this week, those scales ran out of batteries. And because, I've been using them too much for the podcast and brilliant news, I used the button cell batteries I'd taken out of the Taylor Swift bracelet and put them in the scales. Oh, wow.

Robbie Staniforth: That's reuse in action. Well done, Taylor. She's really forward thinking about the redeployment of those batteries in the bracelet.

James Piper: Absolutely. I'm so grateful. Thank you, Taylor. We know she's listening. Well, I'm sure she's listening.

So, additions and corrections. Keep us updated on your shopping and corrections

So, additions and corrections. I've got one edition, which our friend of the podcast, Ian, wrote in to say he'd been to Audi in Harrogate, and the guy at the self scan checkout was handing out bags for life as if there's no tomorrow. That's a, direct quote.

Robbie Staniforth: And. Sorry, what does he mean by that? As in, you must take one of these. Why don't you buy one type thing?

James Piper: Just giving out bags for life in Audi and Harrogate. And following our carrier bag, episode four, Ian was pretty dismayed by that, so he wanted to share that with us. Okay, thanks, Ian. Keep us updated on your shopping and corrections.

James: Corrected two things from last week's rubbish podcast

I've got two corrections, but I'm correcting myself here because I was literally listening to our Taylor Swift episode as I came in, and I thought, there's two things that I need to say here. First one is, I said something like, they take the lids off because people might chuck the lids. And I actually was speaking to someone. It was actually my brother in law went to a football match shortly after we recorded the Taylor Swift episode, where they did the same thing. They took the lids off. And it occurred to me, and actually, it was talking to a couple of people as well, I realised that actually, it's the throwing of the bottles with lids on, with liquid in that gets them further. So it's not throwing the lids around, it's throwing the bottles that are full of liquid. And then that got me thinking, which would I rather be hit in the head with? A full bottle that's really heavy, that's got its lid on, or a bottle that's full of some liquid that I don't know what it is. And I don't know which one I would rather have flying around.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, no, I think you'd rather take the blow and not be doused in miscellaneous, mysterious liquid. But, yeah, thanks for drawing that to our attention, James. Lovely stuff.

James Piper: Just correcting myself. And the other one was I said maybe they should give out branded cups as part of the cost. And I actually went to a wash facility this week where they wash, cups for

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James Piper: events. And I realised, actually, we talked about in the Ocado episode, we talked about fugly packaging and I realised if you give out branded cups, people keep them. Whereas if you make those cups a bit boring and rubbish, people are more likely to give them back after the event. And then going to this wash facility made me realise how easy they then are to wash and get back out there. So this wash facility was quite clear that we should really be using unbranded cups. So I'm just correcting myself there.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah. And also that they're tied to an event, aren't they, if they're branded. So it means, you know, they can't be used at, a Taylor Swift concert. And then the next one I'm going to pick, Coldplay. Are they the next biggest act in the world?

James Piper: Yeah, possibly. Let us know if you have any additions or corrections on anything we said by emailing us at, ah, talkingrubbishpodcastmail.com or follow us on social media where we'reubishpodcast. I've actually just joined threads as well, so we're everywhere, like. And I'm really enjoying threads. It's really, I'm really not enjoying x.

Robbie Staniforth: What's threads?

James Piper: Oh my goodness. Okay, well, it's like the Instagram version of Twitter or X.

Robbie Staniforth: The Instagram version of Twitter. Okay, so what, it's more like text orientated or something, is it?

James Piper: And it's very polite. You literally come in and say, hello, I'm all about recycling. And all these people have suddenly followed us and waved at us and given us recommendations. It's really nice.

Robbie Staniforth: Oh, okay. So maybe, my start on social media should be my migration from LinkedIn should be onto threads, should it?

James Piper: I think so, yes. And Robbie, I've been working to make it really easy to contact us, so I've actually. We've even got WhatsApp now, so people can WhatsApp us if they've got a rubbish or not. I know, I know. I didn't tell you this. I didn't tell you I was doing this, but I went and got an esim and set up a WhatsApp. So if you're on our Instagram or Facebook, I suspect there'll be a link there for our WhatsApp number. and you can just message us. It's probably the easiest way to get. Get in contact.

Robbie Staniforth: Wow. Okay, great. So you're going to be receiving messages from people with these rubbish or not questions.

James Piper: Yeah, maybe some gifts as well. I would enjoy that rubbish process. So every week we take the opportunity to talk about recollection, sorting and recycling of waste. And, we're into the famous plastic. Everyone's favourite.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, well, everyone's least favourite, isn't it?

James Piper: Oh, everyone's least favourite.

There are seven types of plastic and we thought it might be worth discussing

Okay, well, let's spend some extra time on plastic. Normally we sort of do the sorting and recycling across two episodes for each of the materials. So we've done paper and cardboard, glass, aluminium. But actually, plastic is way more complicated than that and we'll talk about this a lot. But plastic gets a bad rep because it's used in so many ways. So if you think about aluminium, you think about an aluminium can. If you think about cardboard. Think about a cardboard box. Think about plastic. Sort of think about a plastic bottle, but then you go, oh, what about a yoghurt tub? Or what about, I can't think of anything else.

Robbie Staniforth: A salad bag, a bread bag.

James Piper: Lovely. Some flexible plastic. So what about the bags? bottles, tubs.

Robbie Staniforth: People also think of, like, seats and stuff, don't they? It goes well beyond packaging. when you start thinking about that, it's like, you know, plastic casing around stuff. It's kind of everywhere, isn't it?

James Piper: Absolutely. So there's seven types of plastic. in the main, there's, I mean, lots of plastics and I think number seven is just other to catch everything else. So, yeah, there are seven types of plastic and we thought it might be worth just going through those, split this across two episodes. So we'll just do four today, three next week. So hopefully that will get people returning. Will that get people returning? You'll be like, oh, I must hear what the other three types of plastic are. Is that what we're going to hear?

Robbie Staniforth: Oh, mate, that's one of. One of our best cliffhangers so far. Sure.

James Piper: Can we. Right, can we get the producers to add in, like an EastEnders doof doof at the end of the four and then we'll just have like a robbie. Is this cheering you up?

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, it has cheered me up immensely, actually. Just the idea of the subject that we are trying to make exciting. The first four types of plastic.

James Piper: Okay. So I think it's worth. Whenever I seen, like, Americans talk about plastic, because we've got quite a few american listeners. Whenever I've seen them talk about plastic, they always talk in numbers. So, you know, they say, like in New York, you can recycle one, four and five. I think they might do this in the UK a little bit, but I certainly see it a lot in America where all recycling comms seem to be the numbers. Oh, really? Yeah. And that's linked to these seven types of plastic. So the number is actually printed on the plastic. I'm looking around to see if I've got any.

Robbie Staniforth: Oh, yes, I know the thing you mean.

James Piper: Here we go. Look, I've got a bottle right here, and it's a, surface and wipe board cleaning fluid, because I'm in the office and printed on the bottom of it is a number two in a little triangle with the words

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James Piper: or the letters HDPe, which we're going to talk about in a second. So that is what you're looking for. When you've got plastic, you'll be able to find a little triangle on it. It will have a number in it. And that's the type of plastic that we're talking about. This is like top of the pops. We're in at one number. one.

Robbie Staniforth: I don't think they start at one. James, have you ever watched top of the pops?

James Piper: Can't start at seven because I haven't got the notes for five, six and seven.

Robbie Staniforth: Oh, God. Okay. We've totally messed this up.

James Piper: I actually. Well, I could do it from memory, but we'll, yeah, in at one. We'll start at one.

Robbie Staniforth: Sort of like top of the bops, but actually nothing like how they do that.

James Piper: Yeah, and it is number one because it's the plastic that's everywhere and that we talk about the most probably.

R PET stands for recycled. So often you will see things like Coca Cola use recycled pet

So, number one pet. And I'm not going to go through what pet stands for. polyethylene something. But, because I haven't written it down. But also, it's just like we all talk about pet, don't we?

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, pet as well. Sometimes it gets not to be confused with the furry things at home.

James Piper: I cat. Yes. So we've talked about pet a lot. pet. I always say pet. You're getting me to pet now.

Robbie Staniforth: Pet. R pet.

James Piper: Oh, no, I do say, r pet.

Robbie Staniforth: So, yeah, when we don't say RPet, do you?

James Piper: Yeah, that's true. So.

Robbie Staniforth: And that, that's a little r for recycling. Guys. We should probably at least explain that bit of the acronym. But PET or PET.

James Piper: So r in R PET stands for recycled. So often you will see things like Coca Cola say we use 100% r peT, and that means that they're using recycled pet in their plastic bottles. And if it's 100%, their whole bottle is made of recycled pet. So that's what RPET means. But pet, one of the most common plastics, it's used in drinks, bottles primarily. So whenever you buy a soft drink or a bottle of water or something like that, it's extremely likely to be Peter. and really the only other place, it's a type of, polyester pet. That's the kind of group of plastics that it sits in. And often you will see, I don't know if you've seen it, Robbie, but you will see clothing that says, I used to be a plastic bottle or recycled plastic bottles. And that's because once you extrude a bottle and you get the pet out, you can turn it into clothing.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah. And quite a lot of like, fleeces, I see with recycled polyester in these used to be a plastic bottle. We really should, And I'm googling it now we know what the acronym is. But try get the pronunciation correct.

James Piper: Okay.

Robbie Staniforth: Polyethylene. So that's the pe terephthalate.

James Piper: and that is why I didn't say it, because it's got like a ph and a th next to each other, hasn't it? Or.

Robbie Staniforth: Okay, this isn't your first rodeo, James. I've gone and embarrassed myself there.

James Piper: Say it.

Robbie Staniforth: That's made me grumpy again.

James Piper: Say it again. Say it again. For the listeners at home.

Robbie Staniforth: Oh, no, I'm really polyethylene terephthalate.

James Piper: I bet you're glad we didn't use that as the email address.

Robbie Staniforth: I'd have no chance. we should really get the, phonetic pronunciation from Wikipedia or something and see what it actually says.

High density polyethylene is widely recycled because of milk bottles

James Piper: Okay, in at two. So we've done one pet. In at two, we've got hdPe, which is much easier to say. So I'll do this one. It's high density polyethylene.

Robbie Staniforth: Ah, I should have chosen Hdpe to pronounce.

James Piper: Absolutely. And polyethylene, is a group of plastics itself, like polyester. And you get two types. We'll come on to the other type in a second. But number, two is high density polyethylene. And high density just basically means it's a rigid plastic. So it's quite easy to think about, obviously, high density, you can think, okay, it's got more molecules, so it's going to be rigid compared to low density, which is the one that's more flexible. So what we're talking about here, and we talked.

Robbie Staniforth: James, you lost me at molecules.

James Piper: It's my biology degree kicking in. So if we think about, we talked about milk bottles, they're made of HDPe and we've talked before about how the lids of milk bottles are normally made of the same material as the bottle itself. So that's both high density polyethylene, but you would also get things like shampoo, detergent bottles, apparently surface and white ball cleaning fluid, because that's the one I have in front of me.

Robbie Staniforth: There we go. Very good.

James Piper: So that's hdPe. So it's a rigid plastic, widely recycled. largely, widely recycled because of milk m bottles. We all buy them. And so councils have put in place, ways of getting number two.

Robbie Staniforth: I don't buy them. James, let's have a little call back to the refill episode where I declared publicly I'm a glass bottle guy for.

James Piper: Milk and your yoghurt, if I remember right.

Robbie Staniforth: And my yoghurt, the kefir. Correct.

James Piper: So posh. Great. And the good thing about HDPE is it can be recycled into food grade because its use, you know, in milk bottles is quite focused. So it's good that it can be recycled the same as Pt. It can be recycled and used, for food products because milk bottles can be turned back into milk bottles.

Robbie Staniforth: So R PET and R HDPE, as in

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Robbie Staniforth: using the recycled equivalent to make new containers, that's pretty high volume stuff. Quite prevalent in the UK and around the world in terms of those getting recycled back into new containers.

PVC is both a rigid and flexible plastic

James Piper: Yeah, that's it in at three. Number three is PVC, which stands for, polyvinyl chloride, I think. I haven't got this in my notes.

Robbie Staniforth: I should have taken that one as well because I knew that too.

James Piper: Did you? Did I get it right?

Robbie Staniforth: Damn. Why did I choose pet?

James Piper: Did I get it right?

Robbie Staniforth: You did, yeah. Polyvinyl chloride.

James Piper: Perfect. And polyvinyl chloride. PVC is both a rigid and flexible plastic. So its rigid version we see basically in the house. So things like pipes, doors, windows, should have heard of, you know, PVC door frames and window frames. Interestingly, the, vinyl records actually get their name from the p. Why would they get my name from the p? Vinyl records that was staying vinyl records get their name from the van in PVC.

Robbie Staniforth: Okay, so that's poly, is it?

James Piper: Great. Let's move on from that. and the flexible form is mostly found in cling film matches. And this isn't great because, basically pvc, the c obviously stands for chloride, which is chlorine. And when you try and recycle it, it can release chlorine gas. So in its rigid form, it's fine, because builders can take out pipes, doors and windows and they can send those off to specialist recyclers. But in cling film, if you're then trying to put that, into a flexible plastic scheme, that's not going to be great. So lots of retailers now will sell non PVC cling film and it will say it on the box. So if you're in the shop and you're buying cling film, just look out for non PVC cling film.

Robbie Staniforth: So we're endorsing that. Are we wearing the talking rubbish seal of approval? Try buy cling film if you need to use it. There is beeswax wrap alternatives. try and get the stuff without chlorine in it.

James Piper: Do you use beeswax? I'm sure you do.

Robbie Staniforth: Of course I do, James.

James Piper: Okay. And in at four, we've got LDPE, which is low density polyethylene. So this is the opposite, or I don't even know if it's the opposite. It's just the partner to HDPE. So HDPE, yes.

Robbie Staniforth: Fewer molecules, I know from my research.

James Piper: Absolutely, absolutely. And that's what makes it flexible, because it's got. I don't.

Robbie Staniforth: Is it fewer molecules? Probably molecules that are small, spaced apart.

James Piper: Yeah, we're saying m that as if it's true. I'm just saying that's how I remember it. I don't know if scientifically this is true, but HDPE, which is number two, is the rigid stuff, and LDP, which is number four, is the flexible stuff. So it's also part of the polyethylene family. And this is the kind of thing where you've got food bags, salad bags, carrier bags, bread bags, all those kind of things. Anything.

Robbie Staniforth: Anything, baggy.

James Piper: Anything baggy. Yeah. That's nice. And obviously, we've talked before on the podcast about this being collected from the curbside for 2027, but at the moment, most supermarkets, certainly large ones, you can take LDPe back to in the UK. So have a look for those flexible recycling points. And even if it just says carry a bag on the. But it just says carry a bag recycling. You could put any LDP in there.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, if recycling's your bag, take them back to supermarkets.

James Piper: Oh, my God, we've unleashed, we've reversed grumpy Robbie into punny Robbie, and it's.

Robbie Staniforth: Just too much and it's not funny. It's just punny.

James Piper: Trash talk.

Robbie: You're wrapping cucumbers in plastic to reduce food waste

So today, Robbie, we are asking the question, a question that I could not tell you how many emails we've had and, ah, messages. And I've put stuff up all over social and people always comment this question, why is my cucumber wrapped in plastic? And actually, just the other day I was on the tube and I could hear someone asking this question to their friend and I had to really bite my tongue not to turn around and be like, well, this is why. So we promised a cucumber episode in episode one, I think. So let's, let's do it, Robbie. A lot of these episodes are going to be series, I think my plan for episode eleven, because next week we've got an interview. the week after, we'll probably do some stuff on microplastics, and I suspect we'll do lots and lots of episodes on microplastics. We'll do lots and lots of episodes on refill. and we're probably going to do lots and lots of episodes about food waste because it's really interesting.

Robbie Staniforth: So let's just do not cucumbers then. Food waste, actually.

James Piper: Yeah. Well, obviously you're wrapping cucumbers. Well, not obviously, we'll talk about it in a bit. But you're wrapping cucumbers in plastic to reduce food waste. And so that is part of this theme.

Robbie Staniforth: I was just wondering if you could milk multiple episodes out of a cucumber. Milking a cucumber sounds

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Robbie Staniforth: awful. I'm on rocky terrain now.

Up to 40% of food produced globally ends up as waste

James Piper: Yes. Globally, believe it or nothing, up to 40% of food produced ends up as waste. That's crazy, isn't it?

Robbie Staniforth: That's shocking. That is absolutely shocking.

James Piper: It is a crazy number. And this actually could be as high as 10% of greenhouse gas emissions are linked to, that food waste, which is just unbelievable. If food waste were a country, Robbie, it would come third to the US and china in terms of carbon emission.

Robbie Staniforth: That's massive.

James Piper: Once you get past the farm, 70%. So once it's in the supermarket, 70% of, food waste is actually from the home, which is crazy. And in money terms, a family of four can waste up to 1000 pounds of food a year.

Robbie Staniforth: Really, when you read out these things, it's quite stark, isn't it? Like, food waste is one of these things that really doesn't get talked about nearly enough in the world of sort of sustainability environment. We're talking mostly about the recycling of packaging rather than the things it's trying to protect.

James Piper: Yes, and thank you to environmental charity rap, who we have to credit for a lot of this work because they do quite a lot in food waste and quite a lot on kind of wrapping vegetables and fruit. And we know quite a few of the guys from wrap. Listen, in fact, I was reliably informed because it's conference season. one of the wrap guys was going around promoting our podcast yesterday, which is really nice in one of the conferences.

Robbie Staniforth: very nice of them.

James Piper: I know. Yeah, I heard this. So, I know they're listening. And thank you guys for all your hard work on food waste because it is really interesting. And there was actually a report a couple of months ago. I think this was a wrap report. I actually haven't got that in my notes, but I think it was. That said, actually having food waste collections is one of the best ways to reduce food waste because once you have to put it out every week and you have it in a bag and you have it in a caddy and you have to put it out, you start going, wow, I'm throwing away so much food here. And I know, why am m I.

Robbie Staniforth: Filling up several caddies a week or whatever. I need to sort of. Yeah, stop wasting so much food.

James Piper: Yeah. Just walking in today, obviously, it's bin day. Happy bin day as always. and the foxes really like to get food waste. So actually I saw quite a few households food waste today because it was all over the street. And you know, I think we really need to solve that. I know Bristol have, better food waste caddies now, but a lot of people don't have them. They have the ones that foxes have learned how to open. So yeah, really important for councillors to implement food waste. That is a visual reminder for how much we're all wasting.

Robbie Staniforth: One of the big things, just like when we were talking about the coffee and the impact of the coffee pod versus the coffee itself, you have to think about the environmental impact of the food inside the container and that, actually the impact of the wrapping. So the plastic around it could be as low as 5%. So as you mentioned before, you know, that means that food waste is often a much bigger, environmental, problem than what it's wrapped in. Now, that's not to say that we shouldn't find ways of recycling the wrapping and the packaging that it's put into, but it's actually to look at it in the round. And so we always have to weigh up people buying stuff that isn't wrapped, but there will be damage because it's not wrapped and it's not protected, versus adding additional packaging to it so that food waste is prevented and less of it spoils on its journey from farm to our, homes.

James Piper: I actually went to Asda. It wasn't that recent, but a few months ago I went to Asda and I was doing a weekly food shop, and I was absolutely astonished at how few items I could buy loose in terms of fruit and veg. Literally everything was in multipacks. And I was very surprised at that, considering the size of a shop. And it really does depend where you're shopping, whether you have that ability to buy fruit and veg loose or nothing.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, no, I think, there was a trend a few years ago, and I know France are much better at this, aren't they? At like, selling loose produce and you actually like, pick up the individual apple or tomato and choose which one you want to, put into your, hopefully reusable bag to take home or into.

James Piper: Your shopping France band, wrapped around fruit and veg.

Robbie Staniforth: So what they've got is designated, floor space for, yeah, unwrapped fruit and vegetables.

James Piper: And we've talked about wrap. Wrap have done lots of reports on this. I'll put them in our link tree so that everyone can see them. I'll try and just put all the reports on there. But really they made three recommendations, when it comes to reducing food waste. So they wanted supermarkets to sell items loose. They want to remove date labels. So that's the best before date because, lots of people, it's actually around 10% of people, which is probably less than I thought, actually. But 10% of people use those used by dates or, sorry, best before dates. Use

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James Piper: by dates. More important, they use the best before date when deciding whether to eat a product or not. So they don't look at it and go, oh, that's still okay, I can eat it. They go, oh, it's past its date, I can't eat it. I think 10% is actually quite low, but it's still important to review removing that because 10%, when we're talking about this significant amount of food waste, is obviously a significant number.

Robbie Staniforth: I think that date label stuff, it's less, it's probably less used for fruit and veg because you can actually look at the thing and people know what spoilt fruit and veg looks like. Whereas if it's something like, you know, processed foods or something that's in a wrap, you know, ready meal or whatever, you're probably more likely you, like, have no idea. You might not be able to spot the mould, but it's spoilt and gone off and therefore the date label is important.

James Piper: Yeah. So just, three things. So sell loose, remove the date labels where it's not a safety hazard, so where it's best before, and provide guidance on refrigeration. So explain to people that putting things in the fridge will make them last longer. So if we just tackle each of those, if we start with sell loose. So again, Rapp wrote that if all apples, bananas and potatoes were sold loose, so just those three things, apples, bananas and potatoes, 60,000 tonnes of food waste could be saved.

Robbie Staniforth: I.

James Piper: And the plastic packaging use would reduce by 8800 tonnes. I mean, that is just astonishing. Three simple items, apples, bananas, potatoes, things that you could definitely just sell loose, would save 60,000 tonnes of food waste and 8800 tonnes of plastic.

Robbie Staniforth: And why is that?

James Piper: Because people buy more than they need. They buy a bag of potatoes and they use half of them for their meal and then they go, oh, and they forget about the other one.

Robbie Staniforth: Oh, I see. So what it's sort of saying is it's not about the protecting the food, it's about buying what you need.

James Piper: Well, I think it's a bit of both. they're the same thing. Right. If you buy what you need, then you cook with what you were aiming to cook with. And if you buy too much, it's going to go beyond its use by date, or sell by date and get ruined and you won't be able to eat it. So it's a bit of both if we go into removing date labels.

If we removed best before date from those items, that would save 50,000 tonnes

So, again, talking about five items instead of three. So this is apples, potatoes, bananas, cucumbers and broccoli. If we removed the best before date from those items, that would save around 50,000 tonnes of food wasted at my home each year.

Robbie Staniforth: Okay, so they're sort of recommending. Actually, there's no need for the date labels. People are sensible enough to know whether to eat something and whether it's good to eat or not.

James Piper: Yeah, I think that's right.

Robbie Staniforth: do you like a ripe banana, James? I must admit, I've got so many overripe bananas in my freezer ready to make banana bread at some time, because I can't. I can't tolerate a sort of brown banana myself.

James Piper: Ah, I'm the same. I was going to say we make a lot of banana bread in my home for exactly that reason. And then in terms of providing guidance on refrigeration, again, this is about storing fresh produce at an optimal fridge temperature, which is below five degrees. And if you store it below five degrees, it can increase shelf life threefold. the stat they gave, which I find astonishing, but I. I can definitely feel is true, because I have had apples in my fridge for a long, long time, and I'm still eating them. An apple can last 102 days in the fridge.

Robbie Staniforth: What?

James Piper: I don't know what happens on day 103. Suddenly it just goes, I've had enough.

Robbie Staniforth: I'm supposed to be storing my apples in the fridge.

James Piper: Well, this is it.

Robbie Staniforth: Like, something.

James Piper: A lot of fruit and veg will last longer in the fridge. So, I mean, typically, I tend to go on. The rule of whatever. Wherever I bought it from is where I store it, you know? So I don't store ketchup in the fridge because it's not in the fridge in the supermarket.

Robbie Staniforth: So if you bought it from Tesco's, you store it at Tesco's.

James Piper: Yes.

Robbie Staniforth: Anyway, so that, doesn't work, James.

James Piper: So, wrap actually presented, I think it's 21 items that should always be sold loose, or could always be sold loose, as in, there's no need for them to be wrapped in plastic. So do you want me just to read off 21? I can do it really fast.

Robbie Staniforth: Sure. And then I'll give you my favourite.

Robbie says broccoli loses 80% of its glucose when unwrapped

James Piper: All right. Okay. So in alphabetical order, apples, aubergines, avocados, bananas, broccoli, cabbages, carrots, garlic, ginger, lemons, limes, mangoes, onions, oranges, parsnips, pears, peppers, potatoes, squash, swede and salad. Tomatoes.

Robbie Staniforth: Very good. Wow, that was quick. And my favourite is broccoli. I'm a big broccoli guy. All the different types of broccoli for me. Well, let me tell you, purple sprouting, etcetera.

James Piper: Let me tell you about broccoli, Robbie. So if, stem, there are some products that if they're not wrapped in plastic, they can lose some of their nutritional value. And broccoli is one of those. So even though you could sell it loose, and I would argue, should be sold loose from a food waste perspective, I did find a study that said it would lose up to 80% of its glucose. I can't say it. I actually can't say it, Robbie. I'll hand over to you.

Robbie Staniforth: You've got one.

James Piper: What's that word?

Robbie Staniforth: Glucosinulates.

00:30:00

Robbie Staniforth: I don't think glucosinolates those are important to me.

James Piper: I think it's glucosinolates, which I, unfortunately have no idea what they are, but I think they're good for you. And if it's unwrapped, it could lose 80% of those things that might be good for you. So if you're interested to know what those are, ah, I will put a link tree up of what glucosinolates means and we can all decide whether that's good for us or not. But certainly this report said it's bad that it's losing 80% of them.

Robbie Staniforth: James, we haven't actually talked about cucumbers yet, mate. I'm not sure if you've noticed, but the cucumber section, we haven't mentioned a cucumber once.

James Piper: We have mentioned that. I'm sure we've said the word cucumber a few times, but yes, no, you're right. And this is like the Olympics episode where we said it was going to all be about data, and then we spent ages talking about, like the Olympics. So I completely agree.

Wrapping cucumbers in plastic extends shelf life by 60%, according to study

Let's move to cucumbers. So why are, ah, cucumbers wrapped in plastic? Well, with cucumbers, it's moisture loss that's the problem. Cucumbers are mostly water, and when you don't have them wrapped in plastic, you're going to start losing moisture and wrapping them in plastic. again, this is a report from new scientists. I think wrapping them in plastic showed that shelf life was extended by 60%.

Robbie Staniforth: Wow. Okay. So we're saying they lose less moisture when wrapped in plastic and therefore they won't spoil in the supermarket more readily. So they'll be there for a longer 60% longer and able to be bought by people coming in. And then likewise, when you take it home, it being stored in plastic will slow down the moisture loss. I know exactly what you mean, though, because those shrively cucumbers, I'm seeing it now, whenever you leave the sort of cut end exposed, it starts to shrivel and that must be the water coming out of it.

James Piper: Yeah. And we went through a bit of phase in the UK where, people who were anti plastic started unwrapping all of their stuff at the till and leaving the plastic for the supermarket. And it always struck me whenever I saw news reports about that, they were always doing it with a loaf of bread. and I thought, God, by the time you get home, that bread is going to be stale. You know, there is a need for that plastic. Unfortunately, unless you're making toast or something, in which case you're halfway there if you made it stale. But it's just sometimes plastic is important. And you'll notice cucumber is not on the list of 21 items that wrap, say, could be unwrapped. We talked earlier about plastic making up 5% of a product's impact. And actually, cucumber is tiny, and the plastic only makes 1% of its impact, so it's even less than our usual 5%. Plastic of a cucumber is 1% of its life cycle. And each cucumber that is thrown away is the equivalent of 93 plastic wraps. Okay, so every cucumber that's wasted.

Robbie Staniforth: Oh, that's a good stat.

James Piper: Is the equivalent of 93 bits of plastic around cucumber. And that means if you take all those stats and you work it all out, the net impact of wrapping is about five times that of not wrapping. So if you sold all your cucumbers unwrapped, that would be five times worse than selling them wrapped.

Robbie Staniforth: Okay. Wow. So don't waste your cucumbers. Leave them wrapped.

James Piper: Absolutely. Have we covered cucumbers enough there, Robbie, for you to be comfortable with? That section is complete.

Robbie Staniforth: You've saved it at the last there, buddy. Well done, m. Good, good.

James Piper: Rubbish or not. Hey, are we actually doing this? Well, that is going to really confuse. Look, that's going to really confuse our editor, who's going to be like, where do I put the music in? Because we always have a say, like, but rubbish or not, Robbie, we'll do that. And then we're going to pause. Let's get the music in. Ah. Now. Okay. Rubbish or not?

James: Let's talk about whether pouches can be recycled or not

So today we're going to do pouches. Now, the reason we're doing pouches is because next week, Robbie, we have an interview with Nick, who's the co founder of Bauer Collective. And Bauer collective are a really interesting company. They basically supply detergents, hand wash, things like that. So stuff stuff within your home, and they supply it. They give you a refillable bottle, and then they will send you a pouch, and within that pouch is the product for you to put into the bottle, and then they refill those pouches. So I thought, before we interview Nick, which is next week, let's talk about whether pouches can be recycled or not.

Robbie Staniforth: Perfect. And so these pouches are most commonly, polypropylene.

James Piper: Have we talked about polypropylene yet?

Robbie Staniforth: Spoiler for the next three.

James Piper: For next week, it's number five polypropylene, isn't it?

Robbie Staniforth: Oh, is it? Okay, well, find out what polypropylene is next week, guys. And low density polyethylene that we talked about, which was number four. Four, correct. Thanks for showing me the signal of four, James, because I'd forgotten, so often the pouch is foil lined, especially for things like pet

00:35:00

Robbie Staniforth: food, provides an extra barrier. but if they're a single material, which some of them are, so they're not, they haven't got multi layers to them. Basically, what you want to do is try and clean it out as much as you can and take them back to lots of retailers in the UK that have flexible plastic collections.

James Piper: Yeah, we're going to talk about labelling in the future, but, I'm sure some of you have noticed on your packaging, there will be a label that says recycle or do not recycle. And the rules on that label for flexibles are, that it has to be a mono material to get the recycling label.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah.

James Piper: The best way of checking whether your material is a single plastic or multiple plastic is to look for that label that says recycle on it and then you'll know that that is a monomaterial, that can be recycled rubbish question.

Family confused about whether shredded paper can be recycled or not

So, I met up with my family at the weekend and, my brother in law Nathan, who works for the police, m was asking about shredded paper. So they collect shredded paper. Obviously there's lots of confidentiality at the police, so they shred all of their paper. And he wanted to know whether this could be recycled because I know in one of your episodes, I think it might have been episode one. Actually. No, episode two, you said, keep paper as paper and try not to shred it. So that's kind of caused a bit of confusion amongst my family about whether shredded paper can be recycled or not.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, I suppose the clarification is it requires, like specialist collections, so the home collections that we have of paper. So your local council coming to collect your bin with paper in, they don't want shredded paper.

James Piper: Although I think you. I would put it in that home bin. So if I had shredded paper, it's just not preferable. Yeah, absolutely. If I had shredded paper, I would be putting it in there and hoping it got recycled. If I was doing that, I would make sure I was using the lid on the bin because I've got a lid for my paper bin because obviously one of the risks to having shredded paper is it's just going to get blown around the street and everyone's going to hate you. So best thing to do is put the lid back on the bin.

Robbie Staniforth: So, in terms of businesses like the police, they'll have a specialist, contractor, or like confidential waste partner. And I know we have one, in the offices that I've worked in previously who will definitely recycle it. So, the shredded, which is one supplier, others are available. Website says that 100% of it actually can get recycled. Final clarification, shredded paper is okay to recycle, but less preferable. So if it isn't confidential stuff, try and keep it as a flat sheet of paper.

Your family have started categorising your laughs because you laugh a lot

James Piper: Robbie. That brings us to the end of the episode. I, you know, I was a bit worried. You turned up, you were quite tired. I knew you were tired and you were grumpy. And I thought, oh, this is going to be the one. We're going to lose, listeners. Everyone's going to be like, Robbie's not as. Because, you were telling me your family have started categorising your laughs because you laugh a lot of they've started. Oh, you've got your. I don't know, what are the names for them?

Robbie Staniforth: There's a motley laugh, which is the breathy. Too breathy, apparently.

James Piper: Too breathy. I'm always worrying about my breathing too, so unfortunately, it's something we have to do, breathe. So that's okay. Which one's that? That's the motley laugh.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, that's the motley laugh. There's also the cackle there, which only comes out very occasionally, apparently.

James Piper: Do you know what I think? You think you laugh too much, but I reckon the listeners really like it. I reckon this is why they say, you know, they miss you when you're not here. And, I think it's because, I think it's because of that laugh.

Robbie Staniforth: That's all I'm here for.

James Piper: Great. So again, if you want to contact us, well, we can be found in so many ways now, so you can follow us.

Robbie Staniforth: Too many ways. Too many ways, James. Well, there's no such thing as too many ways, is it?

James Piper: Considering you haven't even got the logins for any of these things. I don't know how you can possibly say it's taking up your time. Because.

Robbie Staniforth: I'm more thinking. Is it confusing for the listener? I don't know.

James Piper: Every week I think every time I hear you laugh, I'm just going to cheque in now. I'm going to make little notes. Which laugh is this? So you can follow us on social media, which is obish podcast. And we can be found, I think, everywhere now we've got x Facebook, Instagram, TikTok threads, and you can email us@talkingrubbishpodcastmail.com. and if you're modern and don't want to use email, because we're all moving to WhatsApp and all sorts of things, we now have WhatsApp. And you can find that by going to either our Facebook or Instagram page. And there'll be a little button there that says WhatsApp. And if you hit that, you'll be able to send me gifts. So very cool.

Robbie Staniforth: Yes, we're on YouTube as well.

James Piper: We are on YouTube. Why are you doing this to me? Okay, we need to now explain this to the listeners. Your dad. Your dad emailed me not to talk about your laughs, but to say, why are you not promoting YouTube in your socials? And I was like, but if you're listening to that on YouTube, you're already on YouTube. I don't need to promote it. That's like saying, and you can listen to, us on Spotify

00:40:00

James Piper: and Apple. You're already listening. I don't need to promote it. So I am sorry, David Staniforf, but I do not feel like we need to promote YouTube.

Robbie Staniforth: Even though we just have.

James Piper: Great. What? Lovely. End of the episode. Thank you, Robbie. Thank you, everyone, for listening. We've had great fun today. And, we've converted Robbie from Grumpy Robbie into happy Robbie. So you can now go off and have a lovely day.

Robbie Staniforth: Bye.

00:40:25