JEDDAH, 14 November 2004 — A regulation from the Jeddah Municipality makes it obligatory that restaurants, hotels and even small retail cooked food outlets should recycle their used oils.
The oils, to be used once and dumped in containers the next day will be delivered to or collected by one of four municipality-approved contractors and be used in part for the manufacture of soap, said the Deputy Mayor for Services Jamal Azhar.
Apart from the benefits of recycling waste oil into a useable product, the project hopes to raise the health standards of commercial kitchens by ensuring the use of clean oil daily and reduce the risk of disease. Some studies indicate that cooking oils used repeatedly over extended periods can be carcinogenic.
Hani Abdulwahab from the Al-Bilad Hotel confirmed that they had followed the procedure for well over a year.
“We only use the oil once anyway,” he said. “We separate out the oils — for example that used for French fries, fish and others — so that the collection and recycling companies can use the oils with least smell for recycling into soap and the others for different purposes.”
Jamal Azhar added that the regulation for careful disposal and recycling of waste oil also applies to small businesses that offer oil-changes for vehicles. There had, he said, been good cooperation between the recycling companies, the caterers and oil-change businesses and the municipality.
Jimmy Ramanjam, the assistant food and beverages manager for the Intercontinental Hotel here, said that the hotel policy on cooking oil had been set at three days maximum use, well within safety margins.
“Over a year ago we reduced even this to one time use,” he said, “Well ahead of the regulations. It costs a little more, but when the regulations became mandatory, we were ahead.”
The new regulations also cover the disposal of solid and organic waste. Businesses are required to have contracts with one of 12 local companies appointed by the municipality for transporting and getting rid of commercial waste.
This new directive applies to the entire Kingdom with the municipality supervising and making sure that the markets, car shops, hotels are signed up with the “waste” companies.
The municipality expects that violations of the new regulations will generate an extra income in fines of millions of riyals a day; some estimates are as high as SR64 million over the country as a whole. They expect violators to include industry and commerce, hotels, furnished apartments.
Single waste-violation fines for companies that don’t have contracts with waste-disposal companies range between SR500-SR1,000. Fines also apply to the waste-disposal companies who have contracts with businesses and fail to meet them. Failure to measure up to their contracts could end in heavy financial penalties or even closure.
Jamal Azhar admitted that enforcement could be a real problem. Large hotels and restaurants build the costs into turnover; small businesses working on lean margins and low turnover will be tempted to take a chance with the regulations to economize. With over 64,000 commercial establishments to monitor, the challenge to municipal regulators is huge.
Azhar added that the recycling initiative was to run for two years before being evaluated for its effectiveness.
