Chinese restaurant scheme will reduce plastic and help hospice

Scheme to recycle plastic takeaway food containers launches with a fund raising night for Katharine House

A new initiative by a Banbury eatery is set to reduce the amount of plastic it uses whilst raising money for a local charity at the same time. PawPaw on Bridge Street is launching a scheme whereby they will donate money to the Katharine House Hospice for every one of their plastic takeaway containers that customers return.

To celebrate the scheme launching the popular Chinese food outlet are holding a special night tomorrow where they will donate 20% of all their food sales (before VAT) to Katharine House.

PawPaw uses up to 3,600 plastic food containers each week across its three branches. As part of the new initiative, each one that is returned when a customer orders their next meal will be checked to see if it is in a good condition. Those that are will be washed, sanitized and reused. The restaurant will donate 5 pence for every retuned item to the Katharine House Hospice, which is the amount they will save by not having to buy a new container.

James Duong, PawPaw’s owner said: “We’ve just had COP26. Through the summer we’ve seen parts of the Greek islands burning and in Asia they’re struggling with rising water levels.

”With climate change people are thinking ‘with my one bag it won’t make any difference’, but they all count. If businesses all took a little step to using less and recycling a little bit more, we’ll actually reduce our carbon footprint bit by bit.”

Containers can either be returned when a customer collects their next meal, or handed to the delivery driver.

James felt it was important to support the Katharine House as he knows the value of their service after his sister passed away. He said: “I have first hand experience of how much care, love and devotion that every single team member of the Katharine House Hospice puts into that organisation.

“Our initiative will give reoccurring revenue to them for as long as its practical for both of us.”

To launch the scheme PawPaw will donate 20% of all their pre-VAT food sales to Katharine House tomorrow (December 10). Orders can be placed via the PawPaw website here.