The agreement with On.perfekt was not terminated, but rather expired and was not renewed. That is the response from Environment Minister Serge Wilmes to a parliamentary question tabled by Democratic Party MPs André Bauler and Luc Emering. The reason, according to the minister, is that the fight against food waste falls under the remit of the Ministry of Agriculture, in line with the division of portfolios within the government.
As On.perfekt already explained to RTL at the end of August, funding will still be provided for a transition phase running until the end of this year. That has also been confirmed by the Ministry of the Environment. The cooperative was also alerted to the possibility of applying for funding from the Ministry of Agriculture, Wilmes writes. Marie-Anne Diesel, a committee member at On.perfekt, said in August that the cooperative had received written confirmation on 25 June that the convention would be extended, only to be told two weeks later that this would not, in fact, be happening.
The ministry was unable to answer the MPs' question on whether staff had had to be let go as a result of the convention lapsing. Diesel, for her part, said that one person who had left the cooperative would not be replaced. The person in question had been carrying out awareness-raising work in schools.
On.perfekt is a cooperative that collects and resells imperfect food, both through its shop in Marnach and via vegetable boxes. Its employees also carry out awareness-raising work in schools and at events, focused on the fight against food waste.
