The launch of a new campaign promoting the use of food waste to feed pigs brought back some happy childhood memories.

The Pig Idea, being masterminded by food waste expert Tristam Stuart with chef Thomasina Miers, wants to lift the ban on feeding swill to pigs which was introduced in the wake of the foot and mouth outbreak of 2001.

Readers of a certain age will recall that recycling food waste is not a new idea. When I was at school, pig swill bins behind the kitchens were an accepted part of dealing with leftovers from school dinners. The farmer used to come and collect it daily basis – an unmissable event for a kid brought up on bedtime tales of red tractors.

Today most food waste is composted, unless foxes get to your bin first, but by far the most efficient thing to do is to feed it directly to pigs.

Governments in countries like Japan, South Korea, China and many US states recognise that the best way of turning food waste into a valuable resource is to feed it to livestock.

The Japanese government supports pig farmers who want to use food waste as feed. The resulting pork is sold at a premium as eco-pork.

In the UK, thousands of pig farmers have gone out of business because of global price rises for wheat, maize and soy – the principal ingredients of pig and chicken food.

The farmers are competing with people who buy these grains for their own consumption. So we have a mad system in which pigs are being fed food that humans could eat.

Much of this is soy, grown in the Amazonian basin, where rainforest is being cut down at an alarming rate. Around 97 per cent of global soy production is used for animal feed – and Europe now imports 40 million tonnes of soy meal a year.

The Pig Idea says the amount of land needed to produce soy for the European market since the ban is roughly equal to the area of Brazilian forest lost since that date.

When we used to keep pigs (before the foot and mouth outbreak) we had the idea of recycling food waste from local pubs. The landlords jumped at it. The result was daily trips with wheelbarrows full of leftover veg and salad.

We also found cutlery in the recycled grub which, although they were clever, we thought our pigs would never learn to use.

So it was ‘finders-keepers’ and, after a couple of sessions in the dishwasher, the knives, forks and spoons proved perfectly serviceable.

There was one thing in the swill which our pigs just would not eat – lemon slices. Even the chickens turned their beaks up at them. Ponder that conundrum next time you are enjoying a nice gin and tonic.