AMHERST — From vegetable cuttings to disposable yet biodegradable to-go containers, the University of Massachusetts Amherst sends 1,000 tons of waste each year to a composting farm in Belchertown.

But if a statewide plan to cut the amount of food waste going to landfills and harvest green electricity takes hold, that waste might get digested by microbes and converted to burnable gas and then electricity right on campus, said Ezra Small, the campus sustainability manager.

Gov. Deval L. Patrick’s administration proposed Wednesday a commercial food waste ban to take effect a year from now on July 1, 2014. The ban, which does not need action by the state Legislature according to the state’s website, would require any entity that disposes of one ton of organic waste or more a week to donate or repurpose any usable food and ship the rest to an anaerobic digester facility, a composting operation like the one UMass uses now at the New England Small Farms Institute in Belchertown or to someone who will feed it to livestock.

Residential food waste is not included in the proposed ban but it would apply to supermarkets, restaurants, schools and colleges.

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