Recently, I’ve seen a huge influx of brown marmorated stink bugs in my house - if you’re from northeast America, you might be familiar. They’re big, brown, smelly, and everywhere, but luckily harmless, apart from making you feel a bit queasy. And they’ve got me thinking about bugs in a surprising way.
As the novel coronavirus takes over the world, we’ve recently been rethinking some of the ways society functions, with every industry in our economy taking a hit - the food industry included. Unconventional problems require unconventional solutions, and the answer to our growing food crisis, and possibly centuries of starvation throughout the world, might be found in a surprising place: bugs as food.
As gross as it sounds, bugs are already decently common food sources in some other countries; you might find fried queen ants dipped in chocolate on sale in Brazil, or a street food vendor in China selling fried bee pupae. And you might already be eating some bugs yourself: the US Food and Drug Administration allows for 30 or more insect parts in every bar of chocolate.
Bugs, no matter how gross they are, might be a key part in fighting climate change. The meat industry is undeniably harmful to the environment; in the last decade, they have been questioned for being responsible for at least 20 percent of manmade greenhouse gas emissions. Bugs, on the other hand, provide a much more viable source of protein. They don’t use much water, can be grown in small spaces, can be grown on organic waste, need much less food than animals, and have a fast life-cycle. All of these factors combined make them a much more sustainable food source than meat.
Not only that, but they’re surprisingly good for you. According to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, more than 1900 insect species are edible, and many are rich in protein and good fats and high in calcium, iron and zinc.
So. Bugs. They just might be the solution to world hunger, and a key step in saving our planet. If we can ever get over how gross they are, that is.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/25/health/insects-feed-save-planet-wellness/index.html
http://www.fao.org/3/i3253e/i3253e.pdf
https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2020/06/grubbing-bugs-can-we-get-over-the-ick-factor/
