The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has promoted on Monday the consumption of insects as a high-protein and low-fat food for people to fight against hunger, global warming, and pollution. Creating jobs for people is also another advantage resulting from the consumption of insects.
Nowadays, two billions of people eat insects mostly in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Eating insects is known as entomophagy. There are currently 1900 species of edible insects. Beetles and caterpillars are the most eaten insects. Bees, wasps, ants, grasshoppers, locusts, crickets, represent other popular insects which are eaten.
Insects contain good fats, minerals, and fibers. In fact, according to scientists, eating insects is as efficient as eating beef in that it gives the same amount of protein with less fat.
Also, while 2.2 pounds of insects needs 4.4 pounds of feed to be produce, we need 17.6 pounds of feed to produce the same amount of meat. Moreover, the majority of insects raised for food produce less greenhouse gases than animals.
People who sell insects can make money. For instance, four bottles of grasshoppers represent fifteen dollars in Africa. Furthermore, people pay high prices for some species of caterpillars in South Africa, and for some weaver ant eggs in Southeast Asia since they are considered delicacies.
Most insects are in forest environments, but experts see the possibility of farming insects, and especially to breed animals, in view of the fact that they are able to adapt easily in many environments from deserts to mountains. Farming insects has been already used for fish baits.
There is a four million dollars European Union funded research project which studies common houseflies to see if they can recycle animal waste too. Now, farmers use the aforesaid waste as fertilizer, and also pay someone to destruct it.
In some way, we already eat insects. For example, the cochineal, a scaled insect from Peru, is used to produce a red coloring put in a trendy Italian aperitif, and an international, and popular brand of strawberry yogurt. In addition, this kind of coloring is also used in pharmacy to color pills.
I am not really enthusiastic to the idea of eating insects. However, I am not against it if it can help to fight against hunger, global warming and pollution, and to create jobs. I think it is a good idea.
Source :
http://vitals.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/13/18232459-un-urges-eat-more-insects-seriously?lite
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-204_162-57584152/u.n-agency-urges-eating-insects-to-fight-world-hunger-malnutrition/
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