Insects on the way to our plates

Suppose you're an insect for a few minutes.

You love extra-ripe fruits, the kind you find in the bins behind grocery stores. But then a truck arrives and takes your favorite rotting fruits and vegetables... to the bio-methanization plant. Now there's a serious, gluttonous competitor.

Changing insect species, you're now on the hunt for a beautiful beef carcass with no future. It's your specialty to detect and decompose carrion. A delight.

Everything is perfect, but there is a human regulation that says no animal intended for animal consumption should eat meat. Danger of transmission of prion diseases, like mad cow disease. So your future is in jeopardy. You won't be used to feed other animals at the end of your life.

These are the kinds of obstacles that stand in the way of insect breeding and processing for food, and that the Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences at Université Laval is working to reduce.

In addition to the oils and other substances produced by insects, there's also "frass", insect droppings, which represents an interesting potential.

"For every 100 tonnes of organic waste, 30 tonnes are converted into larvae and 70 tonnes into frass". Used as a soil improver, this manure is said to have antifungal factors against micropathogens, and could even boost plants' immune systems, according to work by Laval University's Department of Phytology."

Edible insects are all the rage. Hardly a week goes by without Grant Vandenberg receiving requests from graduate students here and abroad to take part in his research. They come from all over," he points out, "from the city, from the country; they're interested in what they're eating, and want to find ways to produce better.

For the full article: Marché des insectes comestibles: ça fourmille - Alexandra Perron

Illustration: jakajogja - DepositPhotos

Visit ulaval.ca