edible insects 

rick weiss, the director of sciline – an editorially independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit publication service for journalists and scientists – moderated a panel diving into the “future of food.” three experts on the subject spoke about the possibilities that roam beyond typical farming strategies that are more sustainable for the environment and potentially healthier for humans as well. 

dr. julie lesnik, an assistant professor in the department of anthropology at wayne state university, discussed the potential for mass-produced “edible insects” like crickets. crickets produce high levels of protein and even greater levels of calcium and iron compared to pigs and cows. these figures could vary depending on what a farmer feeds their livestock, lesnik said. but overall, insects pack high amounts of nutrients. 

large-scale farms producing a single crop depend on high amounts of fossil fuels, pesticides, and antibiotics, according to healthcare without harm. cows are placed in tight, cramped spaces on farms in order to produce as much meat as possible. this method, in which cows are raised for human consumption, raises concerns about the ethics of mass-producing meat, lesnik said. but crickets like close-knit spaces. 

“crickets already like dark, cramped spaces, and so they produce well. they’re happy in those spaces,” lesnik said. 

many countries already eat crickets and other insects but the u.s. has built up a stigma against them. lesnik said this stigma stems from colonial america when spanish sailors, like christopher columbus’ crew members, saw indigenous tribes eating bugs and viewed the behavior as “beastly.”

“if we’re going to change this attitude, we’ve got to change this idea of it as primitive and savage and allow younger generations to view insects differently and make this food source available to them,” lesnik said. 

cellular agriculture  

dr. kate krueger is a cell biologist and research director at new harvest – a nonprofit research institute that supports innovations in cultured meat and cellular agriculture. during krueger’s introduction to the panel, sciline’s weiss shared “how impossible burgers are, in fact, possible,” given the research krueger has conducted. 

she discussed the potential for cellular agriculture to substitute meat farming. cellular agriculture requires cells to be taken out of an organism, like a cow, and then grown onto a material called a scaffold. a scaffold allows the cells to grow up and be fed with nutrients and minerals in a bioreactor to make a steak-like product. technology for a steak-like product is at least 10 years away from coming to fruition, but products like meatballs, chicken nuggets, and burgers are closer to 5 years from creation, krueger said. 

however, the evolution of cellular technology is raising concerns for meat and poultry farmers. 

“there’s often kind of a push-pull in the field between a lot of enthusiasm about these new products and a lot of potential pushback from different people who grow these animals,” krueger said. 

the veganism movement, fueled by younger generations, has shown the benefits of meat alternatives. but if the world stopped eating meat altogether, serious economic and health repercussions would arise for millions of people, specifically in rural populations. many people rely on a meat-based diet to consume enough protein at cheaper prices. sources like beans and rice would not cut it, experts shared at the world economic forum. 

seaweed production 

dr. denise skonberg, associate professor of food science in the food and agriculture school at the university of maine, studies the benefits seaweed and algae can have on a human diet and the environment. her research focuses on the health benefits of seafood products like marine organisms. 

“there are thousands of species of seaweeds,” skonberg said, “and they vary a lot in terms of their appearance, their color, their nutritional value, their texture, and their flavor.”

she said the growing “foodie” movement in the united states – a movement that has sparked new types of cuisine – leads her to believe large-scale seaweed production would benefit the economy. the global seaweed economy amounted to $6 billion in 2018, mostly produced in china. skonberg said the warm waters on the east and west coasts could make ideal places for larger seaweed farms. 

however, the warming ocean temperatures raise a concern for the sustainability of these potential farms. skonberg said scientists are currently studying the genetic diversity of various kinds of seaweed and testing where various types of seaweed thrive in various climates. 

what’s next

the bottom line for all three experts? more research is needed. sustainable farming for crickets, cultured meats, and seaweed needs more engineering investment to understand if these options can help sustain humans and better the environment. however, all three experts stressed that the possibilities are out there for sustainable food, like increased health benefits for humans. 

now the funding and technology efforts must come together to make it happen. 

scientists describing a new species of ant, strumigenys ayersthey, have broken with conventional naming traditions and used the pronoun “they” instead of the traditional male or female form to promote nonbinary gender inclusivity.

the new ant, described in a recent paper in zookeys, was named after the late artist and human rights activist jeremy ayers. traditionally, a species named after a person would have an “i” appended at the end of the name for males, or “ae” for females; in this case, ayersi or ayersae. instead, the researchers went with ayersthey.

they did this to honor ayers and the large number of people who do not identify with either the male and female genders, according to study author douglas booher, a yale postdoctoral researcher, and co-author philipp hönle, a doctoral student at the technical university of darmstadt, germany.

“in contrast to the traditional naming practices that identify individuals as one of two distinct genders, we have chosen a non-latinized portmanteau honoring the artist jeremy ayers and representing people that do not identify with conventional binary gender assignments, strumigenys ayersthey,” the authors wrote in the study.

ayers was an eclectic artist, publishing photography books, authoring a column in andy warhol’s interview magazine, and writing lyrics for both r.e.m. and the b-52s. indeed, r.e.m. lead singer and songwriter michael stipe joined booher in writing the etymology section of the paper explaining the decision to use the pronoun “they” to honor the artist. ayers is remembered today as a fixture of the athens, georgia, art community, according to a local paper.

hönle first encountered the ant while working on his doctoral thesis at darmstadt, researching ant communities in the chocó area of ecuador. of the specimens he looked at, one stood out for its unique shiny exoskeleton, for which hönle couldn’t find a matching species. hönle then contacted booher, an expert on the ant genus strumigenys, also known as trap-jaw ants for their trap-jaw mandibles. booher quickly identified the specimen as a potentially undescribed species, kicking off the work to describe the new ant.

what sets s. ayersthey apart from other ants in the genus is its signature shiny and smooth outer “skin,” or cuticle, as well as its long trap jaws, described by the researchers in the paper as a “biological mousetrap.”

the strumigenys genus itself is quite diverse. the various species’ trap-jaw mandibles can range from short to long, with the newly described species having large mandibles; some species lack the trap jaw entirely. one common identifying feature of the genus is a sponge-like structure toward the base of the abdomen. according to booher, the function of the sponge structure remains a mystery to scientists.

in a study published in plos biology in march 2021, booher explores the evolution of the trap-jaw mechanism and its gradual increase in length. the trap-jaw mechanism itself is one of the fastest movements in any living creature, with the jaws snapping shut at a rate of up to 1.2 million meters per second squared.

the newly described species is found in the chocó region of ecuador, a biologically rich and diverse coastal rainforest that is simultaneously understudied and under threat due to human activities. logging, mining and oil palm plantations have resulted in a 61% reduction of the chocó region’s forests.

“[the chocó] features a plethora of endemic species. there is one critically endangered subspecies of [brown-headed] spider monkey, ateles fusciceps fusciceps, that only lives in the forests of this part of ecuador,” hönle said. “however, the insect fauna and especially the ants there are poorly known, as only very few researchers did sample the area.”

the region is so understudied that last year hönle and other scientists described another species of native ant, odontomachus davidsoni, calling this one “large and conspicuous.”

hönle’s fieldwork collecting specimens in the chocó takes place on land preserved by jocotoco, an ngo that buys threatened land to conserve it.

“the fact that no one has described this species before highlights how much else might be out there. the new strumigenys is just one more little piece toward a more complete understanding of the fauna,” hönle said.

––

citations:

booher, d. b., gibson, j. c., liu, c., longino, j. t., fisher, b. l., janda, m., … economo, e. p. (2021). functional innovation promotes diversification of form in the evolution of an ultrafast trap-jaw mechanism in ants. plos biology, 19(3), e3001031. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.3001031

booher, d. b., & hönle, p. o. (2021). a new species group of strumigenys (hymenoptera, formicidae) from ecuador, with a description of its mandible morphology. zookeys, 1036, 1-19. doi:10.3897/zookeys.1036.62034

hönle, p. o., lattke, j. e., donoso, d., von beeren, c., heethoff, m., schmelzle, s., … blüthgen, n. (2020). odontomachus davidsoni sp. nov. (hymenoptera, formicidae), a new conspicuous trap-jaw ant from ecuador. zookeys, 948, 75-105. doi:10.3897/zookeys.948.48701

thank you to kvgarlic for the background ambiance.

“summerinsectsjuly2017shawneenationalforest.wav” by kvgarlic is marked with cc0 1.0.

health and climate are inspiring change in what’s on the menu and california-based company eat just is on the forefront of this food revolution.

host frank sesno speaks with josh balk, co-founder of eat just, which has produced and sells plant-based eggs and now, manufactured chicken. the first restaurant is now serving it in singapore, and he says more manufactured food – chicken and fish – is on the way. started from a single cell, say from a feather, in a lab, then ultimately to your plate, it uses a fraction of the water, produces a fraction of the waste, methane, and other things that pollute and warm the planet.

then we hear from planet 世界杯欧洲预选赛免费直播 mary magnuson about insect farming. high in protein, low in planetary impact – are lime-cilantro grasshopper tacos the future?

find out more in our latest episode of planet forward, seen on pbs’s peril and promise and produced in association with asu’s global futures laboratory:

but one project through the global health institute demonstrates that insects can be so much more — like a sustainable protein alternative. entomophagy, the scientific term for eating insects, is becoming a growing trend — one inciting significant research at uw.

postdoctoral environmental health scientist valerie stull directs the mission to improve global health through insects, an initiative that examines the myriad of implications that might come with eating and farming insects — either for human or livestock consumption.

stull said mighti uses an interdisciplinary lens to analyze the social, environmental and public health-related effects these practices could have.

“we are assessing the impacts of insect farming on people’s livelihoods, health and agroecosystems,” stull said.

stull’s research happens both here and abroad — stull said her team works with communities where entomophagy is already commonplace to study its impacts on public health and environment. they try to determine if these communities that eat insects may also be interested in farming them, and what effects that could have. the locations of these communities range from zambia, south africa, uganda and guatemala.

but why eat insects? to americans who have never heard of entomophagy, the practice could seem unappealing. stull, however, disagrees.

“edible insects are fascinating because while humans have consumed insects throughout history, and about two billion people around the globe regularly consume them now, research on the subject is relatively new,” stull said. “they are under-explored and underutilized on a global scale.”

director of the global health institute jonathan patz works through the institute to support stull’s project, along with uw entomology and the nelson institute for environmental sciences.

patz described some of the environmental benefits entomophagy could have on communities. because insects are rich in high-quality protein and demand only modest resources like food, water, land and energy to rear, they may prove a sustainable alternative to other meat industries.

patz, however, described certain challenges to implementing insect consumption in areas where entomophagy isn’t a cultural commonplace.

“the biggest hurdles that still remain are cultural norms in places unaccustomed to eating insects — like in the u.s.,” patz said. “more research is still needed in address food safety issues, and our feeding studies are aimed to provide an answer in this area.”

stull also cited cultural barriers as potential hindrances to spreading entomophagy.

stull described overcoming these as a process toward cultural competency and communication — one that while difficult, also proves rewarding. it’s important to modify the narrative that insects are not food and share knowledge with groups both locally and globally, she said.

moving forward, stull plans to continue coordinating the logistics of efficient insect farming. one of her goals is to potentially rear insects to feed livestock in wisconsin.

her team is currently researching the “bioavailability of micronutrients found in insects” — essentially the potential nutritional value of insects — in hopes of moving this and other endeavors forwards.

“we plan to continue to investigate the social, environmental and health implications of insect agriculture broadly,” stull said.

patz said mighti aims to have an effect on lower-income countries first to more efficiently enhance nutrition, and stull outlined some of their goals in these countries and regions. stull said mighti hopes to provide user-friendly insect farming kits and training materials to farmers to test the impacts insect farming could have on health and nutrition at the household scale.

stull’s team published several studies on the holistic effects of entomophagy in communities. one study focused on the effect of cooperation between industry, government and academia can have when attempting to implement edible insects. another focused specifically on a case study in zambia, and the most recent study took a microscopic approach by examining the effects of cricket consumption on the human gut.

“i hope my research will have a global impact,” stull said. “simply changing the narrative about insects as food is an important piece of the puzzle.”
 

for about 80 percent of the world’s populations, however, insects are an important protein source and a regular part of the diet. some see edible insects as an untapped food source for communities suffering from chronic malnutrition. one such individual is valerie stull, a graduate student at the university of wisconsin-madison.

“i don’t think there is any one panacea for all of our environmental and global health challenges, but i do think that insects represent an underutilized, underexplored food resource that has the potential to be revived and help protect the environment,” she said of the 1,900 edible insect species worldwide.

“i mean, think about how long we’ve been cultivating livestock, domesticating livestock,” she pointed out, “we haven’t yet done that with insects. we’ve domesticated silkworms, we’ve domesticated honey bees, you know, and a few other species but we really haven’t put that much energy into it compared to other animals.”

stull leads the research collaborative mighti, or the mission to improve global health through insects. mighti investigates how farming edible insects can increase food security while protecting environmental resources.

farming insects requires few resources, takes little effort and time, and could provide a reliable protein source year-round. some insects can be reared on agricultural byproducts, such as corn leaves, and many farmable species emit low levels of greenhouse gases, like methane and ammonia.

“the most exciting thing to me was the fact that you don’t have to have access to land or even electricity to be an insect farmer,” stull enthused, “you could do this if you were living in a rural area, or an urban area with very limited resources.”

stull speaks from personal experience, having raised mealworms under the kitchen sink of her one-bedroom apartment. she grinds them into a protein powder or roasts them, and likes their nutty flavor.

her research is based in zambia, which faces pervasive food insecurity and drought. there, insects are commonly gathered from the wild as a traditional part of the diet.

while insects are a great source of protein and fatty acids, stull says foraging for insects is not always sustainable. the most sought after edible insects are often only prolific during certain times of the year, and unregulated wild-harvesting sometimes leads to cutting down trees.

in countries like zambia that experience food insecurity, insect farming could dramatically improve nutrition. additionally, it could create economic stability because insect farming is inexpensive, more reliable than other protein sources in times of drought and does not require transportation from farm to market. it seems like a perfect solution, but stull cautions against taking a paternalistic approach to communities suffering from food insecurity.

“if you try to implement insect farming strategies you need to be very aware of the cultural and social implications of doing so,” she said. “we tried to better understand peoples’ relationship with edible insects currently because the practice of consuming insects, entomophagy, is much more nuanced than you would think.”

stull uses the mealworm as an example. “it’s very resilient, very productive; they’re prolific breeders, and they’re highly nutritious, easy to process into a powder,” she said. “mealworms can be eaten by people, fed to fish, fed to poultry.”

adding to their allure, producing a pound of mealworms requires less than a gallon of water, which is ideal for drought-prone areas, and hardly emits greenhouse gases. in comparison, producing one pound of beef requires 2,000 gallons of water and emits 100 times the amount of greenhouse gases that mealworms do.

farming mealworms in zambia seems like a perfect solution to combat malnutrition, but the reality is more complicated.

as it turns out, mealworms are not currently part of the zambian diet. they prefer termites and other insects.  

termites are nearly impossible to farm because of their complicated, partially underground life cycle. termites also produce a lot of methane, a greenhouse gas. but just because the mealworm is a more sustainable, secure food source than the termite does not mean that teaching farmers to raise mealworms would be feasible. farmers must first accept mealworms as a food source and agree to farm them. if there is no interest, the program is unsustainable.  

stull emphasized that “a long-term solution is to develop some of these insect farming systems in tandem and in partnership with local farmers.” farming systems must be developed such that “you’re learning from them and they’re learning from you.”

“that’s just something that i personally think is really important but is a challenge because to work that way takes a lot more time,” she said.

it is a worthwhile challenge to face, considering the potential impact of insect farming. if stull’s collaborative project works in zambia, a country with low resources, a drought-prone climate, and a culture that does not view mealworms as food, how many other countries could this help? could this break a cycle of dependency on local organizations for survival? could low-income communities achieve economic stability if they had an independently produced and reliable food source?

perhaps in the future, with adequate research, these questions will have answers. in the meantime, edible insects present an unconventional avenue to ease malnutrition. no matter the gut reaction to insects’ hard, honeycomb eyes, long probing antennas, or callous, crusted exoskeletons, it is undeniable they are a worthwhile subject for exploration.

as a result of the mountain pine beetle, nearly 70,000 acres of forest, approximately the size of washington state, have died since 2000. dead trees now carpet the rocky mountains.

every labor day my family and i would drive up to our favorite ski resort and help move the dead trees. it became a competition between all of the kids to see who could roll the most dead logs down the slope. we watched our forests shrink in size more and more each year, causing winds at the top of the mountain to become unbearable during parts of the ski season.

the beetles hatch from the trees they have just killed and swarm until they find a home to burrow and lay their eggs. in the past they would hatch and swarm for two weeks in july; now, that cycle is much longer. with the temperature rising the beetles fly, continually infecting trees for six months from may to october. the winters have gotten increasingly warmer causing beetles, weeds, and other invasive species to have a better chance at surviving the harsh winters. the pine beetles alone have are causing devastation throughout montana and the great plains states.

changes in the climate stand to not only affect montana’s forests, but also it’s largest source of income: agriculture. the national agricultural statistics service reports that over 65% of montana’s land is covered with farms and ranches. wheat is the state’s leading crop, bringing in 1/3 of the state’s agricultural income. farming is an integral part of montana life. changes would drastically affect all of the great plains states, an area that is notorious for severe fluctuations in weather that make life dramatic and challenging for the people, animals, and plants that inhabit the region.

growing up in montana i remember pilling on the under armour, ski coats, and ugg boots, just to make it to school in -40 degree weather. when it got that cold you had to be careful walking to your seat on the school bus, because the aisle was often covered with a layer of ice. a few weeks later it could be up to 80 degrees, and in the summer it often reached above 100, pushing people to the outskirts of town to cool off in creeks and the missouri river. 

parts of that very river, montana’s longest, flooded this year due to record rainfall and snow melt, causing major damage to riverfront properties in my hometown, and leaving much of the crow reservation underwater.

increases in winter and spring precipitation throughout the northern plains will increase the water levels through soil moisture which will help agriculture in the early growing season, and rising temperatures will lengthen the growing season making it so that some places will be able to harvest a second annual crop. yet, warming temperatures can create other difficulties; the national climate assessment predicts that the changing national climate will create more frequent and intense droughts, downpours, heat waves, and severe storms adding stress and cost to the region.

climate change poses many threats to my home, and the great plains states. a beetle outbreak , rising river levels, uncertainty about the future of agriculture, and the always looming chance of a severe weather storm are just a some of the worries i think about as we move into winter. how much longer can my state thrive, and what will it take for montanans to realize the threat and make a change?

_{header photo courtesy of the beacon reader}

at the tree house the pines whisper during the summer and are hushed in the winter when they are covered in snow. the waterfalls rage below glistening peaks, and i get to explore it all. but two summers ago a forest fire came within forty yards of my beloved family cabin, and i saw before me the prospect of the place where all of my treasured family memories were made being burned to the ground.

increased rainfall in the winters and decreased rainfall in the summers create drier summers with reduced stream flow west of the cascades. drier and warmer summers mean drier forests. snowpack in the mountains is low and snowmelt will occur three to four weeks earlier. in fact data that observed stream flow each year in june for the past fifty years shows that in the washington cascade region, stream flow has reduced 4 to 15 percent.

all of these factors make forests in the pacific northwest increasingly susceptible to forest fires. beyond the destruction of aesthetic beauty and recreation areas, as these trees that have stored carbon for years are burned they release all of the stored carbon back into the atmosphere, contributing further to our climate problem. also lost is the ecological service these trees give us by cleaning air and water.

forests in this region will also begin to see greater invasion of the pine beetle. these huge beetles invade increasingly warmer, drier regions, burrow into trees, and kill them from their trunk to their tip, making for patches of dead, dry trees.  however, the beetles won’t last long because they can only survive within a specific temperature range, and the cascade forests will soon be too hot, even for the pine beetles. their presence in the forests will decrease by about 50% by around 2100.

unfortunately, there is not much we can do for our forests. thinning the surfaces and canopies of our forests could abate some of the fire’s fury, but the reality is that persistent warming will simply continue to threaten the forests.

northwest recreational junkies, beware: though seattle, my hometown, is thought to be an epicenter of environmental friendliness and home to many-a-tree-hugger, it is far from being immune to the impacts of climate change. the northwestern corner of the united states not only faces forest vulnerabilities, but also water resource, coastline, and agricultural impacts.

this affects you, the hiker who’s favorite forest will be infested with pine beetles; you, the spring skier with no good snow come march at mt. bachelor; you, the paddle-boarder off of alki beach who’s favorite place to coast through the waters will look very different a few years down the road; and me, one who, like the rest of us in the pacific northwest, delights in the beauty of the snowy mountains and lush nature that surrounds our region that is undergoing change. 

they bite and sting me, mooch off my meals, and intrude upon my personal space. kind of like my roommate.

some of them are creepy, crawly and often found in dirty, smelly places. every time i see a bug, i am disgusted and annoyed.

eating them seems taboo too, but many cultures think the opposite.

in thailand, for example, locals find bugs tasty and nutritious. street carts give buyers a wide range of choices, similar to walking into a candy store. some of the crowd favorites include grasshoppers (which taste like crispy chicken), water bugs (more like licorice), and silk worms (with a familiar nutty taste). though i may be skeptical, 2 billion people eat 1,900 bug types as part of their regular diet. i can’t see myself hating all of them.

still despite the variety, bugs have not yet captured american hearts and stomachs. can this change?

one person who hopes so is andrew zimmer, host of bizarre foods. while i may not take up zimmer’s recommendation of dung beetles, the most bizarre thing about the show is the normalcy of insect based meals in certain parts of the world. in fact, he says most cultures find some aspects of western diets bizarre.

“why do we let milk rot and dry into squares and call it cheese?” zimmer asks. “many aspects of our dining and eating life leave the rest of the world shaking their heads.”

“i stand by the position that anyone who tried half the stuff we see on our travels would become a convert to many foods that only appear strange but taste delicious.”

but i’m not like zimmer. i tend to stick to eating what i’m used to…unless there is some other value to having a wider culinary palette.

did someone say, ‘it can help save the planet!?’ you had my curiosity, now you got my attention. and it’s true. let me walk you through.

over the next few decades, we’ll need to produce enough protein for billions more mouths while also limiting our impact on the earth’s climate. insects could be our savior. a single kilogram of feed yields 12 times more cricket protein than beef protein. 

insects could also reduce emissions. livestock accounts for about 15 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, more than planes, trains, and automobiles combined. on the other hand, insects could reduce these emissions by 60 percent. insects also don’t need as much land and water so they would be cheaper and more plentiful.

of course, while saving the planet is nice and all, i would like to eat a healthy alternative as well. and insects deliver once again. not only do most non-americans find them delicious, but they are also high in protein, less fattening, and high in vitamins and minerals. can i still avoid them after all this?

maybe one day, i’ll see a bug and be fascinated rather than disgusted. maybe one day, i’ll see a bug and be appreciative of its role in our ecosystem rather than a disease spreading pest. maybe one day.

for now i can keep my irrational hatred toward bugs, but still enjoy them as a sustainable substitute for beef.

eric osman is a senior majoring in journalism at the george washington university.