Creepy Crawlers Might Just Be the Perfect Addition to Your Diet
- hunutritionforyou
- Mar 1, 2022
- 3 min read
Updated: Mar 18, 2022
The article Eating the Right Insects can Provide Nutrition and Might Be Good for the Planet emphasizes how insects may be the key to combat food insecurity as well as the nutritional benefits nature's friends provide. The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization reports that billions of people around the world consume insects to supplement their diet. This practice is referred to as entomophagy. Entomophagy is traditional to many ethnic groups and countries such as China, New Zealand, and Brazil. Thousands of insect species are considered edible, including but not limited to, beetles, caterpillars, wasps, ants, grasshoppers, locusts, crickets. The following critical reviews are mentioned throughout the literature: Potential Health Benefits of Edible Insects and University Student Perspectives of Entomophagy: Positive Attitudes Lead to Observability and Educational Opportunities.
The article Potential Health Benefits of Edible Insects states that edible insects have the potential to serve as healthy, sustainable alternatives to animal products due to the high nutrient content of vitamin B12, iron, zinc, fiber, essential amino acids, and antioxidants. The Study emphasizes that the addition of edible insects to the human diet can reduce greenhouse gas emissions, promote agricultural efficiency, reduce the onset of chronic diseases, and improve the management of conditions.
University Student Perspectives of Entomophagy: Positive Attitudes Lead to Observability, and Educational Opportunities was conducted by university scholars. The goal of the research was to encourage positive experiences with insect food items that highlight the benefits of insect production and reduce the novelty of entomophagy to show how positive perceptions of entomophagy increases with continued exposure to the practice. Two cricket powder brownie taste-test surveys were conducted with groups of students to evaluate attitudes relating to insects as food, sustainability of insect production, and nutritional content. Research concluded that students displayed a taste preference for cricket flour brownies but could not differentiate between brownie types. Students indicated a positive attitude towards purchasing insect products in the future. The willingness to try other insect products in the future was greater for students with previous experience of consuming insects. The results of the study were utilized to create a lesson plan for future evaluation of student attitudes, while increasing exposure to entomophagy and providing education on the positive aspects of insects as food production.
Entomophagy provides many beneficial factors not only to personal health, but to the environment. With the world’s population expected to grow to 9.8 billion by 2050, according to researchers consuming insects will be integral in food security. "One of the many ways to address food and feed security is through insect farming. Insects are everywhere, and they reproduce quickly, and they have high growth and feed conversion rates and a low environmental footprint over their entire life cycle (Armas, 2021). Furthermore, "Crickets and some other bugs can be raised vertically, Rao noted. This means they can be raised in layers in climate-controlled facilities, offering the possibility of operating year-round and leaving less of an environmental footprint than a livestock farm (Armas, 2021).”
What Are the Risks?
“There are no known cases of transmission of diseases or parasitoids to humans from the consumption of insects (on the condition that the insects were handled under the same sanitary conditions as any other food). Allergies may occur, however, that are comparable with allergies to crustaceans, which are also invertebrates. Compared with mammals and birds, insects may pose less risk of transmitting zoonotic infections to humans, livestock, and wildlife, although this topic requires further research (Armas, 2021).”
Will you partake in consuming insects?
There are many educational resources available that provide further information. National Geographic and the Food and Agriculture of the United Nations are some helpful sites to boost knowledge. Entomophagy brands such as Seek, Aketta, and Griopro provide these nourishing foods to try!
References
Harris, W. S., Leonard, D., Radford, N. B., Barlow, C. E., Steele, M. R., Farrell, S. W., Pavlovic, A., Willis, B. L., & DeFina, L. F. (2021). Increases in erythrocyte DHA are not associated with increases in LDL-cholesterol: Cooper Center Longitudinal Study. Journal of Clinical Lipidology, 15(1), 212–217. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jacl.2020.11.011
Nowakowski AC;Miller AC;Miller ME;Xiao H;Wu X; (n.d.). Potential health benefits of edible insects. Critical reviews in food science and nutrition. Retrieved February 28, 2022, from https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33397123/#:~:text=The%20addition%20of%20edible%20insects,diseases%20like%20d iabetes%2C%20cancer%2C%20and
Petersen, M., Olson, O., & Rao, S. (2020, October 24). University student perspectives of entomophagy: Positive attitudes lead to Observability and education opportunities. OUP Academic. Retrieved February 28, 2022, from https://academic.oup.com/jinsectscience/article/20/5/30/5937574?login=true
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