In March, a BBC documentary will feature food writer Stefan Gates searching out and eating deep-fried locusts and barbecued tarantulas. But, behind all the gimmicks and jokes about flies in the soup, there is a deeply serious message. Many experts believe there is a clear environmental benefit to humans eating creepy-crawlies. The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has been funding projects since 2011 aimed at promoting the eating and farming of insects in south-east Asia and Africa, where an estimated two billion people already eat insects and caterpillar larvae as a regular part of their diet. In 2012, the FAO published a list of 1,909 edible species of insect and, with sponsorship from the Dutch government, plans a major international conference on “this valuable food source” in 2013.
Why does the FAO fund projects in south-east Asia and Africa?
To encourage more people to start eating insects To convince two billion people who don’t have enough food to start eating insects To show that eating insects is a serious issue To make people healthier for relatively little cost