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The Contribution of Insects to Food Security, Livelihoods and the Environment






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    Six-legged livestock: Edible insect farming, collection and marketing in Thailand 2013
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    The world's population is expected to surpass 9 billion by 2050. FAO estimates that global food production will need to expand by an estimated 60 percent from current levels. Meeting this massive additional demand will require concerted action on a number of fronts, including efforts to increase the production and consumption of currently under-utilized and under-appreciated foods. Edible insects compromise one such category. Insects offer several advantages as human food. They are extremely ric h in proteins, vitamins and minerals, and at the same time are highly efficient in converting the food they eat into material that can be consumed by humans. This publication provides insight into the collection and farming, processing, marketing and trade of edible insects in Thailand - one of the few countries in the world to have developed a viable and thriving insect farming sector.
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    State-of-the-art on use of insects as animal feed 2014
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    A 60-70% increase in consumption of animal products is expected by 2050. This increase in the consumption will demand enormous resources, the feed being the most challenging because of the limited availability of natural resources, ongoing climatic changes and food-feed-fuel competition. The costs of conventional feed resources such as soymeal and fishmeal are very high and moreover their availability in the future will be limited. Insect rearing could be a part of the solutions. Although some s tudies have been conducted on evaluation of insects, insect larvae or insect meals as an ingredient in the diets of some animal species, this field is in infancy. Here we collate, synthesize and discuss the available information on five major insect species studied with respect to evaluation of their products as animal feed. The nutritional quality of black soldier fly larvae, the house fly maggots, mealworm, locusts-grasshoppers-crickets, and silkworm meal and their use as a replacement of soym eal and fishmeal in the diets of poultry, pigs, fish species and ruminants are discussed. The crude protein contents of these alternate resources are high: 42 to 63% and so are the lipid contents (up to 36% oil), which could possibly be extracted and used for various applications including biodiesel production. Unsaturated fatty acid concentrations are high in housefly maggot meal, mealworm and house cricket (60-70%), while their concentrations in black soldier fly larvae are lowest (19-37%). Th e studies have confirmed that palatability of these alternate feeds to animals is good and they can replace 25 to 100% of soymeal or fishmeal depending on the animal species. Except silkworm meal other insect meals are deficient in methionine and lysine and their supplementation in the diet can enhance both the performance of the animals and the soymeal and fishmeal replacement rates. Most insect meals are deficient in Ca and its supplementation in the diet is also required, especially for growi ng animals and laying hens. The levels of Ca and fatty acids in insect meals can be enhanced by manipulation of the substrate on which insects are reared. The paper also presents future areas of research. The information synthesized is expected to open new avenues for a large scale use of insect products as animal feed.
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    Forests, food security and sustainable livelihoods 2000
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    As the articles in this issue suggest, forests contribute to food security and sustainable livelihoods in numerous ways, not only directly but also indirectly, through support to agricultural systems, their role in rural development and in maintaining environmental integrity and the provision of op-portunities for income generation and employment. Governments would do well to consider these contributions in their pursuit of food security goals, by integrating forestry with other disciplines, for example agriculture and nutrition, in policy and planning.

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