All about edible insects, the potential future food resource

Do you remember the delicious pupae you ate at amusement parks or sports days when you were young?

They were enjoyed as a nutritious snack because of their high protein content, but many people avoided them because they were gross.

However, due to the recent problems of excessive energy consumption and carbon emissions in the food production process, there has been a long-standing movement to utilize insects as a future food resource.

How far have edible insects come? Let's find out together.

Feature	Trend (English)
Overall Perception	Progressively shifting towards a more positive direction, with particularly high interest among younger generations and consumers concerned about the environment.
Acceptance	Decreased aversion towards powdered or additive forms where the insect's shape is not visible, and increasing acceptance of insect-added foods.
Purchase Intention	Purchase intention is emerging among some consumer segments due to expectations as a future food resource and environmental benefits, but it is still limited.
Taste Evaluation	Positive taste evaluations are emerging among consumers who have tried insect-added foods, with particularly high scores in Belgium and France.
Major Barriers	Aversion to the appearance of insects, cultural factors, and lack of information remain major barriers.
Influencing Factors	Taste, market accessibility, health benefits, price, environmental sustainability, and food origin are analyzed as factors influencing changes in preference for edible insects.
Preferred Product Form	A tendency to prefer powdered forms processed and added to existing foods rather than whole insect forms.
Positive Perception Factors	High nutritional value, environmentally friendly production methods, and potential as a future food resource.
Negative Perception Factors	Aversion, concerns about safety, and cultural resistance.

1. Types of edible insects: What insects can we eat?

The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety's Food Codex lists a total of 7 insects as food ingredients: grasshoppers, silkworm pupae, brown mealybug larvae, two-spotted crickets, white-spotted flower chafer larvae, American king beetle larvae, and honeybee pupae.

(Temporary standard and standard conversion raw materials 6 types: brown mealworm larvae (mealworm, gosoa), double-spotted crickets, white-spotted flower chafer larvae (grasshopper, flower beetle), American king beetle larvae, and grasshoppers added to honeybee pupae)

2. How far are edible insects being used?

It is not easy to touch them because of their disgusting appearance, but if insects are processed into powder form, their shape does not remain, so the aversion is reduced.

Currently, rather than being consumed directly in powder form, they are used as ingredients in various foods such as bread, cookies, protein bars, burger patties, pasta, and snacks.

In addition, they are attracting attention as space food for the future space age, and various cooking methods using insects are being developed.

3. Advantages and disadvantages of edible insects

Advantages

- Less water and land use: Production is possible with much less resources than existing livestock farming.

- Low energy consumption: It is environmentally friendly because it consumes less energy such as electricity.

- High productivity: It is efficient because the production volume per unit area is high. - Rich nutrition: High in protein content and contains potential ingredients that can be used as herbal medicine.

Disadvantages

- Digestion problems of chitin components: Chitin, the main component of insects, has the disadvantage of being difficult to digest.

- Disgust: Depending on the shape of the insect, you may feel aversion.

- Difficulty in developing various food forms: It is still difficult to process it into various forms.

4. Future possibilities of utilizing edible insects?

In the future, plant-based meat, insect meat, and cultured meat are mentioned as the three major foods that will replace livestock products such as pork and chicken.

However, as laboratory-grown cultured meat becomes possible through factory-style production, the advantages of edible insects may be somewhat diluted due to the development of cultured meat, which is more familiar to people and is evaluated better in terms of ethics.

However, this does not mean that edible insects will be completely replaced, and it is expected that they will compete with alternative meats.

Rather, insects are considered more valuable as feed or agricultural fertilizer because they are good food and nutrients for animals and plants and can produce inexpensive protein.

5. Personal thoughts

Edible insects have various advantages, but in the future, competition with alternative meats is inevitable, and I think that their excellent protein components are likely to be used as health functional foods or livestock feed.

We will have to keep an eye on the development of insect-based foods, but from a business perspective, we will have to wait a little longer to see how they will change in the face of competition with alternative meats.

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