Insect flour: Protein of the future for the pig industry?

Insect inclusion in production animal diets is slowly but surely becoming a potential alternative. Global demand for protein is growing as the human population increases and food consumption patterns change in response to economic growth. A key example is the increased purchasing power of the emerging Asian middle class that consumes more premium imported products, such as meat.

The availability of soybean meal for animal feed may be limited.

While other protein sources, such as meat meal and tallow, are balanced sources of amino acids (AA) and are an efficient use of waste products from animal production industries, they require suitable processing and transportation in order to be used in monogastric animal diets.

A potential alternative source of dietary protein can be found in insects. With feed conversion rates close to 2.0 (van Huis, 2013), the efficiency of insect production is higher than that of traditional domestic animal species.

Insects are fast-growing, rich in protein and lipids, require minimal space and contribute to the natural diet of many species.

insect

In addition to this, waste produced in insect production is a valuable source of organic fertilizer which can be used in crop production. Therefore creating a closed circular economy.

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Source: Di Giacomo y Leury. Animal(2019),13:12,pp 3022–3030 © The Animal Consortium 2019animaldoi:10.1017/S17517311190018733022

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