UN urges people to eat more insects to fight obesity

Is it possible that insects such as crickets, ants, and beetles will become the world's main food in the future? A report recently published by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations pointed out that insects are actually very suitable food for human consumption. Not only are they rich in nutritional value and have low breeding costs, they also cause less pollution to the environment. They can also solve the current problems of food inequality and a large number of obese people in the world.

Insects have high nutritional value

The British BBC reported that for Westerners, eating insects seems to be an unacceptable and strange thing, but in fact more than 2 billion people around the world regard eating insects as a common practice, and more than 1,900 species of insects are eaten by people around the world.

A recent report published by the Forestry Department of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation also pointed out that in many parts of the world, insects are even delicacies. In South Africa, for example, caterpillars are considered high-end food and are very expensive. Every 100 grams of caterpillars contains 28.2 grams of protein and 35.5 milligrams of iron. Mantises contain 20.6 grams of protein, 35.2 milligrams of calcium and 5 milligrams of iron. Wasps, beetles and many other insects are also rich in nutritional value.

Easy to cook and environmentally friendly

The report authors also said that insects are an excellent source of nutrition for growing children or people with nutritional imbalances, and can also help fight obesity. It is recommended to include insects in restaurant menus and design more insect-based recipes to make insects acceptable to more people.

In addition, farming insects is more environmentally friendly than raising livestock. Taking crickets and cattle as an example, to produce the same amount of protein, crickets require 11 times less feed than cattle. Moreover, the greenhouse gas emissions from most insect feces are much lower than those from chickens, ducks, pigs, sheep, etc.