Nutritional and environmental benefits of increasing insect consumption in Africa and Asia

Abstract

Most global dietary forecasts predict a reduction in nutritional deficiencies over the next several decades driven by significant increases in environmentally unsustainable livestock and animal source food consumption. Here, we explore a more environmentally sensitive alternative to improve global nutrition, consuming insects. Our study focuses on Africa and Asia, two continents with a history of eating insects and high rates of nutritional deficiency. We model the impact of adding modest amounts (2.5, 5 and 10 g per day, dry weight) of regionally appropriate and farmable species on total nutrient intake and population-wide risk of deficiency for specific nutrients of concern: protein, zinc, folate, and vitamin B12. We also estimate the total potential change in dietary iron. Five grams per day of insect consumption could alleviate a considerable amount of risk of nutritional deficiency: 67 million (95% uncertainty interval: 49–84 million) fewer people at risk of protein deficiency, 166 million (120–220 million) fewer people at risk of zinc deficiency, 237 million (120–439 million) fewer people at risk of folate deficiency, and 251 million (28–2271) fewer people at risk for vitamin B12 deficiency. For iron, per capita supplies could increase by 3% (0.8%–6.0%) with insects, and even more so for vulnerable groups in countries currently suffering severe rates of anemia: 4.2% (0.5%–8.8%) for women of childbearing age and 4.1% (0.4%–10.0%) for children under 5. Doubling or halving insect intake per capita causes the benefits for nutritional deficiency risk to roughly double or halve accordingly. Effects are most pronounced in South and Central Asia, though sub-Saharan Africa, East Asia, and Southeast Asia also see considerable reduction in nutritional risk. These results demonstrate the potential for insects to fill a crucial role in providing nutrition for these populous and rapidly developing regions while safeguarding the global environment.

Priority Micronutrient Density in Foods

“…Future analyses should focus on understanding how to use these findings to improve food, agriculture, and nutrition policies and programs, which tend to focus on specific foods or food groups. Researchers could build on this work by incorporating additional foods and food groups, including eggshells ( 55 ) and wild or indigenous vegetables, nuts, seeds, pulses, and insects ( 56 ), many of which contain very high nutrient densities ( 57 ). Moreover, these ratings could be paired with broader diet quality metrics ( 54 ) and included as an additional way to assess food affordability, for example, by expanding on existing approaches ( 32 , 35 ), as has been done for other nutrient profiling systems ( 58 ).…”

Priority Micronutrient Density of Foods for Complementary Feeding of Young Children (6–23 Months) in South and Southeast Asia

“…This study focuses specifically on infants and young children living in South and Southeast Asia, however the same approach could be used to analyze the priority micronutrient density of foods for complementary feeding in other regions of the world presenting similar micronutrient gaps in complementary feeding diets, such as Eastern and Southern Africa (55). Future research could build on this analysis, for instance, by expanding the regional food composition database through the inclusion of soy foods and of nutrient-dense wild or indigenous fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, grains, pulses (54), and insects (56), the safety and nutritional adequacy of which is currently being studied for potential application in complementary foods (57). In addition, findings from this study could be compared and complemented with affordability and environmental impact metrics, to assess these variables based on priority micronutrient density by expanding on existing approaches (13,43,58).…”

Priority micronutrient density in foods

“…Future analyses should focus on understanding how to use these findings to improve food, agriculture, and nutrition policies and programs, which tend to focus on specific foods or food groups. Researchers could build on this work by incorporating additional foods and food groups, including wild or indigenous vegetables, nuts, seeds, pulses, and insects (46), many of which contain very high nutrient densities (47). Moreover, these ratings could be paired with broader diet quality metrics (45) and included as an additional way to assess food affordability, for example, by expanding on existing approaches (30,32), as has been done for other nutrient profiling systems (48).…”