Valorisation of Organic Waste By-Products Using Black Soldier Fly (Hermetia illucens) as a Bio-Convertor

Abstract

One third of food produced globally is wasted. Disposal of this waste is costly and is an example of poor resource management in the face of elevated environmental concerns and increasing food demand. Providing this waste as feedstock for black soldier fly (Hermetia illucens) larvae (BSFL) has the potential for bio-conversion and valorisation by production of useful feed materials and fertilisers. We raised BSFL under optimal conditions (28 °C and 70% relative humidity) on seven UK pre-consumer food waste-stream materials: fish trimmings, sugar-beet pulp, bakery waste, fruit and vegetable waste, cheese waste, fish feed waste and brewer’s grains and yeast. The nutritional quality of the resulting BSFL meals and frass fertiliser were then analysed. In all cases, the volume of waste was reduced (37–79%) and meals containing high quality protein and lipid sources (44.1 ± 4.57% and 35.4 ± 4.12%, respectively) and frass with an NPK of 4.9-2.6-1.7 were produced. This shows the potential value of BSFL as a bio-convertor for the effective management of food waste.

Novel Approaches in the Valorization of Agricultural Wastes and Their Applications

“…For example, the biotreatment of food waste by black soldier fly ( Hermetia illucens ) larvae provides volume reduction of the wastes and production of high-quality animal feed. It can recover, recycle, and valorize the food waste materials as constituents of animal feed and grass fertilizers . Biopolymers, other important products obtained from food wastes and byproducts, include a wide variety of products.…”

“…It can recover, recycle, and valorize the food waste materials as constituents of animal feed and grass fertilizers. 56 Biopolymers, other important products obtained from food wastes and byproducts, include a wide variety of products. These biopolymers are used in critical applications in different industries like medicine, cosmetics, pharmaceutical and food industries, water treatment, production and development of biosensors, industrial plastics, and clothing fabrics, because of their biodegradability, biofunctionality, biostability, and biocompatibility.…”

African traditional use of edible insects and challenges towards the future trends of food and feed

“…In recent decades, the accumulation of organic waste and the desire to manage the waste rather than leave them in landfills has spurred interest in BSF use. Naturally, insects play a role in recycling waste; therefore, harnessing this power for organic waste management is economically feasible and sustainable (Diener, 2010;Newton et al, 2005). In this decade, BSF larvae use in livestock, poultry, and aquaculture with the additional benefit of manure from the insect frass is widespread (Barragan-Fonseca et al, 2017;El-Hack et al, 2020;Tomberlin and Van Huis, 2020).…”

Insect feed in sustainable crustacean aquaculture

“…Although insect production systems are a source of greenhouse gas emissions (Parodi et al, 2020), the carbon footprint is low compared to fishmeal and soybean meal (Perednia et al, 2017) because local insect production removes the 30% of emissions caused by global shipping (Mertenat et al, 2019). The use of agricultural by-products and food industry side-streams as substrates for insect mass production is also advantageous (Tschirner and Kloas, 2017), and the ability to recover otherwise lost nutrients from these substrates is major contribution to sustainable protein production (Magee et al, 2021;Van Huis et al, 2020). Many proposed input substrates are decomposed naturally by microbes, emitting 70% more CO 2 equivalents than nutrient valorising by insects (Perednia et al, 2017;Smetana et al, 2019).…”