The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) began funding research into trash-fed crickets as an alternative to conventional and “unsustainable” protein production in July 2023, a federal grant listing shows.
The $130,000 grant supports research that “addresses the need for more cost-efficient production of crickets as a sustainable protein source,” according to the listing. Specifically, the grant will support research into using municipal landfill waste to feed crickets that will later be harvested for human consumption.
USDA awarded the grant to Mighty Cricket Inc., a private firm that sells cricket flour, cricket protein powder and cricket oatmeal. The agency believes that using landfill waste to feed crickets could help the firm “procure cricket feed at lower cost than what is available on the market,” leading to savings that could then be passed along to the consumer.
USDA’s grant listing criticizes traditional animal farming for being too resource-intensive and too harsh on the environment. (RELATED: Slash Your Meat Consumption To Help Gov’t Hit Climate Goals, Advisory Group Suggests)
“Conventional protein production poses a substantial strain on the ecosystem, requiring unsustainable quantities of water, land, and feed as inputs,” the grant description reads. The grant description also calls “conventional” farming a “significant source of greenhouse gas emissions.”
The grant listing claims that the demand for bug protein has increased in recent years due to “public awareness of the need for more sustainable food sources.”
“To sustain the world’s growing population, food production practices need to dramatically shift towards resource conservation,” the grant continues. Bug farming is “one solution” to that problem, according to the USDA grant description.
Mighty Cricket’s website stresses the environmentally sustainable nature of cricket cultivation, pointing to lower land use, less waste, decreased carbon emissions, less intensive water use and reduced energy consumption, among other things.
Influential organizations like the United Nations and World Economic Forum (WEF) have published materials expressing support for introducing insects into the Western diet.
A 2022 article published by WEF argues that incorporating insects into our diet could be an effective way to combat climate change. Another WEF article, meanwhile, argues that growing global population will heighten the need for new sources of protein, such as insects.
Moreover, a 2013 UN report urged people to begin eating insects to reduce world hunger and pollution.
Insects are, to a limited degree, beginning to catch on in the west; Companies are popping up across Europe, for instance, selling food made from bugs.
Examples of insect consumables sold in Europe include cricket chips from Czechia, bug burgers from Germany and beetle beer from Belgium.
USDA and Mighty Cricket did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
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