Way forward to bring insects in the human food chain

2015 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 121-129 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. Vantomme
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Food Chain ◽  
National Policy ◽  
Economic Benefits ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Health Food ◽  
Environmental Consequences ◽  
Food And Feed ◽  
Legal Frameworks

The recognition that insects can contribute to food security has received a remarkable boost by the media, and is getting more attention from researchers and from food and feed agencies worldwide. This paper reviews major activities and achievements over the past 4 years and suggests ways forward mainly from an FAO perspective. To assure that insects can remain part of the diets of 2 billion people, action is urgently needed to protect and ensure sustainability in gathering wild insect populations, to promote simple semi-domestication techniques, and to farm insects at household or industrial scale levels. Integrating edible insects as healthy food into the agenda and campaigns of food agencies will require a more comprehensive understanding on the nutritional and health values of more insect species. Further investigation is needed particularly of impacts on consumer's health, food safety, environmental impacts and risk assessments of using insects in the food chain. National and international poverty alleviation agencies and aid programmes need to be made aware that gathering and farming insects is a viable option to help people improve their livelihoods. For this to happen, a comprehensive awareness raising campaign needs to be launched on the socio-economic benefits that insect gathering and farming can offer, with a special focus on improving the food security of the poorest of society. Legislators and policy makers are called on to deliberate and include insects as feed and food into existing national policy and legal frameworks covering the food, health and feed sectors. Research is needed to investigate the sustainability and quantify the environmental impacts of harvesting and farming insects as compared with traditional farming and livestock-raising practices. This would help to inform the public about the real footprint and cost of our food choices and on their socio-economic and environmental consequences.

scholarly journals Food Loss and Waste Prevention Strategies from Farm to Fork

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (10) ◽  
pp. 5443
Author(s):  
Rosalinda Nicastro ◽  
Petronia Carillo
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
Food Security ◽  
Food Chain ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Food Supply ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Economic Benefits ◽  
Human Consumption ◽  
Food Supply Chain ◽  
Food Loss

About one-third of the food produced globally for human consumption is lost or wasted each year. This represents a loss of natural resources consumed along the food supply chain that can also have negative impacts on food security. While food loss occurs between production and distribution and is prevalent in low-income countries, food waste occurs mainly at the consumer level, in the retail and food service sectors, and especially in developed countries. Preventing food losses and waste is therefore a potential strategy for better balance food supply and demand and is essential to improve food security while reducing environmental impact and providing economic benefits to the different actors in the food supply chain. In this context, we specifically provide an overview of case studies and examples of legislation from different countries and actions carried out by the various actors in the food chain and by non-profit organisations to effectively prevent and or reduce food loss and waste. We also outline current limitations and possible research avenues. We conclude that the comparison and the integration of knowledge, and the awareness of where along the food chain, for which foods and in which countries the greatest losses are produced, is essential to decide where and how to target efforts in the most effective way.

Implantação do aterro sanitário no município de Marituba-PA e os efeitos sobre as comunidades do entorno

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Moisés Rita Vasconcelos Júnior
Keyword(s):  
Solid Waste ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Urban Policy ◽  
National Policy ◽  
Policy Instruments ◽  
Social Impacts ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Metropolitan Region ◽  
Technical Standards ◽  
Non Governmental Organizations

The municipality of Marituba, Metropolitan Region of Belém - RMB, has suffered environmental impacts due to irregularities in the landfill operation implemented in 2015, which triggered social impacts perceived by all the population, including neighboring municipalities, such as Ananindeua and Belém Protests were carried out by the Movement Outside the Garbage that is constituted by the dwellings of the surrounding neighborhoods to the place where the embankment is located, of owners of commercial activities linked to the tourism and Non Governmental Organizations that interrupted several times the transit of the main route that interconnects the seven municipalities of the RMB and the entrance of the embankment, in order to draw the attention of the municipal public power to the problems that the population would have been facing ever since. From this, the following questions arose: What social impacts would people be making in these protests? Would such problems be directly related to the activities carried out in the landfill? And finally, what are the actions of the public authority and the company that manages the enterprise in the management of these social impacts? The relevance of this study concerns not only the identification of social impacts considering the fragility of this approach in the Environmental Impact Studies and concomitantly in the Reports of Environmental Impacts, but also, from the point of view of the debate about the licensing process of enterprises of this nature and employment and the need for the joint use of environmental and urban policy instruments, considering that RMB municipalities have not yet used sustainable alternatives for the reduction of solid waste produced in their territories, as well as the reduction of environmental impacts caused by dumps , and in the case of Marituba, of the landfill that operates outside the standards established by the Brazilian Association of Technical Standards - ABNT, which is responsible for the management and treatment of solid waste and the National Policy on Solid Waste - PNRSN.

scholarly journals Environmental Consequences of Closing the Textile Loop—Life Cycle Assessment of a Circular Polyester Jacket

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (7) ◽  
pp. 2964
Author(s):  
Gregor Braun ◽  
Claudia Som ◽  
Mélanie Schmutz ◽  
Roland Hischier
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Circular Economy ◽  
Textile Industry ◽  
System Analysis ◽  
Action Plan ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Environmental Consequences ◽  
Energy And Material Flows

The textile industry is recognized as being one of the most polluting industries. Thus, the European Union aims to transform the textile industry with its “European Green Deal” and “Circular Economy Action Plan”. Awareness regarding the environmental impact of textiles is increasing and initiatives are appearing to make more sustainable products with a strong wish to move towards a circular economy. One of these initiatives is wear2wearTM, a collaboration consisting of multiple companies aiming to close the loop for polyester textiles. However, designing a circular product system does not lead automatically to lower environmental impacts. Therefore, a Life Cycle Assessment study has been conducted in order to compare the environmental impacts of a circular with a linear workwear jacket. The results show that a thoughtful “circular economy system” design approach can result in significantly lower environmental impacts than linear product systems. The study illustrates at the same time the necessity for Life Cycle Assessment practitioners to go beyond a simple comparison of one product to another when it comes to circular economy. Such products require a wider system analysis approach that takes into account multiple loops, having interconnected energy and material flows through reuse, remanufacture, and various recycling practices.

Exploiting the beneficial properties of microalgae for food and feed use

2021 ◽  
Vol 67 (4) ◽  
pp. 3634-3648
Author(s):  
Erika Koppányné Szabó ◽  
Krisztina Takács
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Crop Production ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Large Population ◽  
Agricultural Practices ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Biologically Active ◽  
Population Increase ◽  
Health Food ◽  
Food And Feed

By 2050, 9.8 billion people are projected to live on Earth, which means that we need to double our current food production to keep pace with such a large population increase. In addition, rising greenhouse gas emissions and the associated climate change are placing a significant strain on the planet’s ability to sustain itself. However, in order to increase the quantity of proteins of plant origin, it is necessary to increase crop production areas, harvesting frequencies and the quantity of crops produced. Unfortunately, the optimization of these factors is already very close to the available maximum in the current situation. The developed cultivation systems and maximum utilization of the soil power leads to very serious environmental problems, soil destruction, loss of biodiversity and serious environmental pollution through the transport of the produced plant raw materials. This poses a serious challenge to food security and further increases the risk of hunger. There is therefore a need for agricultural practices that can lead to the cultivation of food and feed crops that have better sustainability indicators and are more resilient to climate change, which can be used to safely produce health-promoting feeds, as well as novel and value-added foods. Within this group, a particular problem is presented by the protein supply of the population, as currently about one billion people do not have adequate protein intake. However, conventional protein sources are not sufficient to meet growing protein needs. As mentioned above, food and feed proteins are based on plant proteins. In recent years, a prominent role has been played by the research into alternative proteins and the mapping of their positive and negative properties. Among alternative proteins, special attention has been paid to various yeasts, fungi, bacteria, algae, singe cell proteins (SCPs) and insects. In this paper, we focus on the presentation of algae, particularly microalgae, which are of paramount importance not only because of their significant protein content and favorable amino acid composition, but also because they are also sources of many valuable molecules, such as polyunsaturated fatty acids, pigments, antioxidants, drugs and other biologically active compounds. It is important to learn about microalgae biomass in order to be able to develop innovative health food products.

scholarly journals KERAGAAN PRODUKSI DAN HARGA KENTANG DI KECAMATAN PANGALENGAN, KABUPATEN BANDUNG

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 265
Author(s):  
Salma Aulia Rahmah ◽  
Eliana Wulandari
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Potato Production ◽  
Economic Benefits ◽  
Production Costs ◽  
Macro Level ◽  
Average Price ◽  
Average Amount

Agriculture has an important role in food security in Indonesia from micro to macro level. One of the agricultural subsectors is horticulture particularly in potato that can support food diversification programs in Indonesia. The problem that occurs in horticultural commodities is the fluctuating selling prices that affect the economic benefits received by business actors. This study aims to analyze the revenue of potato farmers from 2016 to 2018. The research was conducted in Pangalengan Sub District by including 52 potato farmers. The data in this study used both primary and secondary data, which were then analyzed quantitatively. The results of the study showed that the average amount of potato production in 2016 to 2018 in Pangalengan Sub District was 17.27 tons per hectare, while the average price of potatos in the last three years was Rp. 7,640 per kg. Based on the results of the study, the average of potato revenues in 2016 - 2018 is Rp. 131.946.193 per hectare. Revenue of potato farmers in Pangalengan Sub District is quite large, thus potato farmers have the potential to earn large profits if they can reduce production costs.

Future plant solutions by interfering RNA and key messages for communication and dissemination.

2021 ◽  
pp. 167-173
Author(s):  
Hilde-Gunn Opsahl-Sorteberg
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Plant Breeding ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Sustainable Food ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Crop Varieties ◽  
General Terms ◽  
Key Issues ◽  
The Many ◽  
Interfering Rna

Abstract Communication is an increasing prerequisite to justify academic existence and value, and for project funding of all kinds to show relevance and value, including the future of European networks like COST Actions. Academia is slowly adapting to this expectation and learning the profession of communication. Language and vocabulary are key issues in communication, and particularly to reach the many important non-scientific audiences. Therefore, this chapter starts with a description of some new plant breeding technologies relevant for communicating, in general terms, the science behind plant improvement. This is followed by selected examples of the application of these techniques to improve current and future crop varieties. Finally, key messages gathered from the European iPLANTA project for policy makers, non-specialists and specially interested citizens are communicated. This is to show a wider audience how RNAi can contribute to sustainable food solutions and food security with minimal environmental impacts.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document