A little more in-depth than your standard UN FAO 2013 edible insect report talking points. The article features Mohammed Ashour of Aspire Food Group (his co-founder Gabe Mott will appear on an upcoming podcast) and has some interesting highlights…

Ashour rattles off yet another alarming statistic, saying that when it comes to worldwide malnutrition, “nine years from now, we’re going to have a 214-trillion calorie deficit. To put that in perspective, it’s the equivalent of feeding every person in the world breakfast for an entire year. That’s the global food deficit we will see within the next decade.” The culprit, he and his small team of fellow students discovered, was our reliance on livestock for protein.

We’re mostly happy to eat marine life that, if it were land-based, would probably remain off most people’s plates. Is there really a difference between eating a king prawn and a bug? What would you call a sea-dwelling spider? A crab, right? It’s our perceptions that affect our appetites, and introducing insect protein in the form of powders or flours is simply a step in achieving mass acceptance.

Click here to read the full article “Could eating insects really save the world?” by Kevin Hackett for The National.