mouth. But

have you ever considered that insects could be more nutritious, environmentally friendly,

and abundant

than most other foods? Should we all be eating insects?

Compare 100 g of crickets, to 100 g of chicken, beef or pork, and you'll find they have comparable

protein content, but crickets are much higher in essential vitamins and minerals such as

calcium, zinc

and iron. Similarly, insects like mealworms are low in fat, and contain large amounts

of fibre.

But, that's not the only reason to incorporate them into your diet. Currently there are 1.53

billion

hectares of cropland and 3.38 billion hectares of pastures covering our Earth. Essentially,

38% of the

land you see on a map is used for agriculture and farming. But where it takes 200 square

meters of land

to grow 1 lb of beef, it only takes 15 square meters to grow 1lb of crickets.

Furthermore, by 2025 its expected that 1.8 billion people will live in areas with little

to no fresh water. And yet, 70%

of our fresh water sources are used in agriculture alone! To produce 1 kg

of beef it takes

22,000 litres of water, whereas 1 kg of pork takes 3,500 litres, and 1 kg of chicken takes

2,300 litres. But

to make 1 kg of crickets? It only requires 1 litre of water! This is because insects

can become fully

hydrated just from the food that they eat. They're also more digestible - In fact, 80%

of a cricket is edible

and digestible compared to 50% of a chicken and 40% of cattle.

And its not like our mouths have never tasted insects before. For every 100g of spinach,

50 small

insects like aphids, thrips and mites are permitted. Peanut butter is allowed to contain

roughly 30 insect

fragments - such as heads, bodies or legs - per 100g. And even the hops used to make

your favourite

beer can contain 250 aphids per 100g. Yup - your summer beer may be spiked with a little

more bug juice

than you anticipated.

So WHY aren't we eating insects? They're actually consumed in some parts of Asia, Latin America

and Africa.

In fact, the capital of Congo has households eating 300 g of caterpillars a

week, which is 96

tonnes of caterpillars every year! But much of the Western world is used to screaming

in disgust if

they find a bug in their salad! This may be because western culinary traditions have spawned

out of

colder climates with less insects, increased farming and larger animals to eat. As Europeans

began to

colonize the world, they contextualized bug eating as savage and primitive because they

observed many

indigenous people doing it. Little did they know, bugs are actually extremely nutritious!

But while the idea of eating insects may literally be hard to swallow, as recipes are created,

processing technology evolves and our mindsets adapt, maybe insects will become the superfood

of the future.

Look out greek yogourt and kale! There are some new kids in town.

We actually challenged ourselves to chomp down on some bugs, try out a few recipes,

and eat things

like cookies and snack bars using insect flour, in our latest AsapTHOUGHT video. We also discuss

the role

and potential for insects in helping to solve world hunger. Make sure to click the screen

or the link in the

description below to check it out!

And subscribe for more weekly science videos!