Obviously, there is no such thing as an action without consequences. There is always some after-effect. Something influences some other thing; that thing, in turn, has an effect on another phenomenon, and so on. Finally, it turns out that only the consequences are certain. Action and consequences – however trivial this may sound – are two sides of the same coin. However, in a world that prioritises action, and inaction is evil, in a world based on such a tenet, the consequences are hidden, hoping that perhaps no one will put the blame on us, and somehow all this will work. The costs are swept under the carpet, the continuation is left unsaid, and nobody talks about destruction. This is how every market works, including the food market. Fresh fish for dinner? Great! – but what does this notion mean? What is the definition of “fresh” in your dictionary? Well, we eat it anyway. And yes, one the one hand, I am glad that my children try new foods. I am glad, but it is more out of habit than based on current knowledge. I think: yes, healthy, after all it is a fish. But then I start to wonder how it got here. Whose hands has it gone through? How was it was bred? What did this fish eat? What has happened that manufacturers found it worthwhile to put this fish to my plate from overseas? The whole market ecosystem worries me: overfished fisheries, damaged seabed, disturbed water ecosystem, killed bystanders – birds, turtles, dolphins, porpoises, seals, and various species of fish.
Transport and logistics. After all, I live in Europe, and actually we do not have fish in here anymore. Air pollution or the carbon footprint of fish. What if my dinner came from a fishpond? In that case, the use of antibiotics and parasticides must also be added to this equation. Hardly anyone cares, but there is such a thing as suffering: the density per cubic meter, the terribly poor water quality, the way death is inflicted. So what good things have I done for myself and the world by buying this fish, baking it with lots of garlic, lemon and a little butter? Whom do I support? Surely, I do not support myself or my children: after such a dinner we are a bit less healthy. And, at the same time, we contributed to the support of a network of dependencies that make it difficult for me to be optimistic about the future. We have sanctioned the costs swept under the carpet.
What if we had chicken? Beef? Oh, vegan burgers? After all, even crop production has consequences of loss of biodiversity, deforestation and environmental pollution with a huge amount of chemicals. I can pretend that such production is free of death – but in the back of my mind I know that it is not. It is just death that is distributed differently, somewhere further down the chain of dependence. There are bees dying somewhere. A bird died – it was poisoned by insects full of pesticides. The fish in a nearby lake die – who knows, perhaps some man is sick after eating them.
Obviously, you can forget any worries about it and do your own thing. I will not lie: I like chicken, preferably in some Asian sauce. I eat beef from time to time since it is available; and I find it hard to give up fish. I eat it and somehow it all still works. After all, as I said, there are always consequences, there are no actions without them, and we have to eat, anyway. Besides, greater forces are at work here than ourselves. How can we create a canteen at which 8 billion people eat? It cannot be done at no cost. Food production, as everything else today, is mass production, entangled in the network of global dependencies. Therefore, there is always someone to suffer: the environment and animals in the first place, and with them – us. However, there is no point in delineating any dividing lines here: we are all one biosphere, even if we think we have nothing in common with, for instance, Baltic mussels.
A few years ago I became interested in insects as a potential source of food(for animals and/or humans) but I would never have thought that I would go into it. I just thought that it would be nice. It would be nice if insect products entered the network of dependency surrounding the food market. It would be nice if protein, fat, microelements and vitamins obtained from insects could be used as food for animals so that we would not have to feed animals with animals (e.g. fish with fishmeal) or GM crops, but can provide balanced food whose environmental cost is virtually zero. It would be nice if I could use such products myself in the form of a high-protein meal for baking bread, energy bars, protein drinks and perhaps maybe a burger with insect protein, lasagne, pasta – whatever you want. Again, it is all about consequences and dependencies.
Introducing insect products into the network of dependency in mass food production could significantly relieve a system that has already been stretched to its limits. And this is not about revolution. The case is not so simple – actually, it is quite complicated. After all, I also dream of scaling up the production, I will also use energy and generate waste – however, much less would per kilogramme of insect protein of excellent quality. I do not mean that we should all eat insect-based products. For many people – even if these products are highly processed so that the final product will not even resemble the source – it will be an impassable barrier. But why not feed the animals with them? Why not buy food based on insect protein for dogs or cats? Why do they have to eat beef, chicken, salmon or horse meat when insect protein has much better nutritional ratings – and is tastier? Why not give insect-based feed to chickens when – and this is coming soon – EU legislation changes? Why not feed fish with insects? Why not offer products of this type to people who are open enough to try them, knowing that they are healthy, tasty and their production does put a methane cloud over the Earth? This could relieve the system. One cow will not be slaughtered, every reduction in the mass production of chickens and pigs, every farmland freed from mass crop production in favour of forests, every blast of methane, every cubic meter of carbon dioxide we give up producing, every reduction in the catch of decimated schools of fish – these are successes. The consequences for the environment could be a blessing. The consequences for our health and the health of animals – invaluable. Right, it would be nice.
This is a good time for charts. They can be easily found, for instance on the Internet. Western Europe has been studying insects for decades – this is nothing new, so there is a lot of charts. And everything is basically clear – the production of insects for food is, at the moment, just like that. If we, as a society, really want to deal with the climate disaster happening here and now, apart from changing the way we convert energy from coal to renewable energy, switching from combustion to electric vehicles or using biofuels, remodelling our compulsive consumer lifestyle – its pillar being the constant production of new unnecessary products that do not disappear when we lose sight of them, even if we throw them in the recycling bin, if we really want to do something for our planet and for the next generation, we must also change the way our food is produced. Such a new way needs to relieve the environment and provide us with good food. So – insects come in handy. Charts? Why not indeed.
If you want to see them so badly, just search them online yourself. Along with increasing knowledge, resistance to this knowledge goes up, too. Charts simply do not work – except in a small circle of scientists. For us, it is just small talk of data: they look nice indeed, but what’s for dinner? As a species, we are not able to sense abstract data. We do not have enough empathy to be convinced by the statistical details. It does not work like that. Had it been otherwise, mankind would already have moved towards sustainability five decades ago – and, as we know, this has not happened. So no graphs, sorry! At most, just a summary: each of the parameters – whatever it is supposed to represent, be it water consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, surface or energy consumption, they all look the same: value bars for livestock – cows, pigs, chickens – climb high, scratching the ceiling; the bars showing the data for insects crawl near the surface – they barely escape the tentacle of the x-axis, and they meaning nothing on the y-axis. This is impressive. Obtaining insect products, such as protein of the same quality as that from salmon or red meat, which is rich in trace elements and vitamins; or obtaining balanced fats rich in omega 6 and 9 acids, which we can use in the food, pharmaceutical or cosmetic industries, using insect excrement, which is the balanced organic fertilizer for your flowers and vegetables, costs the environment a minimum. This production produces no greenhouses gases, uses little energy, generates a minimum amount of waste, uses almost no water – and consequently postpones the impending climate disaster. Is there anything more important now?
So no more it-would-be-nices! Here we go!