Feed
With the opening in France of the world’s largest insect farm, could 2020 be the tipping point for this alternative protein in aquaculture markets?
Insect scale-up
THE world’s largest insect farm and US agricultural feed giant Cargill are joining forces to take a bite out of a new multi-billion dollar market to replace fishmeal in salmon and trout feed. Their solution: the black soldier fly, whose voracious larvae are highly efficient at producing protein and compost.
But while insect meal helps reduce the dependence on wild caught fish, will it catch on with fish farmers and consumers?
More than half of the fish consumed worldwide comes from aquaculture, according to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), a figure expected to grow by 60 per cent by 2030.
A major challenge for breeding carnivorous fish is the availability of protein and lipid resources adapted to their nutritional needs.
The FAO estimates the global demand for quality protein to be worth 500 billion dollars, including an emerging market for proteins derived from insects worth a potential 30 to 50 billion dollars.
Since July 1, 2018, the European Union has authorised aquaculture farms to feed their fish proteins derived from insect larvae.
Now Cargill and InnovaFeed, a French biotech start-up building the world’s largest insect farm, are trying to convert Europe’s fish farms to insect feed.
‘With a population that is growing exponentially and finite resources on our planet, Cargill’s mission is to nourish the world in a safe, responsible and sustainable way,’ Megan Fairchild Anderson, Cargill Aqua Nutrition’s global marketing communications lead, told Fish Farmer.
‘With that perspective, Cargill is proactively looking for alternative feed ingredients and new proteins.
‘Traditionally, a lot of aquaculture feeds were based on fishmeal and oil derived from wild fish which were not commonly eaten directly by humans.
‘But today the feeds have developed to use many terrestrial sources of protein and energy, and there is also now a lot of work to develop novel sources as well.
‘Cargill is investing in some of these directly and also working with other suppliers to encourage them to develop alternative sustainable sources of nutrients, so we can grow the sustainably sourced raw material basket to help feed the aquaculture industry. Today, fishmeal is about 10 per cent of the diet.’
Cargill, a huge 150-year-old firm with 160,000 employees across 70 countries, is promoting alternative ingredients such as single-cell protein feed pioneered by two firms, Calysta and White Dog Labs, and ‘promising’ insect protein.
‘It has two major advantages,’ Anderson said: ‘First, insects are part of many fish species’ natural diet, and second, it can be produced in a sustainable way at a competitive cost using widely available co-products of the cereal industry.
‘Currently, the main market for insect protein is aquaculture. The total fish feed market is estimated at 50 million tonnes per year today, and is growing six to eight per cent annually.
‘The global aquaculture market is still experiencing high growth and we will need alternative sources of protein to support sustainable growth. The market for insect meal can therefore be very large.’
Larger volumes
She added: ‘The insect industry is at an inflection point. We will see much larger volumes available as soon as [this] year. InnovaFeed has spent the past years developing an innovative and competi
“It can be produced in a sustainable way at a competitive cost using widely available coproducts of the cereal industry”
tive technology to produce large volumes of insect protein.
‘They will launch their first full-scale plant with a production capacity of 10,000 tonnes per year of insect meal at the start of 2020, and are planning five additional plants of the same size in the upcoming two years.’
InnovaFeed’s head of Value Chain, Chloé Phan
Van Phi, told Fish Farmer: ‘Aquaculture is the fastest growing agro-business with an annual growth of about eight per cent.
‘Traditional protein sources for aquafeed are insufficient to meet this growth: in particular, fish stocks are currently exploited to their maximum, thereby limiting the production of fishmeal.
‘Therefore, to meet that growth, the industry needs to secure new sources of proteins. Insects, thanks to their ability to convert low value biomass into high quality animal proteins and reintroduce them in the food chain, is emerging as an excellent solution.’
InnovaFeed, created in 2016 by alumni of the McKinsey firm, is one of two French start-ups competing for leadership in this new industry.
Ÿnsect has developed its solution based on Tenebrio Molitorn beetles, also called mealworms, while InnovaFeed produces protein to feed fish, birds and small mammals from the larvae of Hermetia illucens, or the black soldier fly.
The biotech firm, headquartered in Paris, employs around 60 engineers and technicians, relying on the eco-friendly nature of its activity to attract Millennials who favour meaning over salary.
‘More and more, young graduates are choosing a job which they think can be positive for the planet,’ Clément Ray, InnovaFeed’s chief executive officer and co-founder told La Tribune.
InnovaFeed’s team have developed an innovative process allowing them to produce high quality insect meal at an industrial scale.
InnovaFeed currently runs two sites: the Gouzeaucourt pilot plant near Cambrai (Hauts-de-France), inaugurated in late 2017, which uses 3,000 square metres of local agricultural by-products for breeding insects, and the construction site of Nesle in the Somme, in partnership with the Tereos starch factory; this, according to Ray, should be ‘the largest site in the world, with annual capacity producing 10 to 20,000 tonnes of insect protein’.
‘The idea is to bring new circular economy solutions to the agri-food industry,’ Ray said.
‘The insect farm deploys a circular and zero waste logic, by using an eco-product as raw material- recycled starch and sugar from the food industry- and therefore does not waste natural resources.
In addition, the nutrient rich larvae can be reinjected into agricultural land as organic fertiliser.
Unique model
Van Phi said: ‘For this plant, InnovaFeed developed a unique industrial symbiosis model which consists of co-locating with an existing industrial player to minimise our carbon footprint and maximise economies of scale.
‘Therefore, we are located next to Tereos, a starch manufacturer that will directly convey its co-products to feed our larvae through a pipeline we are building between their site and our site. This way, it is 9,000 trucks per year that we are saving.
‘We are also co-locating with a wood biomass turbine where we are capturing their fatal energy (energy that was previously dissipated into the air) to fuel our plant.’
Some 60 per cent of Nesle energy comes from fatal energy, she said, so it does not produce any additional carbon footprint.
Ray added: ‘We respect the same cycle as that of nature, in which insects accelerate the decomposition of biomass, fruit for example. Then, we extract the nutrients from this biomass which will feed birds and fish.
‘Once the larvae reach a certain stage, protein and oil are extracted from the larvae, to be used in feed for pets, aquaculture species and young animals like broilers and piglets.
‘By upcycling local cereal co-products and repurposing insect waste as an organic fertiliser, InnovaFeed’s products have a positive environmental impact.
‘We’re also able to have a positive impact on climate change by saving 25,000 tonnes of CO² emissions per year with each 10,000-tonne production unit by feeding insect meal to animals. That is equivalent to removing 14,000 cars off the roads.’
The factory makes three products. First an insect protein called ProtiNova, with an amino acid profile adapted to the nutritional needs of fish, and secondly SaniNova insect oil rich in fatty acids, including a high content of lauric acid known for its antimicrobial properties.
It is designed as a natural feed supplement for young or adult animals whose digestive tract is sensitive to bacterial infections, such as piglets or poultry, and a sustainable alternative to palm or
“There are still challenges to overcome, in particular regarding the inclusion of insect meal in the ons” Label Rouge specificati
copra oil directly in the diet.
Finally, there’s a natural solution, FrassiNova, produced from insect larvae droppings, to promote plant growth and improve the qualities of the soil for agriculture. It can be used in organic farming, as part of a circular management of agricultural land, used to fertilise the crops from which the raw materials are derived to feed insects.
‘Insect meal has a very similar amino acid profile to fishmeal,’ said Van Phi. ‘Trials have shown that insect meal was at least as good as fishmeal for salmonids and even much better for shrimp.
‘Trials on insect meal have demonstrated a high digestibility and equal or better performance, with up to 100 per cent fishmeal replacement.
‘It has also demonstrated an improved quality of finished product: improved organoleptic quality, higher omega-3 concentration, deeper colouration and lower concentration of pollutants in the fish flesh.
‘In terms of environmental benefit, insect meal has a 30 per cent lower
CO2 impact than fishmeal, and that does not take into account the impact on marine biodiversity.
‘Once our plant in Nesle is finished, InnovaFeed has announced the construction of five others in parallel in Europe, the US and Asia following the industrial symbiosis model.
‘With this larger volume, we plan to develop sustainable salmon and shrimp value chains following the model of the insect fed trout.’ (See box, right.)
Megan Fairchild Anderson of Cargill said: ‘We have been collaborating with Lerøy on trialling insect protein in commercial feed already.
‘The availability of higher volumes of insect protein will enable the roll-out of commercial production. We see insect meal as a sustainable alternative.
‘Over the past three years, InnovaFeed and Cargill have led multiple trials demonstrating that its insect protein can be an effective alternative to fishmeal used in salmonids or shrimp feed, with equal or improved performance. Insect meal has a similar protein content and similar digestibility to fishmeal.
‘Salmon feeds have fallen from using up to 70 per cent marine ingredients in the 1990s to between 10-20 per cent, varying with customer requirements, but Cargill is also applying a policy that the marine ingredients are sourced sustainably.
‘By 2025, our ambition is that all of our marine ingredients should come from Marine Stewardship Council certified fisheries and today in Norway and Scotland we are nearly at 70 per cent.
‘This is also supported by our use of trimmings from fish caught for direct human consumption, contributing to the circular economy in food systems by securing important nutrients which would otherwise be wasted. Up to half of our marine ingredients purchased annually are from trimmings, depending on the local availability.’
She added: ‘While it is possible to make a series of diets that include insect meal for the lifecycle of salmon which entirely replace fishmeal using other protein sources, we do not feel that it is necessary as we continue to maintain a focus on sourcing sustainable fishmeal.
‘Our preference is to continue to use relatively small amounts of sustainably sourced fishmeal from whole fish or trimmings, complemented with other sources of protein from sustainable supply chains.
‘Our aim is not to focus on particular ingredients, but rather be able get the nutrients we need to put in the feeds from a wide range of sustainable origins.
‘To this end, we work with our suppliers to demonstrate their sustainability credentials and, where required, improve them.’
She said while the short-term focus for Cargill’s partnership with InnovaFeed is on salmon, other aquaculture species are also being considered.
Will insect protein catch on at Scottish fish farms?
Van Phi said: ‘There has been a very strong interest from salmon farmers in Scotland as insect meal is perfectly aligned with Scottish farmers’ requirements in terms of quality and sustainability.
‘There are still challenges to overcome, in particular regarding the inclusion of insect meal in the Label Rouge specifications.
‘We are actively working on them with our partners and are hopeful to resolve them in the short term.
‘InnovaFeed’s insect protein is currently being used by multiple fish farmers in Europe.
‘Insect rearing is still a very young industry. 2020 will be the first year with significant volumes of insect protein coming on the market with our industrial scale plant.’.