Salmon and Black Soldier fly, anyone?
Bid to feed farmed fish bugs branded ‘recipe for disaster’
SALMON farmed in Scotland could soon be fed a ‘stomach-churning’ diet of ground-up flies, under plans by a recycling body backed by the Scottish Government.
The Zero Waste Scotland quango has proposed the creation of insect farms where food waste would be used to fatten up millions of Black Soldier flies.
The larvae would then be harvested and fed to caged salmon in fish farms across the country.
Zero Waste Scotland believes it would cut financial and environmental costs for the fish-farming industry – worth nearly £2 billion a year – by providing a cheaper, more sustainable source of ‘high-quality protein’.
But critics yesterday warned that many shoppers would be disgusted by the practice – and said it could lead to the spread of disease.
Don Staniford, director of Scottish Salmon Watch, said: ‘Tinkering with Mother Nature is a recipe for disaster.
‘Scottish salmon is stomach-churning stuff already without the addition of insects to the feed. I don’t think consumers would love the idea of eating farmed fish fed on insects.’
The proposal to feed salmon groundup flies follows other controversies about fish-farming. In 2016, The Scottish Mail on Sunday revealed plans to make fish food from abattoir waste rich in protein from slaughtered poultry – including offal, blood and ground-up bone and feathers.
Mr Staniford said fish farmers who had previously turned to that ‘revolting’ idea were now ‘scraping the bottom of the barrel’ with the insect proposal. But
Coming soon to a fish-counter near you, the salmon that’s truly fowl...
quango chiefs said the idea, set out in a report published last week, could be a ‘game-changer’ for Scottish salmon and the wider economy and environment.
The move would have been impossible until recently because of a blanket ban on animal-sourced meal for livestock imposed by the EU in the wake of the mad cow disease crisis.
But the restriction on insect feed was lifted for fish farms in 2017 after the European Food Safety Authority concluded that – provided insects were not fed on, or in contact with, animal products – they posed no greater threat of disease than existing legal foodstuffs.
The Zero Waste Scotland report states: ‘Extensive testing has shown the flies do not carry human or livestock diseases... previous studies found favourable attitudes towards using insect meal among fish farmers and consumers.’
Report co-author Michael Lenaghan said: ‘This is a fascinating and potentially game-changing opportunity.’
Dr Richard Dixon, of Friends of the Earth Scotland, said: ‘I’m pretty sure the fish-farming industry is nowhere near ready to embrace this food source, fearing a backlash that would damage their attempts to present farmed fish as a luxury, natural product.’
The Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation said flies were a natural food for fish, adding: ‘We are monitoring these exciting developments closely to establish whether it might become commercially viable.’