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Meat producers should replace cattle with insects, scientists say
The rearing of cattle and pigs for meat production results in an estimated
18 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. With worldwide consumption
of beef and pork expected to double by 2020, alternatives are being
investigated. Of these, perhaps the most notable has been the development of
"in-vitro meat" which is lab-grown tissue not requiring the production of a
whole organism. Initiated by NASA as a form of astronaut food, in-vitro meat
production took its first steps in 2000 when scientists used goldfish cells
to grow edible protein resembling fish fillets. Since then, turkey and pig
cells have been used to create spam-like substances, and Time Magazine has
included in-vitro meat in its list of the top 50 breakthrough ideas of 2009.
In addition to the environmental impact of current meat production
techniques, scientists believe that the inevitable increase in price as
population-driven demand grows will ultimately result in traditional meat products
becoming unavailable to many people around the world.
However, if the idea of eating meat grown in a lab doesn't appeal to you,
there is another option.
Researchers at Wageningen University in the Netherlands looked at
mealworms, house crickets, migratory locusts, sun beetles, and Dubia cockroaches,
and for the first time quantified the amounts of methane (CH4) and nitrous
oxide (N2O) released per kilogram of insect meat. They found that the
amounts of gases released by insects to be much smaller than those released by
cattle and pigs. For instance, mealworms produce between ten and a hundred
times less greenhouse gas emissions per kilogram than do pigs. Ammonia levels
also declined significantly.
Article continues:
http://news.mongabay.com/2011/0109-morgan_insect_meat.html
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