• Privacy Policy
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
Climate Change Dispatch
  • Home
  • Videos
  • Who We Are
  • Facts Vs. Fearmongering
    • Real science vs Junk Science
      • 1100-plus Peer-Reviewed Studies
      • 97% – Myth of the Climate Change Consensus
      • Michael Crichton: Aliens Cause Global Warming
      • Climate change and its causes
      • Climate Science Primer
      • CO2 is not pollution
      • Deceptive Surface Temperature Records
      • Editorial: Great Global Warming Hoax
      • Rules for Climate Radicals: Part 1
      • Rules for Climate Radicals: Part 2
      • Rules for Climate Radicals: Part 3
      • Why CO2 Is A Minor Player In Global Climate
      • Why Politicized Science Is So Dangerous
    • Facts Not Fear
      • A Simple Question For Climate Alarmists
      • Climate Change – The Facts
      • Climate Change Fears Are Empirically Baseless
      • Global Warming 101
      • Global Warming Q&A
      • Understanding The Medieval Warm Period
      • Ocean Cycles and Climate
      • Overview of Plate Climatology Theory
      • Precautionary Principle
      • Should We Celebrate Carbon Dioxide?
      • The Skeptics Handbook
      • Weather Versus Climate
      • Why I’m a GW skeptic
      • Winning the climate debate with facts
      • Why Aliens Cause Global Warming
    • Greenhouse FAQs
      • CO2, Plants, & Industry
      • How much have temps changed?
      • How much have temps changed?
      • How much have temps changed?
      • Is global warming real?
      • Measuring temperature
      • Swimming in CO2?
      • Scientists urge caution?
      • Today’s warming trend
      • Variations in temperature
    • Gore’s Greatest Goofs
      • Deconstructing the Truth
      • Fact-Checking Al Gore’s Latest Predictions
      • How Gore Created The Global Warming Hoax
    • Inside Real Climate
      • Closer look at the 97% Consensus
      • GW’s Amazing Story
      • IPCC gets failing grade
      • Real Climate Exposed!
      • Truth about Real Climate
      • We’ve Been Conned
      • What is there a 97% consensus about?
    • Behind the IPCC
      • 1,000 Scientists Dissent
      • Climategate: Caught Green-Handed!
      • Climategate Inquiries
      • Climategate Inquiries 2
      • NIPCC Report Now Available
      • Understanding the Climategate Inquiries
  • Submissions
  • Contact Us
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Videos
  • Who We Are
  • Facts Vs. Fearmongering
    • Real science vs Junk Science
      • 1100-plus Peer-Reviewed Studies
      • 97% – Myth of the Climate Change Consensus
      • Michael Crichton: Aliens Cause Global Warming
      • Climate change and its causes
      • Climate Science Primer
      • CO2 is not pollution
      • Deceptive Surface Temperature Records
      • Editorial: Great Global Warming Hoax
      • Rules for Climate Radicals: Part 1
      • Rules for Climate Radicals: Part 2
      • Rules for Climate Radicals: Part 3
      • Why CO2 Is A Minor Player In Global Climate
      • Why Politicized Science Is So Dangerous
    • Facts Not Fear
      • A Simple Question For Climate Alarmists
      • Climate Change – The Facts
      • Climate Change Fears Are Empirically Baseless
      • Global Warming 101
      • Global Warming Q&A
      • Understanding The Medieval Warm Period
      • Ocean Cycles and Climate
      • Overview of Plate Climatology Theory
      • Precautionary Principle
      • Should We Celebrate Carbon Dioxide?
      • The Skeptics Handbook
      • Weather Versus Climate
      • Why I’m a GW skeptic
      • Winning the climate debate with facts
      • Why Aliens Cause Global Warming
    • Greenhouse FAQs
      • CO2, Plants, & Industry
      • How much have temps changed?
      • How much have temps changed?
      • How much have temps changed?
      • Is global warming real?
      • Measuring temperature
      • Swimming in CO2?
      • Scientists urge caution?
      • Today’s warming trend
      • Variations in temperature
    • Gore’s Greatest Goofs
      • Deconstructing the Truth
      • Fact-Checking Al Gore’s Latest Predictions
      • How Gore Created The Global Warming Hoax
    • Inside Real Climate
      • Closer look at the 97% Consensus
      • GW’s Amazing Story
      • IPCC gets failing grade
      • Real Climate Exposed!
      • Truth about Real Climate
      • We’ve Been Conned
      • What is there a 97% consensus about?
    • Behind the IPCC
      • 1,000 Scientists Dissent
      • Climategate: Caught Green-Handed!
      • Climategate Inquiries
      • Climategate Inquiries 2
      • NIPCC Report Now Available
      • Understanding the Climategate Inquiries
  • Submissions
  • Contact Us
No Result
View All Result
Climate Change Dispatch
No Result
View All Result

Can Bug Eating End U.S. And African Protein Shortages?

by Paul Driessen, guest post
June 16, 2020, 8:27 AM
in News and Opinion
Reading Time: 6 mins read
A A
3

insect food bugsNearly two centuries ago, amid a fungal infestation that destroyed Irish potato crops and brought famine, starvation, death, and the emigration of countless men, women, and children, Gulliver’s Travels author Dr. Jonathon Swift offered “A Modest Proposal for preventing the children of poor people in Ireland from being a burden on their parents or country, and for making them beneficial to the publick [sic].”

Dr. Swift suggested that children too young to work could be eaten in place of potatoes. As he explained, “a young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious, nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee or a ragout.”

Surely, he said, this is preferable to aborting unborn or murdering newly born children.

Of course, his proposal was only in jest, a sly response to the callous disregard many of his countrymen displayed toward the Irish tragedy and the plight of poor families throughout the United Kingdom.

Today, despite enormous advances in seeds, fertilizers, irrigation, mechanized equipment, pest control, and agricultural practices, famine still stalks dozens of countries, especially in Africa.

Millions still live on the edge of starvation, all too often kept there by despicable government agencies, pressure groups, and financiers that despise modern agriculture, promote “agro-ecology” and even oppose Golden Rice.

Africa’s poverty, malnutrition, despair, and premature death have been made even worse this year by one of the worst plagues of desert locusts in memory. Swarms numbering in the billions descended on East Africa, which was completely unprepared to cope with them.

The first swarms unleashed even larger second and third waves, with swarms larger than Manhattan.

The insatiable insects are devouring millions of square miles of crops, pasture lands, gardens, and forests, creating massive food shortages that could cause hundreds of thousands of deaths from starvation.

Meanwhile, coronavirus outbreaks among workers forced meatpacking plants to close.

Wendy’s took burgers off the menu at many locations, and the fast-food chain’s customers are again asking “where’s the beef?” – echoing the iconic television commercials from 35 years ago.

Pork is also in short supply, even as American pork shipments to China quadrupled in recent months. Chicken too is scarce.

But now we may have a fortuitous alignment of the stars, a happy confluence of events, wherein a modest proposal for abundant food in the form of locusts could benefit the hungry “publicks” of two continents.

Up to now, we have had an unhappy confluence of sick ideologies: the belief that too many people are a cancer on the Earth, depleting fossil fuels that are destroying our climate and planet, and ignoring what former Obama science advisor John Holdren insisted was a vital need for modern societies to de-develop, de-industrialize, and dictate to still-poor countries how much they will be permitted to develop.

The ideologies have forced too many Africans to continue living primitive subsistence lifestyles or pack into impoverished cities that lack basic energy, water, roadway, communication, refrigeration, hospital, sanitation, and employment opportunities. The locust plagues could turn this awful situation around.

Enormous nets strung between two trucks or airplanes could harvest millions of locusts at a time.

Thousands could be employed constructing and operating food processing facilities, hauling insects to them, running them through roasting ovens and freeze-drying machines, packing and shipping the finished delicacies to hungry families around Africa, and North America, and teaching people to savor them.

Thousands of more jobs could be created by managing the new export and import businesses. Commercial airliners sidelined by COVID would be rejuvenated.

Millions of people could go almost overnight from hunger to enjoying what Popular Science magazine has described as delicious, nutritious food, rich in protein and all nine amino acids essential for human development.

The new meat substitutes would give entirely new meanings to “in-flight meals.”

There is yet another benefit. These activities and facilities would require reliable, affordable electricity, on a far larger scale than can possibly be provided by wind turbines and solar panels.

They will require coal, gas, nuclear, and hydroelectric power plants.

However, environmentalist pressure groups, UN agencies, the World Bank, and multilateral (anti)development banks have been telling Africans that wind and solar power must be their energy future. They and the EU clearly won’t finance those power plants.

But perhaps Chinese agencies and companies will finance and build them, as they have in many other countries – often under exploitative, extortionist loan arrangements, to be sure.

The projects could also be incentivized by a desire to resurrect China’s tarnished reputation for having unleashed the Wuhan virus on unsuspecting nations.

They might also secure special prices on locust products that would be right at home in China’s wet markets and on its television equivalent to “Bizarre Food” with Andrew Zimmern.

Popular Science expresses deep concern that “raising cattle requires a lot of space and water, and more room for cattle means less [sic] trees, which in turn means a diminished natural capacity of the planet to process carbon dioxide.”

Its writers clearly have no clue that modern non-organic farming with biotech crops enables fewer farmers to raise more crops, from less land, with less water and fewer pesticides, than any other farming methods in history – or that cattle typically graze on lands that have limited value for growing crops.

They obviously have not read any of my reports and articles about the monumental impacts that wind, solar, battery, and biofuel technologies have on farms, scenic, and wildlife habitat lands.

Instead, PopSci cites a 2013 report by the ever-helpful UN Food and Agriculture Organization, which has worked for years with radical environmentalist groups to oppose modern farming, biotech, and even hybrid seeds, synthetic insecticides and fertilizers, and even mechanized equipment like tractors.

PopSci and the FAO extol the virtues of “entomophagy,” a fancy progressive term for eating bugs, not beef.

Indeed, they say, this could be “the answer humanity is looking for.” (If that’s the answer, it must have been a very foolish question.)

The FAO report offers techniques for processing “edible insects” into tasty consumable products that can improve people’s diets and livelihoods, create thriving local businesses, and even promote the “inclusion of women.”

It has sections on overcoming the yuck factor and setting up industrial-scale processing operations. (I should have known the FAO would be ahead of me on that.)

The FAO study says bugs can have twice as much protein as beef and 1.5 times as much as fish and poultry. PopSci sings the praises of grasshoppers, locusts, crickets, ants, and mealworms – whole or powdered – like snacks, desserts, guacamole, or entire meals.

Mealworms have “an earthy flavor, similar to mushrooms or beets,” says Joseph Yoon, chef and founder of Brooklyn Bugs, a “catering company and education platform” in New York that serves an entire menu featuring insects.

You can add them to brownies – or toss some salt on sautéed mealworms to get “protein-boosted potato chips.”

Since they are committed to saving the planet from fossil fuels, climate change, big corporations, and modern technologies, people attending the next UN climate confab in November 2021 in Glasgow should expect to dine on an entire smorgasbord of tasty locusts and other bugs.

Perhaps they can be paired with haggis, Scotland’s savory traditional pudding of bone broth, sheep heart, liver and lungs, onion, oatmeal, suet, and spices, cooked together in the animal’s stomach.

Back here in the States, for the same reason, those delectable African locusts could figure prominently at the upcoming Democratic National convention in Wisconsin’s Brew City this August.

They would pair very nicely with those pilsner beers that made Milwaukee famous.

Personally, though, I’ll stick with hearty beef, lamb, chicken, ribs – and really big bugs: shrimp, lobster, crabs, and crawfish – served up at the Republican National Convention, accompanied by a good IPA.


Paul Driessen is a senior policy analyst for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (www.CFACT.org) and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power, Black Death, and other books and articles on energy, environment, climate, and human rights issues

  • Truth
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Gettr
  • Threads
  • gab-logo Gab
  • Mastodon
  • Buffer
  • Telegram
  • Email
  • Copy Link
  • Share Using More Networks…

Popular Posts

Electric Vehicles (EVs)

The ‘Green’ Scam Of The Century: How ‘Renewables’ Increase Fossil Fuel Demands

Oct 23, 2024
News and Opinion

Antarctica Is Colder, Icier Today Than At Any Time In 5,000 Years

Apr 15, 2024
Energy

30-Plus Signs That The Climate Scam Is Collapsing

Apr 09, 2025

Comments 3

  1. Sonnyhill says:
    5 years ago

    Thanks Paul. That was a enjoyable read.

  2. Christine Nore says:
    5 years ago

    Insects carry all sorts of parasites and it would be naive to assume they would not like a mammal host.

  3. Spurwing Plover says:
    5 years ago

    And of course those idiots from PETA will oppose eating bugs they demand we all go Vegan since PETA was founded by a total Nut

Stay Connected On Social Media

gab-logo

Donate Today

Beating back the alarmist narrative takes time and money. Please donate today to help!

Recent Posts

  • COP30 Amazon17 Republican AGs Urge Trump Admin To Skip COP30 Over Green Energy Policies
    Oct 24, 2025
    The attorneys general say attending COP30 would back costly, unreliable wind and solar and risk U.S. energy security. […]
  • severe storm over cityClimate Expert Reveals Latest Scandal Tied To Billion-Dollar Disasters
    Oct 24, 2025
    Climate Central takes over the Billion-Dollar Disasters tabulation, sparking fresh controversy over its methods and motives. […]
  • ocean sun cloudsNew Study Finds 75% Of Rising Ocean Heat Likely Natural, CO2 Not A Factor
    Oct 24, 2025
    Study shows ocean warming driven mostly by natural cycles, not greenhouse gas emissions, challenging mainstream global warming narratives. […]
  • LNG terminal in germanyU.S. And Qatar Push Back On EU’s Climate Mandates That Threaten LNG Exports
    Oct 24, 2025
    U.S. and Qatari officials warn that the EU’s latest climate regulations under CSDDD could endanger Europe’s access to affordable natural gas. […]
  • marines trainingCrazy Hill Op-Ed Demands Generals Respond To Climate Change ‘National Security’ Threat
    Oct 23, 2025
    The Hill warns of climate Armageddon unless U.S. generals join the fight against ‘Mother Nature,’ now deemed a national security threat. […]
  • Shipping port near power plantEurope’s Energy Crisis Shows Net Zero Dogma Comes At A Cost
    Oct 23, 2025
    While China’s rare earth threat exposes U.S. supply chain risks, Europe’s energy crisis shows how net zero policies backfired spectacularly. […]
  • wind farm climate outDemocrats Ditch Climate Messaging As Rising Utility Costs Hit Voters
    Oct 23, 2025
    As Democrats struggle with climate messaging, voters feel the pinch from rising utility bills and the party's costly green energy policies. […]
  • Protest system change not climate changeLead Attorney Admits Real Goal Of Climate Lawsuits: Backdoor Carbon Tax
    Oct 23, 2025
    A top lawyer spearheading climate lawsuits says the quiet part out loud: litigation is a backdoor carbon tax on oil companies and consumers. […]
  • WMO reportHow The World Meteorological Organization Lies To You—Using Your Taxes
    Oct 22, 2025
    The WMO’s 2025 greenhouse gas report hides key data that undercuts the so-called climate 'crisis' narrative—funded by your tax dollars. […]
  • Hurricane generating ocean waves2025 Hurricane Season Is Flopping As Alarmist Predictions Fail
    Oct 22, 2025
    The 2025 hurricane season so far has seen no major U.S. landfalls, exposing alarmists’ failed predictions of catastrophic storms. […]

Get Instant Email Notifications

Subscribe to receive a digest of daily stories, or get emailed once they're published. Check your Junk/Spam folder for a verification email.

Submit a tip

Please enter your email, so we know you're human.

Books You May Like

exposing great lie

Have a suggestion? Let us know! We swap out books based on your input. We participate in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program. See here.

  • About
  • Privacy Policy
  • Contact Us

© Portions copyright Climate Change Dispatch

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Videos
  • Who We Are
  • Facts Vs. Fearmongering
    • Real science vs Junk Science
      • 1100-plus Peer-Reviewed Studies
      • 97% – Myth of the Climate Change Consensus
      • Michael Crichton: Aliens Cause Global Warming
      • Climate change and its causes
      • Climate Science Primer
      • CO2 is not pollution
      • Deceptive Surface Temperature Records
      • Editorial: Great Global Warming Hoax
      • Rules for Climate Radicals: Part 1
      • Rules for Climate Radicals: Part 2
      • Rules for Climate Radicals: Part 3
      • Why CO2 Is A Minor Player In Global Climate
      • Why Politicized Science Is So Dangerous
    • Facts Not Fear
      • A Simple Question For Climate Alarmists
      • Climate Change – The Facts
      • Climate Change Fears Are Empirically Baseless
      • Global Warming 101
      • Global Warming Q&A
      • Understanding The Medieval Warm Period
      • Ocean Cycles and Climate
      • Overview of Plate Climatology Theory
      • Precautionary Principle
      • Should We Celebrate Carbon Dioxide?
      • The Skeptics Handbook
      • Weather Versus Climate
      • Why I’m a GW skeptic
      • Winning the climate debate with facts
      • Why Aliens Cause Global Warming
    • Greenhouse FAQs
      • CO2, Plants, & Industry
      • How much have temps changed?
      • How much have temps changed?
      • How much have temps changed?
      • Is global warming real?
      • Measuring temperature
      • Swimming in CO2?
      • Scientists urge caution?
      • Today’s warming trend
      • Variations in temperature
    • Gore’s Greatest Goofs
      • Deconstructing the Truth
      • Fact-Checking Al Gore’s Latest Predictions
      • How Gore Created The Global Warming Hoax
    • Inside Real Climate
      • Closer look at the 97% Consensus
      • GW’s Amazing Story
      • IPCC gets failing grade
      • Real Climate Exposed!
      • Truth about Real Climate
      • We’ve Been Conned
      • What is there a 97% consensus about?
    • Behind the IPCC
      • 1,000 Scientists Dissent
      • Climategate: Caught Green-Handed!
      • Climategate Inquiries
      • Climategate Inquiries 2
      • NIPCC Report Now Available
      • Understanding the Climategate Inquiries
  • Submissions
  • Contact Us

© 2025 Climate Change Dispatch

 
Share via
  • Facebook
  • Like
  • Twitter
  • Pinterest
  • LinkedIn
  • Digg
  • Tumblr
  • VKontakte
  • Print
  • Email
  • Reddit
  • Buffer
  • Love This
  • Weibo
  • Pocket
  • Xing
  • Odnoklassniki
  • WhatsApp
  • Meneame
  • Blogger
  • Amazon
  • Yahoo Mail
  • Gmail
  • AOL
  • Newsvine
  • HackerNews
  • Evernote
  • MySpace
  • Mail.ru
  • Viadeo
  • Line
  • Flipboard
  • Comments
  • SMS
  • Viber
  • Telegram
  • Subscribe
  • Facebook Messenger
  • Kakao
  • LiveJournal
  • Yammer
  • Edgar
  • Fintel
  • Mix
  • Instapaper
  • Copy Link
  • Truth
  • gab-logo Gab
  • Gettr
  • Baidu
  • Mastodon
  • Threads
  • Bluesky
Share via
  • Digg
  • Tumblr
  • VKontakte
  • Print
  • Email
  • Reddit
  • Buffer
  • Love This
  • Weibo
  • Pocket
  • Xing
  • Odnoklassniki
  • WhatsApp
  • Meneame
  • Blogger
  • Amazon
  • Yahoo Mail
  • Gmail
  • AOL
  • Newsvine
  • HackerNews
  • Evernote
  • MySpace
  • Mail.ru
  • Viadeo
  • Line
  • Flipboard
  • Comments
  • SMS
  • Viber
  • Telegram
  • Subscribe
  • Facebook Messenger
  • Kakao
  • LiveJournal
  • Yammer
  • Edgar
  • Fintel
  • Mix
  • Instapaper
  • Copy Link
  • Truth
  • gab-logo Gab
  • Gettr
  • Baidu
  • Mastodon
  • Threads
  • Bluesky