Love your dog, but worried about the environmental impact of their meat-heavy diet? Now one British company is offering a solution — feed your pooch insects instead. It launched a dry dog food on Thursday made from black soldier fly larvae in a bid to tackle the “carbon pawprint” created by pets in the animal-loving nation.
“One of the very best things we can do for the environment is to reduce our meat consumption, but up until now there haven’t been many options for our carnivorous four-legged friends,” said Tom Neish, the brains behind Yora dog food.
There are nearly 9 million dogs in Britain where almost half of adults own a pet, according to the PDSA veterinary charity.
Photo: Screen grab from Facebook
照片：擷圖自臉書
Studies suggest pets consume about a fifth of the world’s meat and fish, and a dog’s carbon footprint is more than twice that of a 4x4 car, according to Yora. Compared to beef farming, it said the grubs need just 2 percent of the land and 4 percent of the water to produce each kilogram of protein, which means they generate 96 percent less greenhouse emissions. The grubs are grown on vegetable waste at a Dutch farm and the left over matter provides fertilizer for crops.
Neish said a teaspoon of fly eggs could create 100kg of high-protein larvae in 14 days. “It’s an amazing nutrient cycle that has been underutilized,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. “Insects have been part of the food cycle since the beginning of time, but we just haven’t been tapping into it.”
Vet Rory Cowlam, who stars in the BBC TV show “The Pets Factor”, predicted other pet food companies would follow suit. “Insect protein is a really sustainable way of producing protein,” he added. “I think it’s really exciting and I’m sure we’re going to see a huge trend now.”
Photo: AFP
照片：法新社
Yora is named after one of the last uncontacted tribes in the Amazon rainforest, which is threatened by the rising demand for farmland to meet the world’s booming appetite for meat.
But Neish, who is developing a similar food for cats, admitted it could be a challenge to persuade the public to “get over the ick factor.” “Once you overcome your preconceptions it’s actually quite tasty,” he added. “It has a slightly mushroomy flavor. I’ve tasted quite a few insects in my trials because I don’t think I should feed a dog anything I wouldn’t eat myself.”
(Reuters)
Photo: Screen grab from YouTube
照片：擷圖自YouTube
寵愛你的狗兒，卻又擔心牠們重度仰賴肉食的飲食習慣會對環境造成衝擊嗎？一家英國公司現在提出了解決方案──改用昆蟲來為餵養你的狗。這家公司上週四推出了一種由黑水虻幼蟲製成的乾狗糧，為這愛動物的國家解決寵物所製造的碳足跡問題。
「我們可以為環境做的最好的事之一，就是減少對肉類的食用量，但到目前為止，我們肉食性的四條腿朋友並沒有太多選擇」，Yora 牌狗食背後的智囊湯姆‧奈許說。
據獸醫慈善組織PDSA統計，在英國有近九百萬隻狗，近半數的成年人飼有寵物。
Photo: Screen grab from Facebook
照片：擷圖自臉書
Yora 公司說，據研究顯示，全世界約五分之一的肉類和魚類產量是由寵物所食用，一隻狗所產生的碳足跡，是一輛四輪驅動汽車的兩倍多。與肉牛畜牧業相比，以昆蟲的幼蟲生產每公斤蛋白質，只需要百分之二的土地面積，以及百分之四的水，這表示它可減少百分之九十六的溫室氣體排放。這些幼蟲是在荷蘭一座農場中以廢棄蔬菜飼養，吃剩的東西則可當作農作物的肥料。
奈許說，一茶匙量的黑水虻蟲卵，可以在十四天內孵化出一百公斤的高蛋白幼蟲。「這是令人驚奇的養分循環，但尚未被充分利用」，他對湯森路透基金會說。「昆蟲從一開始就是食物循環的一部分，我們只是還沒有去發掘它。」
主持英國廣播公司電視節目「寵物因素」的獸醫洛利‧考蘭姆預測，其他寵物食品公司也將紛起效尤。「昆蟲蛋白質的生產，是一種真正永續的蛋白質生產方式」，他補充道。「我覺得這真是令人振奮，相信這將蔚為趨勢。」
該公司之名「Yora」，是源自亞馬遜熱帶雨林中最後一個未與外界接觸的部落「尤拉」。為滿足世界對肉類大量增長的需求而不斷擴展的農地，讓尤拉部落飽受威脅。
但正在研發類似貓食的奈許承認，要說服大眾去「克服覺得它噁心的心理」可能充滿挑戰。「你一旦克服了自己先入為主的看法，會發現它其實還蠻好吃的」，他補充道。「它有一種略帶蘑菇味的味道。我試吃了很多昆蟲，因為我覺得不該餵狗吃我自己不想吃的東西。」
（台北時報林俐凱編譯）
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