Humans need to become insectivorous and to encourage this imperative the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization is sponsoring an event titled “Forest Insects as Food: Humans Bite Back” in Chiang Mai, Thailand. The NY Times reports today that among the topics to be addressed at the workshop later this month is “Why douse fields with pesticides if the bugs we kill are more nutritious than the crops they eat?” Of course NY Times coverage would not be complete without the obligitory food do-gooder to disabuse meat and potatoes Americans of the notion that bugs are, well, yucky.
The Times folks trot out one David Gracer: “one of a small but growing number of people earnestly working to transcend the yuck factor. By day, Gracer teaches expository writing at the Community College of Rhode Island. By night, he stalks America’s elite chefs with an electric wok and Tupperware stuffed with six-legged critters in an attempt to convince them that consuming insects is both pleasing to the palate and good for the planet.”
Says Gracer; “Insects can feed the world. Cows and pigs are the S.U.V.’s; bugs are the bicycles.”
Source: NY Times Magazine 2/10/08
Also see “Insect Cuisine: Good for You”
“Food Insect Festivals of North America”
New article today on our Global Warming..page.
Tags: david gracer, eating bugs, human food supply, insect cuisine, insects as food
ConservaCity 
Leave a Reply