'Ÿnsect focused on producing insect protein for animal feed and pet food'

Surely nothing could go wrong feeding herbivorous animals a diet of insect protein...

mikestew 8 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Especially when you could have just fed them the grain directly:

…factory-scale insect production typically ends up relying on cereal by-products that are already usable as animal feed — meaning insect protein just adds an expensive extra step. For animal feed, the math simply wasn’t working.

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odie5533 8 hours ago | parent | next [-]

They fooled investors with the sustainability angle. What a huge waste of money on a terrible idea cloaked in lies about sustainability.

	▲	benregenspan 8 hours ago \| parent [-]
		It seems like their pet food business (where they were competing with input-intensive meat products) could genuinely have been sustainable, if they hadn't taken so much time to figure out that competing on livestock feed is hopeless.

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ErroneousBosh 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This sounds like "draff", or distillery mash, where you get a huge lorryload of spent grain from brewing for very little money, which is still pretty damn nutritious for cows and sheep.

Better than letting it sit and rot, emitting massive amounts of methane in the process.

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7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

[deleted]

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Alex2037 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

plant protein is vastly inferior to animal protein. they don't feed livestock fishmeal for the hell of it.

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Fnoord 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The quote you make doesn't mention herbivores.

Cat food contains insect protein, and cats are carnivores. They even catch and eat insects themselves.

In contrast, cats are being fed grains which they wouldn't naturally eat.

Moreover, insects are a cheap source of animal protein.

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thayne 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Not all agricultural animals are herbivores. Pigs and chickens are both omnivores. Also insects are probably good feed for some species of farmed fish.

	▲	geon 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Cows and horses are opportunistic omnivores.

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conception 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

From the article looks like fish feed.

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guywithahat 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I mean most pets are carnivores or omnivores, it sounds to me like they just scaled up before they had really found product-market fit