Insects eat our crops. Millions of rand are spent annually in South Africa controlling insects that eat our crops. Insecticides are the one way of controlling pests but they have undesirable side-effects on our health and the environment so the preferred method is biological control where entomologists find beneficial parasitic and predatory insects such as parasitic wasps and ladybird beetles that can be released to control the pests. Insects eat our stored food. There are many other stored product pests that can cause serious food losses and some of these you will have encountered in your kitchen if dry foods are left unprotected in your cupboard for too long.
Insects maim and kill our livestock.
The sheep blowfly Lucilia cuprina causes about a R20 million loss to the South African wool and mutton industries per year. Insects provide us with food. Insects recycle waste. Dung beetles bury dung and prevent it from building up and acting as a breeding site for flies. Flies and beetles breed in dead animals and consume the flesh and skin resulting in nutrient recycling and cleaning up of the landscape.