Mealworms as an environmentally sustainable solution to malnutrition and food insecurity
Authors: Elizabeth Frank, Gabrielle Wimer
Journal: The Lancet Planetary Health (2018)

Guatemala has the sixth highest prevalence of chronic malnutrition in children younger than 5 years in the world (50%), and indigenous populations are disproportionately affected (70%). Guatemala is also one of the ten countries established by the World Food Programme to be most vulnerable to natural disasters and the effects of climate change. Thus, an effective strategy to improve nutrition and increase food security must be environmentally sustainable and adaptable to environmental change. Programmes that focus on providing families with nutritional supplements are not financially sustainable because communities become dependent on aid. Furthermore, supplements are not environmentally sustainable because of the packaging waste associated with processing, along with greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation required to deliver them to beneficiaries. Attempts to avoid supplement disbursements by helping families maintain livestock as a source of protein are costly. Thus, the growing edible insect movement provides a promising, affordable, and environmentally sustainable solution. Raising insects is cheap, and requires minimal space, food, and water. MealFlour works in Guatemala and embraces a planetary health approach to reducing malnutrition and increasing food security by working with local Guatemalan partners to teach people how to raise mealworms as an affordable and environmentally sustainable source of protein. Roasted mealworms are 55% protein, release no methane (in contrast to cows, which are responsible for 30% of global methane emissions), and require little water (2000 times less than cows). The farms reduce waste because they can be built from upcycled materials such as jerry cans or water containers, and mealworms eat organic waste such as banana peels. MealFlour's ongoing pilot programme, which started in October, 2016, is taking place in the community of Candelaria, in Quetzaltenango in the western highlands of Guatemala. Five women were recruited from the nutrition programme at MealFlour's partner non-governmental organisation, Primeros Pasos, to participate in a 6-week training course that reviewed how to build mealworm farms (of which each unit is a square foot in size, and multiple units can be combined to increase production), how to take care of the mealworms, and how to process the mealworms into a powder. Since the programme started, all five women have maintained their farm and have steadily improved their mealworm farming skills, as evidenced by exit surveys showing that all of the women understood proper farm maintenance. Four of the five women have begun eating the mealworms and preparing them for their children, whereas the fifth woman is waiting to increase the production of her farm before eating the mealworms. The optimal temperature for mealworm farming is 25·5–27·0°C, so one challenge for the MealFlour pilot project was adapting the process to the colder climate of Candelaria. Collaborative monthly focus groups allowed participants to share ideas about how to warm the farm, which included keeping it in the kitchen and insulating the farm with blankets. Other challenges include finding strong local partners who can take over the programme and the long-term follow-up, as well as developing a network for information sharing on best practices for mealworm farming. Funding Our work is funded by the HealthRoots Foundation, the University of Chicago, the Resolution Project, and by generous private donors. Contributors EF and GW contributed equally to the study design, project implementation, data collection, analysis, and interpretation. Declaration of interests We declare no competing interests. Acknowledgments We would like to acknowledge the women of Candelaria who participated in our pilot programme, Joyce Lu who contributed to the study design, and our partner organisation, Primeros Pasos.