On 15 May, we organised, together with Biif (Belgian Insect Industry Federation) and the Flemish Department of Agriculture and Fisheries an all day event on edible insects.
A stakeholders meeting in the morning brought us great insights on :
- The current novel food legislation applying to edible insects (presented by Isabelle Laquiere from the Federal Public Service Health, Food Chain Safety and Environment)
- The Belgian insect producer sector (presented by Tom Van den Bogaert from he Flemish Department of Agriculture and Fisheries). We discovered that mealworms is the most popular insect and West Flanders the most active province in the country.
- Our colleague at ValuSect Christine Brombach (ZHAW) highlighted some important factors influencing consumers to eat insects (or not): Food neophobia, disgust, the available information, curiosity...
The whole day, stands with insects producers and ValuSect were open to the general public. We noticed a great enthusiasm and curiosity for edible insects. The visitors got the opportunity to taste various insect snacks and enjoyed this delicious sustainable protein.
Please find here the stakeholdersmeeting presentations:
- Eating insects: is the policy ready? - Isabelle Laquiere
- Eating insects: is the sector ready? - Tom Van den Bogaert
- Eating insects: is the consumer ready? - Christine Brombach
