＜prologue＞
I started a blog called “The Baby Boomer Generation’s Miscellaneous Blog”（Dankai-sedai no garakutatyou:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳） in July 2018, about a year before I fully retired. More than six years have passed since then, and the number of articles has increased considerably.
So, in order to make them accessible to people who don’t understand Japanese, I decided to translate my past articles into English and publish them.
It may sound a bit exaggerated, but I would like to make this my life’s work.
It should be noted that haiku and waka （Japanese short fixed form poems） are quite difficult to translate into English, so some parts are written in Japanese.
If you are interested in haiku or waka and would like to know more, please read introductory or specialized books on haiku or waka written in English.
I also write many articles about the Japanese language. I would be happy if these inspire more people to want to learn Japanese.
my blog’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳 | 団塊世代が雑学や面白い話を発信しています
my X’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多帳（@historia49) on X
<Added March 11, 2024> “Eating” Nuisance Stink Bugs Wins SDG Grand Prize
At a competition for high school students to present their ideas for achieving the SDGs (held for the first time in Iwate Prefecture), a student from Kuzumaki High School won the top prize for their “Eating Nuisance Stink Bugs.”
The idea of turning stink bugs, which are proliferating in the region, into food was highly praised for its innovative approach of turning a nuisance pest into a local attraction.
Kuzumaki High School student Mio Yoshida said, “I’m incredibly happy. Stink bugs are all around us, so I’d love it if they became popular and even became a home-cooked dish.”
However, the very concept of the SDGs is questionable, and since “insect eating” has proven a failure with crickets, I don’t think stink bugs, let alone crickets, would be acceptable to Japanese people.
<Added 2024/2/17> Cricket company goes bankrupt, highlighting Japanese people’s rejection of eating insects
Cricket Farm, a company that cultivates and sells edible crickets, has filed for bankruptcy, along with its parent company, causing a stir. While edible insects have been gaining attention as a valuable protein source that could help alleviate the food crisis, many people strongly reject them.
Cricket Farm was founded in 2021 and sold products containing cricket powder, an environmentally friendly next-generation food. Despite high hopes, receiving a syndicated loan of 41 million yen from Suwa Shinkin Bank and the Japan Finance Corporation, the business failed to get off the ground and ceased operations at the end of last year. The total debt of the three companies, including the parent company, is said to be 242.9 million yen, highlighting the lack of public acceptance of edible crickets.
In 2013, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) published a report stating that edible insects could be an effective solution to the food crisis. They were also recommended as a valuable protein source at the 2015 UN Summit, attracting attention, particularly in Europe and the United States.
In Japan, MUJI made headlines in 2020 when it sold “cricket crackers.” In 2022, a high school in Tokushima Prefecture sparked controversy by serving pumpkin croquettes containing dried cricket powder as school lunches, resulting in a flood of complaints from people saying, “Don’t let your children eat insects.”
In response to the news of Cricket Farm’s bankruptcy, idol group Kamen Joshi member Tomoka Igari posted on X, “There are other things to eat at the moment, so I don’t feel like eating crickets,” which likely reflects the true feelings of many Japanese people.
While many people are left wondering, “Why should we be encouraging the eating of insects when ehomaki is wasted in large quantities as food waste?”, it’s undeniable that the government has been a little too forward-thinking when it comes to the food crisis and the SDGs.
Japan is currently facing various issues, including a shrinking workforce and increased pension burdens for young people due to a declining population caused by a low birthrate. Looking at the world as a whole, however, we are on the brink of an era of food shortages due to a population explosion.
Amid this, eating insects is attracting attention.
1. Population Explosion
The current world population is approximately 7.7 billion. It’s estimated that in 1900, the population was approximately 1.5 billion, meaning that the population has increased by 6.2 billion in just over 100 years.
Various factors have been attributed to the population explosion, including rapid advances in medicine and science, advances in food production technology, the British Industrial Revolution at the end of the 18th century, and the colonial policies of European powers.
Whatever the cause, the biggest factor is that we have moved from a time of high child mortality and high birth rates to a time of low birth rates and low death rates, where mortality rates have declined due to improvements in medicine and food conditions.
While developed countries are currently experiencing population decline or slight increases, developing countries in Africa, the Middle East, South America, Southeast Asia, and elsewhere are experiencing a population explosion.
Securing food and water resources has become a serious issue due to factors such as environmental pollution, global warming, and climate change, in addition to the population explosion.
2. The Age of Food Shortages
According to a 2016 research report published by a think tank at Lloyds Bank in the UK, the world’s population is expected to reach approximately 9 billion by 2050, leading to serious food shortages in countries around the world.
The “World Population Prospects” published by the United Nations in 2013 predicted that the world’s population would reach approximately 9.6 billion by 2050 and 10.9 billion by 2100.
Countries around the world are racing to develop vaccines in response to the novel coronavirus pneumonia, and it is expected that a “scramble for a vaccine whose effectiveness and safety has been confirmed” will ensue.
Similarly, the population explosion is threatening a global food shortage. For countries like Japan, whose food self-sufficiency rate is as low as 39%, this could pose a life-or-death issue of “food security” in the form of a “food war” if they are unable to import enough food.
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) also predicts that food production needs to increase by 60% by 2050 to address food shortages caused by the population explosion, but achieving this goal will be difficult.
I believe Japan should do everything it can to increase its food self-sufficiency rate (ideally to 100%, as it was before the Edo period), cut off its supply chain reliance on imports from China and other countries, and establish a self-sufficient system as soon as possible.
3. Eating insects
In Africa, Australia, South America, and Asian countries such as Thailand and China, eating insects has continued as a traditional part of food culture.
Currently, at least 2 billion people around the world eat approximately 1,900 species of insects.
Even in mountainous areas of Japan, such as Nagano Prefecture, it is customary to eat bee larvae and locusts as a valuable source of protein.
Insects that are eaten around the world include scarab beetles, caterpillars, wasps, grasshoppers, cicadas, termites, dragonflies, and flies.
As for flavor, cicadas are said to have a nutty taste, giant hornet larvae have the texture of pufferfish milt, migratory locusts have a texture similar to shrimp or crab, and male Taiwan giant water bugs have the scent of pear.
(1) Benefits of Eating Insects
① High Nutritional Value
For human consumption, white rice provides approximately 170 kcal per 100 grams, while insects provide approximately 400-500 kcal.
When comparing the animal protein content of grasshoppers and pork at the same weight, grasshoppers contain more.
Depending on the type of insect, they can be rich in vitamins, and insects also have lower cholesterol levels in their fat than pork or beef.
② Low unit cost of raising insects and less environmental impact
Raising larger livestock requires more feed and water, with pork being more expensive than chicken and beef being more expensive than pork. For example, approximately 8 kg of feed is required to produce 1 kg of beef. In contrast, only 2 kg is required to produce 1 kg of insect meat.
It is also believed that pigs produce 10 to 100 times more greenhouse gases than mealworms (mealworm larvae).
Insect farming is attracting attention as a “food of the future” and “space food” due to its low environmental impact, water consumption, and land requirements.
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has proposed that, in order to overcome food shortages in the future, insect farming should first be started as a way to “produce livestock feed.”
(2) Disadvantages of eating insects
① They look gross.
When I was in high school, the biology club members had a tasting session of grilled locusts at our school festival, but no one wanted to eat them.
I think many Japanese people view insect eating as “gross,” “creepy,” or “eating something weird” based on its appearance.
Unless it’s processed, such as into a powder, I don’t think it would be generally accepted in Japan in its raw form.
② Safety Issues
Wild-collected insects can pose safety issues because we don’t know where or what they ate. Therefore, just like wild game dishes, eating them raw is strictly prohibited and they must always be cooked.
Insects also spoil easily, so picking and cooking dead insects is dangerous.
③ Allergy Risks
As long as insects are handled in a hygienic environment, there are few known cases of humans transmitting diseases or parasites, but more research is needed.
In addition, poisonous insects and those that feed on the nectar of poisonous flowers should be avoided.
Furthermore, because insects are closely related to crabs and shrimp, they may also cause shellfish allergies.
④ High Unit Price
Surprisingly, in Thailand and Africa, insects are considered a “luxury food” and are traded for more than 10 times the price of meat.
The reason for this is that most insects are “wild-collected” and are small, making capture time-consuming and labor-intensive, resulting in high labor costs.
Incidentally, bee larvae and locusts sold in Japan are expensive, even if they are processed from cheaper Chinese or Korean products.