Status of the regulatory environment for utilization of insects as food and feed in Sub-Saharan Africa-a review

Abstract

A conducive regulatory environment is crucial for ensuring the safety and effective promotion of insects for direct and indirect human consumption. In this review, national and regional policies, regulations, and relevant publications in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) were examined for their take on the use of insects as food and feed. Majority of the SSA countries (91.7%) lacked food safety policies, and of the four countries (8.3%) that had, only one considered the ‘risk-based approach’ for assessing food safety. Two policies, one in Malawi and the other in Tanzania respectively, recognized insects’ use. The lack of regulatory frameworks in most SSA countries is partly attributed to inadequate scientific data regarding insects’ biological, chemical and physical safety. This potentially exposes consumers to health hazards and limits income from insect and insect-based food and feed operations. However, some information and/or data to inform policy, and in a few cases to develop standards, has been generated by several research and development projects in the region. The need for supportive regulations toward the use of insects has been recognized and is being acted upon in a number of SSA countries. For effective promotion of insects as food and feed in SSA, countries need to generate risk assessment data as recommended by Codex Alimentarius and develop and implement relevant standards.

Keywords:

• Insects for food and feed
• consumer safety
• policy
• regulations
• codex
• alternative protein

Acknowledgements

This review was done with the financial support from the International Development Research Center (IDRC) and the Australia Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) through the NSFEED (Integrating Insects in Fish and Poultry Feed in Kenya and Uganda) project and the INSBIZ project funded by Bio-Innovate Africa Phase II Program. The contribution of the INSFEED and INSBIZ project research teams and partners in Kenya and Uganda is acknowledged.