The EU has officially approved the use of shredded mealworms as food products. The beetle powder evangelists are adamant that a small dosage of the additive will benefit both the environment and our nutrition. But the skeptics maintain that devouring insects has never been a gastronomic staple in Europe. Who is it that is pushing the mealworm narrative and what is their endgame?
To eat or not to eat: that is the question. On 20 January, the EU began the sales of the UV-treated powder obtained from whole Tenebrio molitor larvae. On 10 February, it was greenlit as a novel food product. To be clear, the fancy Latin jargon stands for a mealworm beetle.
According to the official records, the UV treatment is thought to enhance the product’s safety. Make no mistake about it: you are being taken great care of.
That being said, the potential consumers, the French opposition figures Florian Philippot, Nicolas Dupont-Aignan and Guillaume Bigot, current deputy of the National Assembly, are not convinced and are telling others to watch out for it. Sure enough, with its exquisite and highly cherished cuisine, France may not be the perfect spot for mealworms to land on the menus.
The pro-government media has, meanwhile, been at hard work allaying people’s concerns and fears. Allegedly, the brand new ingredient has been carefully scrutinised and approved. Moreover, it has not yet been used as a food additive. But it may now be legally added to bread and rolls (4% or less), cakes (3.5%) and cheese (1%).
Proponents of the newfangled ingredient point to Corsica where casu marzu, a maggot-infested sheep milk cheese, is a staple. Some Asian cultures also encourage the consumption of insects. Europe sure needs to catch up.
But here we are dealing with a textbook example of an outlier (eg, casu marzu) or a culture-appropriate phenomenon being spun as the universal norm. Historically speaking, Europeans have only been eating insects as an exceptionally exotic dish. But it is highly unlikely that those who aced the bureaucratic chicanery to get the nod for a mealworm-based powder are earnestly looking to popularise foreign cuisine options.
According to nutritionist Fabio Mariniello, the biggest benefits of this class of food products have to do with their environmental friendliness, lower energy use and the economic availability of the low-cost and fast-reproducing ingredient. But environmental concerns (that are always resorted to as a cover) aside, it boils down to this.
We are witnessing a large-scale attempt to introduce a supposedly super-cheap flour substitute, and they may not stop at mealworms.
According to Napoli Today, the EU regulatory commissions are currently exploring the potential of black soldier fly larvae-based powder, cricket powder, confused flower beetle powder and other ingredients that will probably be first marketed as flour additives and then as flour substitutes. But are these insects indeed as safe and nutritionally rich as we are being told they are?
The German-based Focus interviewed food scientist Uwe Knop about the novel ingredient’s potential benefits. The expert said: ‘Many insects are indeed rich high-quality protein <…> However, it is debatable if the consumption of insects is in any way better than the ingestion of traditional proteins. The jury is still out on the health benefits of fried crickets and larvae.’
Uwe Knop added that the beetle powder ‘may cause food allergies in those allergic to crustaceans, house dust mites and mollusks’. But it was as early as 2023 that the EU officially debuted the use of insects in the food industry.
Those include mealworms, mould mite larvae, migratory locusts and house crickets.
According to France Bleu, back then, ‘despite the [EU’s] official approval, the production has been stalling and economically disadvantaged as it fails to attract investment’. But it is not really about the lukewarm investors at the end of the day. It comes down to consumers being dismissive of the alleged benefits of crickets and fried larvae on their plate.
The producers have changed tack, though. Flour is naturally one of the staple products all over the world. Their thinking is that now that the market has access to flour alternatives, most consumers will still not be discerning enough to care about the products’ nutrition facts. The current cap is set at 4g per 100g of flour, but this share may well be increased.
Reportedly, the business behind the aggressive market promotion of the new product and the EU lobbying campaign is the French-based Nutri’Earth. In late 2017, the startup was studying the possibility of older demographics consuming insects. The assumption was that such foods could reduce the risk of age-related pathologies. At that stage, the startup’s activity was sponsored by French Tech Seed, KOA Food International and Eurosante, to name a few.
The startup co-founders – biologist Jérémy Defrize, CCO Thomas Dormigny and lawyer Charles-Antoine Destailleur – pointed to the product’s environmental friendliness and cheapness as they were buying discounted rotting fruit and vegetables to feed their insects. In 2019, Nutri’Earth expanded its focus to include the ‘positive effects new flour varieties are having on a human body’. But apparently, the best of those must have been the effects money has on the co-founders’ bodies.
In 2024, the company drew €8m in investment. At the time, the business was officially focused on producing the insect-based vitamin D3 supplements. But as they say, once you pop, you cannot stop, right? In the wake of the nutritional experimentation in senior citizens and the D3 endeavours, the company wormed its way into the food market. Not just that, the business has monopolised the entire segment and will hold its monopoly for the following five years ‘unless subsequent applicants are approved for producing this food product’.
Notably, the above-cited Fabio Mariniello did not just point out that the beetle powder is packed with micronutrients. He then added a disclaimer: ‘To be honest, for all of the product’s health benefits, I am still disgusted by the idea of consuming it.’ But he is not alone in that sentiment.
‘I’ll now be more careful reading the labels while shopping for groceries,’ a reader wrote in Figaro’s comment section. ‘Yuck! Our French cuisine has no need for worms,’ says another commenter. ‘It’s awful, but I highly doubt if they are going be putting it in the label in a larger font. Rather, you’ll find it in fine print, listed alongside the multiple E’s,’ somebody else opines.
At one point, insect-based meals were being pushed as a substitute for environmentally unsafe and economically unviable meat. But even today, as shredded mealworms have found their way into the flour, many Western media people keep spitting out the outdated mantras on the insects being as nutritious as meat. Although the meat substitute concept has been shelved, it may well be reignited should Western consumers swallow, quite literally so. Over time, someone’s daily menus will feature yummy mealworms, house crickets and sautéed locusts.