Small Talk - Spring 2019

small talk LATEST NEWS Taken from an article in The Guardian online, by Rebecca Smithers. Thurs 10th Jan 2019 The UK’s first dog food made from ​insects​went on sale in January, which its manufacturers say could help reduce the environmental damage caused by the massive volumes of meat routinely fed to dogs and cats. Globally, pets consume about 20% of the world’s meat and fish, a number set to rise with ​ the trend​for consumers to feed them human-grade meat. Pet food is also estimated to be responsible ​for a quarter of the environmental impacts of meat production​in terms of use of land, water, fossil fuels, phosphates and pesticides. Insects provide a relatively high 40% of the protein in the new product. They are dried and ground with oats, potato and ‘natural botanicals’. The current version comes in the form of dried pellets, although the manufacturer says it hopes to launch a ‘wet’ version later in the year. Environmental experts have long recommended insects as a relatively sustainable food source that could help end world hunger and reduce the damaging environmental impact of ​meat production​.​ Insects are also very nutritious, containing essential proteins, fats, minerals and amino acids, and are easy for animals to digest. Dog food made from insects to go on sale in UK for first time

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