Study explores cat owner willingness to use insect-ingredient foods
It’s estimated that 46.5 million households enjoy cats as pets in the United States. The pet food market size is projected to grow to $76 billion in 2024 which could translate to incredible opportunities for novel protein suppliers like insect producers in the coming years.
A recent study in the Journal of Insects as Food and Feed surveyed cat owners in Chile about their willingness to use cat food that incorporates insect ingredients. A total of 1684 participants were surveyed online, shown pictures of different types and preparations of insect ingredients in treats and food and provided with information on the benefits of insects as food for pets like healthy fats and vitamins and how much water is saved during production as compared with beef protein.
While most owners were willing to feed insects to their cats (63.6%), there were preferences about the type of insects in the food: black soldier fly larvae (Hermetia illucens) vs mealworm larvae (Tenebrio molitor) vs. adult crickets (Acheta domesticus) and how those insects were presented in the food (20% insect meal in treats vs. whole insects vs. stand-alone insect meal).
Participants were most willing to feed the treats with 20% cricket meal or mealworm meal to their cats while indicating that the “environmental sustainability highlights” and the “nutritional highlights” were helpful factors when making their considerations. Owners were least inclined to feed whole insects of any type.
This was a fascinating, nuanced study that took into account the owner’s strength of relationship to their pet cats and provided insight into how many of the households allow their cats outside where they could be eating whole insects as a regular or occasional part of their diets.
The participants who were not willing to feed insect ingredients to their cats (36.4%) cited reasons in the seven following categories:
insects are unpleasant and generate disgust*
lack of information about insects as feed ingredients*
insects are not considered safe
the cat has a special disease and/or dietary requirements
the cat does not consume or does not like processed feeds
insects are considered animals and there is no agreement on the exploitation of more animal species to produce food
they prefer traditional feeds*
*most responses fell into these categories
As pet owners become more knowledgeable and accustomed to “newer” insect protein sources like black soldier fly larvae, will results change?
This type of research helps industry have a clear path to create valuable products for consumers. As always with insects and insects as food/feed, education about their nutritional value, sustainability and safety is vital to move the industry forward.
Citations:
Villanueva, V., Valdés, F., Zavala, S., Yáñez, J.M., & Valenzuela, C. (2023). Perception of cat owners on the use of insects as feed ingredients for cats. Journal of Insects as Food and Feed, 9(11), 1431-1443. https://doi.org/10.1163/23524588-20220106
The Center for Environmental Sustainability through Insect Farming (CEIF) is an NSF Industry-University Cooperative Research Center. CEIF bridges Academia and Industry with foundational, pre-competitive research to drive growth of the Insect Agriculture space.