(PatriotWise.com) — Hollywood star Nicolas Cage has said eating insects could end the world’s hunger. The actor said he ate a cockroach during the filming of his 1988 hit movie Vampire’s Kiss. Cage told the co-star of his latest movie Nicholas Hoult, “If you could get rid of your fear, your phobia of eating insects you could solve world starvation.”
Cage and Hoult feature together in a new movie about Count Dracula and his erstwhile companion Renfeld. In his attempts to sell the idea of eating bugs to Hoult, Cage said the creatures are abundant, full of nutrition, high in protein, and low in fat. But he added he does not believe the idea will take off.
Eating bugs is tipped as the future of gourmet food by ardent climate change activists. The EAT-Lancet Commission on Food, Planet, and Health has said that if the world is to sustain a population rapidly approaching 10 billion people, a radical transformation of our eating habits is essential.
The United Nations estimates that meat and dairy production account for 14.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions. It also forecasts that food made from insects will produce just one-hundredth of those emissions.
A YouGov survey carried out in the summer of 2021 found that 18% of Americans would be happy to eat whole insects, while 25% would consume food products made from bugs. Food produced from creepy crawlies is already typical in many parts of the world, but in Western society, the idea is largely unfamiliar and distasteful. The 2021 poll found that women are more averse to insect consumption than men.
The country with the highest compliance figure is Mexico, where 48% (of men) said they would happily eat the bugs. The US is in sixth place, and last on the list is culinary-giant Italy. Only 21% of Italian men said they would consume food containing insects, and only 13% of women. When asked if they would eat whole bugs, 17% of Italian men and only 10% of women said they would.
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