BENGALURU: Unlike elsewhere in India, edible bugs are part of the diet of the indigenous tribes in the Northeast. A team of Bengaluru-based researchers found that bugs, insects and snails are widely consumed in most parts of the region.
Entomophagy is the technical term for eating insects. Before the advent of tools and farming, every human being was an entomophage. That practice continues in the Northeast. Insects are consumed in various forms and for multiple purposes — food, health benefits and even neurotoxic effects.
Researchers from the Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), Bengaluru, started the study in 2018, to understand entomophagy. So far, they have found that around two billion people regularly eat insects as part of their diet and over 2,000 species of insects are listed as edible.
The research team documented over 500 species of edible insects from the regions. It included grasshoppers, caterpillars, beetles, termites, bees, wasps, ants, cicadas and many aquatic insects.
They found that several species were popularly consumed but remained unrecognised or even less documented.
Dr Priyadarsanan Dharma Rajan, senior author of the paper and ATREE entomologist, told this newspaper that the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation released a paper in 2013 suggesting insects are the future source of protein as conventional livestock is reducing due to increasing pollution, reducing water and land sources.
Consumption of insects is not just limited to the Northeast, but in many other states and communities, including Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka. The indigenous communities consume insects in the form of curries, pickles, boiled, fried, as a chutney or even raw. Some are also consumed for medicinal purposes. For example, ants are consumed as a cure for asthma.
In Nagaland, Rajan said, they found markets where edible insects are sold. For example, the Asian giant hornet was in the news in Europe and the US a few years ago as it was seen as an invasive species. But it is eaten in the Northeast and is said to have health benefits.
A kilogram of the hornet is sold for `6,000 and people are domesticating and growing it. Its nests are sold for `50,000-60,000 and the larvae are also eaten.