New Food Sources and Production Systems
Ways to maintain resilient food systems
The consumption of food is essential for survival and is a source of strength, vitality, and energy. The act of eating also helps to maintain our cultural traditions and is vital to our social lives since it is a fundamental component of any celebration. However, the way we manage food may have negative long-term consequences. Even if we produce enough food, one in ten people still go hungry, and three billion people lack the financial means to eat healthy. Approximately one-third of the food produced and the associated natural resources are lost to wastage. As a result, our food and farming systems are outpacing the planet's capacity to sustain them. We are also destroying the soil, which contributes to climate change and extreme weather conditions, by focusing on quantity rather than quality and by compelling farmers towards monocropping for low prices.
The outbreak of the coronavirus highlighted how fragile our food distribution systems are. During the height of COVID-19, consumers were forced to face barren shelves due to panic buying and farmers were forced to leave their fresh produce in the fields to rot due to lockdowns. Our worldwide supply chains were unable to keep up with the changing demands that were placed on them.
Few questions that need to be addressed here are: How do we ensure that there is sufficient nutritious food for those who work to produce it as well as those who consume it? How can we make sure that our food systems are resilient, fair, and equitable? How can we protect the environment while providing food for the growing population throughout the world?
Thinking about the future of food safety
To answer the above concerns, the most recent research from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations examines how factors such as population expansion, climate change, economic growth, and changing consumer behavior patterns may impact food safety in the future. The difficulties associated with ensuring food safety in food and agriculture are the primary subjects of the report entitled "Thinking about the future of food safety - A foresight report." Ismahane Elouafi, FAO chief scientist, says, “We are in an era where technological and scientific innovations are revolutionizing the agri-food sector, including the food safety arena. It is important for countries to keep pace with these advances, particularly in a critical area like food safety, and for FAO to provide proactive advice on the application of science and innovation.”
Fortunately, some of the new foods entering the mainstream market are being produced using new food production systems that represent advances in pre-existing food technologies. Here are some of the alternative food sources discussed in the mentioned article:
EDIBLE INSECTS
For ages, people around the world have con- sumed insects as part of their diets. Eating insects has not only been linked to nutrition, but also to a variety of cultural and religious traditions. Although some parts of the world have historically consumed insects, there is a rising interest in bringing in- sect-based goods to a wider customer base, in- cluding Western nations where insect consumption is less common.
A good supply of protein, dietary fiber, healthy fatty acids, and minerals like iron, zinc, manganese, and magnesium can be found in edible insects. Moreover, rural communities can benefit economically from the sale of edible insects that are raised or gathered in the wild by diversifying their livelihoods. Insect farming is appealing from a sustainable perspective since it generally uses less land and water and emits less greenhouse gasses than conventional livestock farming. Black soldier flies, yellow mealworms, smaller mealworms, crickets, grasshoppers, and house flies are a few of the identified insect species for commercialization.
Eating insects, however, may not be so strange in Europe. Over 30 edible insect enterprises have submitted a Novel Food dossier for Acheta domesticus, or house crickets to the UK's Food Standards Agency (FSA). Woven Network, an organization for insects for food and feed, expects regulatory approval for its house cricket dossier next year. The 100-page dossier includes more than 200 scientific publications and 20 laboratory analyses to support the argument that house crickets are safe for human consumption.
Moreover, following a request from the European Commission, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) Panel on Nutrition, Novel Foods and Food Allergens (NDA) was asked to deliver an opinion on dried yellow mealworm as a novel food pursuant to Regulation (EU) 2015/2283. Yellow mealworm is the larval form of the insect species Tenebrio molitor. The EFSA panel notes that there are no safety concerns regarding its stability as long as the novel food complies with proposed specification limits during its entire shelf life. Therefore, mealworms are seeking final certification from the European Commission as a novel cuisine.
The benefits of this emerging business must be evaluated against potential problems such as ensuring food safety. As with other commodities, edible insects can provide food safety risks. Some of the chemical hazards include flame retardants, dioxins, and heterocyclic aromatic amines, among others. Moreover, further research is needed to determine the allergenicity of edible insects and the influence of processing.
JELLYFISH
For more than a thousand years, Chinese consu- mers have used jellyfish as a valuable food source. To reduce the water content, lower the pH, and firm up the texture, traditional processing me- thods use a multi-phase processing approach using a salt and alum mixture. While most swim- mers avoid jellyfish, several scyphozoan jellyfish species that have moderate stings can be eaten. The most prevalent and significant species in the Asian jellyfish fishery, which accounts for a multi-million dollar seafood industry in Asia, is Rhopilema esculentum Kishinouye.
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) recognized edible jellyfish as a natural diet food in 2015 and compared them to vegetables such as broccoli and carrots. Rehydrated jellyfish contains 92–96% water, 3–7% protein, and very low quantities of carbohydrates, fat, and cholesterol. The most prevalent macro-elements are calcium, magnesium, potassium, and sodium. However, once processed, jellyfish food products also include elevated levels of aluminum because of the alum curing agent.
Moreover, jellyfish, like other commodities, provide food safety risks that must be considered for industry growth. First, jellyfish spoil at room temperature, so these should be processed immediately. Jellyfish can serve as a host of pathogenic bacterial genera such as Vibrio, Mycoplasma, and Acinetobacter, among others, which can cause health implications to humans and marine animals. In addition, aluminum was identified as a chemical hazard in ready-to-eat jellyfish in China and Hong Kong as high dietary aluminum levels can cause deve- lopmental difficulties in babies and young children, while causing liver damage, reproductive toxicity, Inflammatory Bowel Syndrome (IBS), and Alzheimer's disease in adults.
Moreover, jellyfish absorbs plastic from their surroundings with the bioaccumulation of microplastics which may expose humans to microplastics, although the health implications are not clearly documented.
Furthermore, the promotion of jellyfish research using an ecosystem-based approach must be in place to increase knowledge and predictive modeling of jellyfish blooms. In addition, such research can implement strategic monitoring and management plans to utilize this resource as a sustainable food source.
PLANT-BASED AND CELL-BASED FOOD PRODUCTION
Plant-based replacements and cell-based meats have gained popularity in the past decade. Some consumers avoid meat from farmed animals, but a rising number are substituting some of their meat intake with plant-based re- placements that mimic the texture, flavor, and nutrient profile of farmed meat using pulses (le- gume seeds), grains, oils, fungi, and other plants. Cell-based meats created from animal stem cells using tissue engineering techniques are also joining these items rapidly.
Animal husbandry, the dominant meat production model worldwide, has negative public health and animal welfare consequences. Processed meat consumption may also cause chronic diseases and early death. Consequently, these negative health effects are reducing farm animal meat consumption.
Meat alternatives are advocated as a remedy to environmental, animal welfare, and public health problems linked with farmed meat production and consumption. Plant-forward diets, especially in heavy meat-consuming countries, are crucial for climate change mitigation. Fortunately, these alternatives resemble the meat's texture, flavor, and nutrients. These range from natural foods that resemble meat (e.g., pulses, mushrooms, jackfruit) to products that are not designed to mimic meat but can be used in similar ways (e.g., tofu, tempeh, seitan, bean burgers) to processed products that imitate eating certain meat products (e.g., meat-like burgers, hotdogs, fish fillets).
"Meat alternatives are advocated as a remedy to environmental, animal welfare, and public health problems linked with farmed meat production and consumption. Plant-forward diets, especially in heavy meat- consuming countries are crucial for climate change mitigation."
Moreover, several products are made to resemble farmed meats viscerally. Soy, wheat, pea, mycoprotein, and lupin beans are employed in most plant-based alternatives.
Unfortunately, eating meat substitutes have public health repercussions including nutritional, chronic illness, and food safety issues. Plant-based alter- natives may contain excessive salt, flavoring, coloring, and binding agents. Red and processed beef heme iron raises type 2 diabetes risk.
Since cell-based meats are not yet commercially available, their nutrition profile remains uncertain. Moreover, plant-based meat replacements have high moisture content and neutral pH which can promote pathogen growth. Post-extrusion addition of non-sterile chemicals, unhygienic handling, and cross-contamination may introduce unwanted microorganisms. Mycotoxins may also be present in plant-based foods and beverages upon which oat-based beverages are most susceptible to contamination with deoxynivalenol. Phytoestrogens such as isoflavones, lignans, and coumestan present in a diet may impact the endocrine system, but several processing methods can inactivate or diminish antinutrient factors.
Furthermore, allergic and gastrointestinal reactions to mycoprotein plant-based alternatives (e.g., Quorn) have been reported. However, adverse mycoprotein reactions in the general population are rare. To be safe, people with food additive and gum sensitivity should avoid plant-based alternatives.
These plant-based alternatives could minimize the environmental effect of food production, but they could also destabilize agri-food systems, which could have public health, environmental, and regulatory ramifications. Progress in this field will require a multidisciplinary approach to address these problems.
SEAWEEDS
Seaweed, traditionally consumed by Asians, is a nutrient-dense meal with high-quality protein, making it a potential alternative protein source to tackle global food security challenges. In 2019, the world cultivated 34.7 million tons of seaweed, worth USD 14.7 billion.
Red seaweeds are the earliest freshwater and marine eukaryotic algae (macro algae). They have the most diverse taxonomy, with 6,500 species known. Red seaweed's high protein and essential amino acids (EAAs) levels make it an attractive protein source. Species and habitat typically impact nutrition, although they generally give low calories, high protein, fiber, vitamins, minerals, and bioactive components.
However, edible seaweed may contain heavy metals, iodine, anti-nutritional factors, radioactive isotopes, ammonium, dioxins, and pesticides. These hazards could affect seaweed products, including isolated proteins. Safety of seaweed and seaweed products for commercial production usually depend on culture conditions.
Furthermore, heavy metal pollution is also a safety problem. Seaweeds have been utilized as heavy metal bio-sorbents for years. However, seaweed producers must increase output to fulfill market demand. Long-term evidence on seaweed farming's environmental implications is scarce. Seaweed production must be balanced with environmental concerns to avoid exceeding recipient habitats' carrying limits. Also, introducing non-native species into a region must be avoided to preserve local biodiversity. Implementing a One Health strategy to seaweed growing will boost sector growth and ensure sustainable production.
The aforementioned article provides a more in-depth look into the newly discovered environmentally-friendly food sources and production systems. In view of the need for new and inventive ways to produce food for the rising masses and in consideration of the environmental and bio-hazardous difficulties faced by traditional methods of food production, it is vital that we prepare ahead for these new and improved food sources.
In addition, we need to keep in mind the challenges that are posed by the traditional methods currently used in the food production industry. While there remains a great deal of dangers and concerns regarding the safety of food linked with these novel and unusual food sources, a proper need to educate policymakers and comprehensive research on these food sources is a must. Hopefully, doing so would help direct the way towards innovative and sustainable food production.