Born in Halifax, brought up in Hull, Rob Bell has worked in over 30 countries across the globe, having operated in ports, logistics and marketing in the private sector and advised governments. Here he writes for Business Live.
The news has been full of Covid and Brexit. There is hardly any room to think straight and for business this is tough. We are where we are and so, I am working with people from around the world and sharing with you their ideas on what’s next and how to get the best out of your business in these challenging times.
Years ago, two athletes broke world records but made headlines for different reasons. First up, Sergey Bubka, of the then Soviet Union. Bubka broke the world record for the men’s pole vault 35 times from 1981 to 1991.
His nickname was The Bacon Slicer; with $500 for every time an athlete beat a world record, Bubka set records very slowly.
Then, we have someone who ripped up the rule book to break the record. At the Mexico Olympics in 1968, the competition for the high jump was hotting up – the most competitive field ever seen.
One by one, the athletes cleared the bar – upright, face forward and, they landed on their feet. This was the straddle technique.
Imagine the scene. The hush of the crowd for an Olympic final. Dick Fosbury of the USA limbered up – spectators and a global television audience had never heard of him - ran at the high jump bar at an angle, jumped and “flopped” over the bar backwards. He won gold and smashed the world record.
The business world is littered with plenty of Bubkas but, as Covid and Brexit change the rules we need a few more Fosburys. Firms who rethink their product, even their industry.
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Let’s take a look at some examples from around the world. Then, let’s all rethink our own way forward.
If you want a winning word for scrabble try ‘entomophagy’. The practice of eating edible insects is becoming big business as a source of nutritious food for pets and livestock, plants and soils - as well as humans.
This is farming in the 21st century with insights into our emerging food requirements and how best to meet the need.
By 2050 global population will be 10 billion. Agriculture will have to produce double the amount of food and fibre with a smaller rural labour force; more feedstocks for biofuels while adopting more efficient production methods and adapting to climate change. We cannot scale up our existing protein supply chain without scaling its negative byproduct: environmental degradation.
Let’s look at the numbers. 80 per cent of the planet’s agricultural land is now used for grazing and animal feed production even though meat delivers no more than 18 per cent of calories needed.
Over 30 per cent of farmed fish goes into animal feed as well. Each day, humans worldwide drink an estimated 5.2 billion gallons of water. Cows drink roughly eight and a half times that amount in a day.
That means 30 pounds of grain and 2,400 gallons of water to produce one pound of beef.
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We use 5 per cent of the earth’s water for livestock and on average, a pair of cows will graze on 1.5 acres of land. In South America, rainforests continue to be cleared to grow soya to feed European animals.
We need to halve meat and dairy production by 2050. We all need to become flexitarians; less dogmatic on what we eat and more conscious of the footprint of our tastes and the industries that support them.
Here’s where entomofarms come in. The Hult Prize challenges students to solve a pressing social issue around topics such as food security, water access, energy, and education. In 2013, Hult focussed the Global Food Crisis.
Personally chosen by President Bill Clinton, the $1million prize went to Aspire Food from McGill University - for the idea of processing edible insects to produce a sustainable source of protein to provide slum communities with an easier and better access to essential nutrients.
In 2014, Aspire Food Group started up a project developing novel edible-insect farming technologies to address malnutrition and food insecurity in Ghana.
The palm weevil larva is a local delicacy rich in essential nutrients such as protein, iron and zinc that has been traditionally hand harvested from palm trees and consumed across most of Ghana.
Some say that they taste of bacon when cooked and the Malaysian dish, Sago Delight, has variations throughout Asia.
Fast forward and Aspire is now building a purpose built 21st century farm in London, Ontario processing crickets into all-natural, sustainable, superfood ingredients that are nutritionally superior to livestock, cell-cultured and plant-based alternatives. The farm breaks new ground with patent-pending, scalable technologies processing insects into a value-added food ingredient. Aspire is working on three core markets: pets and livestock, soils and plants, then... people.
Humans may struggle with the idea – though the French have long enjoyed their snails – but more than a quarter of the entire human population eats insects on a regular basis.
Crickets can be fried, boiled and when roasted taste like roast nuts. They are said to take on the flavour of their food, a characteristic being explored. The protein is efficient: 100 times fewer greenhouse gasses than a steak, 122 times less feed and almost no water. Multiple edible insects are being explored globally.
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Under the Victorian arches by London Bridge railway station, Entocycle is home to around 10 million soldier flies each day, a research and development insect farm turning bugs into animal feed. Just 55 per cent of the world’s crop calories are actually eaten directly by people.
Another 36 per cent is used for animal feed. According to founder Keiran Whitaker, soldier flies are ideally suited as they don’t spread disease and thrive on a diet of rotten vegetation.
In one of the farm’s windowless labs, thousands of larvae devour used coffee grounds from nearby cafes and spent grains from hipster breweries.
“Within a week they’ll turn the waste into protein,” says Whitaker. “That’s when we harvest them.”
The choice on edible insects is mind-blowing - it would be near impossible to sample the full variety of flavours: there are ants that taste of citrus, nutty crickets, arachnids like soft-shell crab, and even grubs that resemble bacon! Insect flour can be found as a protein-rich substitute for some standard grain flours in products like crackers, biscuits and protein bars.
Back in Canada, a pair of microbreweries, La Baleine Endiablée and Lion Bleu in Quebec, have released a beer that uses crickets as they would otherwise use grain. “Stout Aux Grillons (cricket stout)” says Jérémie Tremblay, “tastes like oatmeal stout with a twist. It has chocolate and coffee overtones – great with ribs”.
Next up, rethinking retail. Re-cap on Rob's first column ' How the world could be working after Covid-19 '.