Thai food processors eye growing cricket market

By The Nation

 

 

The Thai Food Processors Association (TFPA) is aiming to invest in cricket products, as the demand from international consumers is increasing, TFPA chairman Wisit Lamlumcha said.

 

Even though the target groups are limited, cricket is believed to be a refreshing new menu and is high in nutrients while consumers are still selective due to its production, he said.

 

The growing markets are located in the United States, China, Europe and South America where healthy food is a trend. Crickets are high in protein and they are an alternative for consumers who do not eat meat.

 

Cricket exports have made Bt9 million a year and Thailand's northeastern region is trying to increase the quantity as the current production capacity is 7,000 tonnes a year, Wisit said.

 

The National Bureau of Agricultural Commodity and Food Standards and the Department of Livestock Development are encouraging cricket farmers in 10 provinces with a total 848.5 rai (136 hectares) of cricket farms.

 

Wisit said that the price in the US, EU, Japan and China was Bt100-Bt200 a kilogram but the value of cricket pellets jumped to Bt1,000-Bt1,800 per kg.

 

Napadol Thongmee, the director of the Thai Trade Centre in New York, said that cricket products tended to expand in the US due to the size of the market, allowing niche markets to be established.

 

The target groups are shops in museums and zoos, Hispanic people who normally consume insects, and people who are running a movement to enhance insect consumption.

 

“If Thai entrepreneurs receive USFDA to guarantee the products’ standards, the market will be bigger,” Napadol said.

 

Source: https://www.nationthailand.com/business/30392742

 

-- © Copyright The Nation Thailand 2020-08-10

 

- Whatever you're going through, the Samaritans are here for you

- Follow Thaivisa on LINE for breaking COVID-19 updates

Grasshoppers OK. Crickets? Nasty!

Good idea!  Especially as the cricket season is in full swing in UK now.  Maybe this will make up for the loss of revenue due to no spectators ????

 

This article really bugs me!

Drove back from Kalasin to Krabi last year with an esky full of live Crickets, threatened my Wife that if any escaped she had to eat them there and then. Issan has strange eating habits, shrimp that jump off the plate is a favourite.

9 hours ago, Puchaiyank said:

This article really bugs me!

They eye and they mull and then they lure.  Who writes this stuff?

 

And there was me thinking they wanted to do catering at a 20/20 match .. 

Edited August 10, 20205 yr by Justgrazing
Sp

18 hours ago, webfact said:

The growing markets are located in the United States, China, Europe and South America where healthy food is a trend. Crickets are high in protein and they are an alternative for consumers who do not eat meat.

I hope healthy food does become a trend in the US, the home of fast food.

 

Crickets are insects, but they must have some 'meat' in their bodies, so how can they be 'an alternative for consumers who do not eat meat'?

Alternative to meat? They are animals, strange logic. Must be some starved vegan that cooked that up. They should have a fat juicy steak to get the brain going.

Edited August 11, 20205 yr by DrTuner

3 minutes ago, DrTuner said:

Alternative to meat? They are animals, strange logic. Must be some starved vegan that cooked that up. They should have a fat juicy steak to get the brain going.

I've always looked at grasshoppers like tiny cows, living on grass. Crickets like to hang out in urinals. Nasty!

2 hours ago, DrTuner said:

Alternative to meat? They are animals, strange logic. Must be some starved vegan that cooked that up. They should have a fat juicy steak to get the brain going.

According to Wiki:

Crickets, of the family Gryllidae, are insects related to bush crickets, and, more distantly, to grasshoppers.

 

The same Wiki entry also says this:

Cricket flour may be used as an additive to consumer foods such as pasta, bread, crackers, and cookies. The cricket flour is being used in protein bars, pet foods, livestock feed, nutraceuticals, and other industrial uses.

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cricket_(insect)#As_food  

2 hours ago, bluesofa said:

According to Wiki:

Crickets, of the family Gryllidae, are insects related to bush crickets, and, more distantly, to grasshoppers.

 

The same Wiki entry also says this:

Cricket flour may be used as an additive to consumer foods such as pasta, bread, crackers, and cookies. The cricket flour is being used in protein bars, pet foods, livestock feed, nutraceuticals, and other industrial uses.

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cricket_(insect)#As_food  

They are added to some brands of energy bars for protein so people are already eating them without knowing it. 

Ignorance is definitely preferable in this case. The Truth may set your stomach free.! 

Edited August 11, 20205 yr by RocketDog
Pithy addition

If you had a cricket ball in one hand and a cricket ball in the other what would you have .? 

A bloody big cricket that's what you'd have .. 

6 minutes ago, Justgrazing said:

If you had a cricket ball in one hand and a cricket ball in the other what would you have .? 

A bloody big cricket that's what you'd have .. 

No chance of leg before wicket then, if they were that big.

Although I suppose he'd have a chance of bowling a maiden over.

3 hours ago, Justgrazing said:

If you had a cricket ball in one hand and a cricket ball in the other what would you have .? 

A bloody big cricket that's what you'd have .. 

Or you'd be taking one on the chin

On 8/10/2020 at 3:34 PM, webfact said:

Thai food processors eye growing cricket market

Howzat?