Travel for scoping and feasibility study for a fully circular insect feeding system for aquaculture in Lake Victoria

About the project

UK-registered Partner: Mana Biosystems Ltd – Christian Hollingbery
Africa-registered Partner: RioFish – Angela Odero

The cost for fish feed is increasing rapidly, with the global average price rising from $1400/MT in May 2020 to $1670/MT in November 2022. Rising prices are due to reduced supply of fishmeal (⅓ drop) from 1997 to the present day. Since fish meal makes up a major component of fish feed in western Kenya, feed costs now account for up to 70% of production costs of aquaculture there due to this dwindling supply.

The production of insect protein (IP) through the bioconversion of organic waste using Black Soldier Fly (BSF) is a solution. BSF can valorise a large range of organic wastes, including fish guts, which are often disposed of to landfill or thrown back in the water in the aquaculture industry. There is a great opportunity to use fish waste produced in aquaculture operations located on Lake Victoria, Kenya to produce insect protein meal and oil for fish feed, operating in a completely circular system. This would reduce pressures on local freshwater fish populations and could bring increased benefits to fish and human health.

Mana has used this grant funding as an opportunity to travel to meet Riofish, a fish farming and processing operation, to establish a relationship and determine how they can use Mana’s insect farming technologies to produce insect meal from their waste.