Third Millennium Farming (3MF) – Insect Farming in Cities

Micro-farming – algae, plankton, insects

By Jakub Dzamba
University of Toronto
Nov, 2009
Email: k.dzamba@utoronto.ca

Excerpts:

The purpose of this living document is to add clarity and factual depth to a concept called micro-farming; where the remarkable ability of micro-organisms and insects to rapidly reproduce is harnessed for the production of food.

Third Millennium Farming (3MF) is about using species of micro-organisms (algae and plankton) that are much better converters of sunlight into plant biomass than even our fastest growing crops, and similarly using species of micro-livestock (insects) that are much better converters of plant biomass into edible meat than even our fastest growing livestock.

These organisms are not only vastly more efficient for farming food, but the actual processes that will be involved in this type of farming can play key roles in making the function of our cities more sustainable.

There are over 1400 known species of edible insects, and its estimated there are several times this amount of undiscovered edible insects. Many of these species can thrive under very different environmental and physiological conditions, but most importantly on a much more diverse range of food than traditional livestock. As a result several new strategies for farming feed for micro-livestock can now be considered. Micro-livestock’s ability to utilize alternate feeds is equally central to the idea of 3MF as is the farming micro-livestock itself, but is even more powerful in decreasing the end foodprint of 3MF.

Micro-livestock can be fed traditional fodder crops, the same ones we use to feed livestock (usually cereals). They can also be fed some plant species which posses an ability for achieving rapid growth rates like algae, sugarcane and phytoplankton; or they can be fed using industrial/agricultural waste products that aren’t ordinarily considered edible such as paper, wood pulp and non-usable lumber.

Industrial/City Waste: The wood and paper industry ends up with various types of waste products that have no other use than being incinerated for energy. Examples of this are wood pulp, recycled paper, and even lumber destroyed by pests such as the B.C. Mountain Pine Beetle. These waste products are could be used as feed for some species of insects.
Considering the above mentioned plant species and city wastes could be used to feed micro-livestock farming operations it becomes easier to picture how 3MF could integrate with our cities. Imagine algae-culture operations that harness both: waste water treatment plants, as a source for nutrients, and fossil fuel power plants, as a source of concentrated CO2. Or micro-livestock farms integrated into industrial operations, using the biomass waste as feed and converting it into a viable source of food and perhaps (using termites) hydrogen as well.

Maybe the antagonism between city and agriculture, core and periphery, would fade away, allowing for one to be grafted onto the other, while simultaneously allowing nature to creep back into our metropolises and daily lives. Farmers might return to the city transformed – a mix between engineer, biologist, botanist and scientist – managing high-tech farms integrated into our buildings’ systems and city infrastructure.

Read the complete document here.