Auchan to launch “insect-fed” labelled farmed trout, the first to do so in France.
The French retailer Auchan will sell the fish across its 52 stores in Northern and Central France in a bid to support sustainable aquaculture.
Getting the product to store involved a cross-industry partnership between insect producer InnovaFeed, feed company Skretting, and trout farmer Truite Service.
The French company InnovaFeed received a EUR 40 million boost for investment in the launch of 5 new production sites by 2020. Fish feed producer Skretting are also getting industrial orders for insect feed.
The trout will be labelled “nourrie à l’insecte.”
In a press release the company said: “In the context of high world population growth and fish consumption, aquaculture is reducing the pressure on wild fish stocks. This booming industry, however, faces a major challenge: the availability of natural and sustainable protein resources adapted to the nutritional needs of fish. Insects offer a solution. (…) The commercialisation of these “insect-fed” Auchan trout chains is fully in line with this approach, in order to develop a sustainable French aquaculture sector. Furthermore, it is a 100% natural solution since wild trouts eat insects in streams and love them.”
To be labelled as such, the rule is that “a minimum 50% of the fish meal has been replaced by insect protein”. The feed fed to Auchan’s “insect fed” trout contains therefore 8% of insect meal (initially contained 16% of fish meal, out of which we replaced half by insect meal).
An educational site has also been created to explain the new approach to customers called www.nourrialinsecte.com.
The fish will be rolled out in stores by the end of 2019.
