<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

<p>Since <italic>per capita</italic> global meat utilization is predicted to increase to 40% from 2019 to 2050, global use of cultivable land in livestock, poultry, and feed production is 30%. Use of alternative protein sources as animal feed can be a solution to minimize cropland usage in conventional feed production. Commonly used protein sources in animal diets like soybean meal and fish meal are facing challenges of high demand, but the current production might not fulfill their dire need. To overcome this issue, the discovery of alternative protein sources is the need of the hour, insect meals like black soldier fly (BSF) are one of these alternative protein sources. These flies are non-infectious, bite-less, can convert the variant types of organic waste (food wastes, animal and human excreta) proficiently into rich profile biomass with reduced harmful bacteria count and do not serve as a vector in disease transmission. Based on the substrate used, the BSF larvae protein, fat and ash contents vary from 37 to 63%, 7 to 39% and 9 to 28% on dry matter basis, respectively. Previous studies have reported using BSF and its by-products as alternative protein sources in broiler diets with partial or complete replacement of conventional protein sources. In this review, a brief introduction to insect meal, BSF origin, life cycle, nutritional profile, influences on growth performance, carcass characteristics, fatty acid profile of meat, biochemical properties of blood, gut morphology and microbiota of the caecum along with its influence on laying performance of layers has been discussed in detail. Studies have concluded the partial replacement of conventional protein sources with BSF is possible, whereas complete replacement may cause poor performance due to reduced digestibility up to 62% attributable to chitin content (9.6%). Further studies to corroborate the effect of dietary BSF on growth performance, carcass characteristics, fatty acid profile of meat, and gut morphology and caecum microbiota are required to standardize the inclusion levels in feeds for higher performance of poultry.</p>
</abstract>

Since per capita global meat utilization is predicted to increase to 40% from 2019 to 2050, global use of cultivable land in livestock, poultry, and feed production is 30%. Use of alternative protein sources as animal feed can be a solution to minimize cropland usage in conventional feed production. Commonly used protein sources in animal diets like soybean meal and fish meal are facing challenges of high demand, but the current production might not fulfill their dire need. To overcome this issue, the discovery of alternative protein sources is the need of the hour, insect meals like black soldier fly (BSF) are one of these alternative protein sources. These flies are non-infectious, bite-less, can convert the variant types of organic waste (food wastes, animal and human excreta) proficiently into rich profile biomass with reduced harmful bacteria count and do not serve as a vector in disease transmission. Based on the substrate used, the BSF larvae protein, fat and ash contents vary from 37 to 63%, 7 to 39% and 9 to 28% on dry matter basis, respectively. Previous studies have reported using BSF and its by-products as alternative protein sources in broiler diets with partial or complete replacement of conventional protein sources. In this review, a brief introduction to insect meal, BSF origin, life cycle, nutritional profile, influences on growth performance, carcass characteristics, fatty acid profile of meat, biochemical properties of blood, gut morphology and microbiota of the caecum along with its influence on laying performance of layers has been discussed in detail. Studies have concluded the partial replacement of conventional protein sources with BSF is possible, whereas complete replacement may cause poor performance due to reduced digestibility up to 62% attributable to chitin content (9.6%). Further studies to corroborate the effect of dietary BSF on growth performance, carcass characteristics, fatty acid profile of meat, and gut morphology and caecum microbiota are required to standardize the inclusion levels in feeds for higher performance of poultry.

A Review of Black Soldier Fly (<italic>Hermetia illucens</italic>) as a Potential Alternative Protein Source in Broiler Diets

Department of Animal Nutrition and Nutritional Diseases, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine

Department of Plant and Animal Production, Burdur Vocational School of Food, Agriculture and Livestock

University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences

Annals of Animal Science

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

A Review of Black Soldier Fly () as a Potential Alternative Protein Source in Broiler Diets

Since per capita global meat utilization is predicted to increase to 40% from 2019 to 2050, global use of cultivable land in livestock, poultry, and feed...

A Review of Black Soldier Fly (Hermetia illucens) as a Potential Alternative Protein Source in Broiler Diets

Published Online: Nov 13, 2023

Page range: 939 - 949

Received: Jul 02, 2022

Accepted: Dec 02, 2022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/aoas-2022-0094

Keywords
black soldier fly, broiler, growth performance, carcass characteristic, gut morphology

© 2023 Ibrar Ahmed et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

A Review of Black Soldier Fly (Hermetia illucens) as a Potential Alternative Protein Source in Broiler Diets

Published Online: Nov 13, 2023

Page range: 939 - 949

Received: Jul 02, 2022

Accepted: Dec 02, 2022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/aoas-2022-0094

Keywordsblack soldier fly, broiler, growth performance, carcass characteristic, gut morphology

© 2023 Ibrar Ahmed et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Keywords
black soldier fly, broiler, growth performance, carcass characteristic, gut morphology