Fight hunger in Kenya by providing insect protein

My name is Proscovia Alando, the co- founder at Ressect. Help Ressect fight hunger in Kenya by providing affordable insect-based protein through an efficient process.

I have spent my childhood first hand experiencing the impacts of malnutrition, hunger and poverty growing up in Nairobi, Kenya. My life changed drastically when I conceived that I could make a change in my community to not only to fight hunger and malnutrition but also create a means of livelihood while conserving the environment.

I realised that fish farming could be a solution as fish is a great source of protein and can play a major role in meeting the nutrition needs especially for women and children while also serving as a means of livelihood. But looking at the statistics, the fish consumption level in Kenya is at 4kg per capita per year compared to the global average of 20kg per capita per year indicating high levels of malnutrition.

Fish farming requires high capital investments due to high cost of production, where feeds account for up to 70% of the total production cost. The high cost of feed is due to high-cost of Protein (Fishmeal) which is expensive due to overfishing, illegal fishing and pollution of water bodies. In order to farm enough fish sustainably, we needed to lower the cost of production by providing alternative sustainable protein for fish feed formulation. That is when we decided to farm Black solder Fly insects which are rich in protein (42%) and fat (35%) and can be used as alternative protein source for fish feed formulation. Development of new fish feeds based on high-protein BSF larvae meal could ensure that fish are produced in a sustainable way and that there are enough high-quality feeds to meet the demand for fish farmers.

We set up an insect farming start-up - Ressect to realise this goal. Ressect specialized in farming Black Solder Fly insects (BSF) as an alternative protein source in animal feed formulation. Our start-up operates in a circular economy basis where nothing goes to waste. The BSF feeds on dead decaying organic matter and the byproduct, frass, can be used as fertilizer. We carried out various trials with the insect farming and realized that it could lower the cost of production while reducing pressure on the wild stock (Fishmeal) and providing a consistent supply of protein. But it was at that point when we spent hours to manually do harvesting, sieving and drying of the insect larvae that we realized we needed help from our community to automate our processes and make our production efficient by getting equipment for harvesting, sieving and drying.

The automatic sieving machine that costs 4000 USD can increase our production efficincy by automating and speeding up the black soilder fly larvae harvesting sieving to seperate them from the Frass.

With another 5500 USD, this microwave cabinet dryer will ensure an efficient drying and processing of the larvae to provide high quality product that fish farmers can use as feed

Through your support, we will be able to ensure a more efficient production process and a consistent supply of insect protein to fish farmers to promote sustainable and affordable fish farming and meet the nutritional needs of our community.