Edible Insects and Entoveganism

As global edible insect industries grow, the prerequisites for an ethical insect consumption are being actively negotiated and constructed. Entoveganism, a niche dietary philosophy whose practitioners supplement a conventional plant-based diet with edible insects, provides an important framework for considering insects as food and probing the boundaries of morality, acceptability, edibility, and animality. This chapter considers the potential for an ethical entoveganism and follows prominent assumptions employed by practitioners and stakeholders to construct moral terrain for insects as food. These assumptions argue that entoveganism decreases suffering on three levels: a) the suffering of definitely sentient animals implicated in agro-industrial food systems, b) the suffering of humans impacted by malnutrition and food insecurity, and c) the future suffering of all life due to the effects of climate change. Whether or not these assumptions hold, as billions of insects are being primed for direct killing within mass rearing facilities, this is a pivotal time to consider the insect as more-than-other and to weigh the moral considerations of insect consumption. By engaging with entoveganism as an exploratory concept, this chapter asks: Is there potential for an ethical insect consumption within industrial contexts? How may entoveganism serve as a conceptual framework for considering insects’ role within industrial food systems, social constructions of food value, and potentials for more ethical food systems futures?