(Newswire.net — April 1, 2020) — Analyzing the food market tells us that many people are willing to pay a higher price to eat superfoods. But would you really eat a pond scum?
You are more likely to serve it as a nutty green cookie or even as an unexpected bright blue smoothie without any discouraging taste and smell, it sounds worse than it is, BBC reports.
According to UN data, the Earth’s population is expected to reach eight billion by 2023. Although the market seems to be full of products, recent studies suggest that our current system can only feed a population of 3.4 billion people.
Could the world of microalgae and cyanobacteria help feed the growing population of the world, or is this just another passing trend when it comes to food?
The European Union has recently adopted an ambitious strategy for developing the Bioeconomy, the EU Science Hub reports. In this strategy, microalgae represent a new biological resource for versatile applications, especially as a new source of valuable nutrients for human and animal consumption.
Despite the downsides, including the dubious properties of superfoods, microalgae do offer some huge benefits, claims Professor Alison Smith, Head of Plant Sciences at the University of Cambridge and one of the world’s leading algae scientists. She explains how eating algae is an age-long tradition:
“People have been eating blue-green algae for a very long time. There are reports from several hundred years ago of people in South America scooping spirulina out of ponds to supplement their diet.”
One of the comparative benefits is that unlike other protein sources, microalgae do not require high-quality agricultural land.
“Microalgae and spirulina can be grown in all sorts of locations. In water, in the oceans, in ponds, in lakes and so on. Even on your patio and on snow,” says Alison Smith.
This means that we can grow these organisms anywhere, even in space, and it can potentially be used to feed astronauts on a mission to Mars.