Making food from black soldier flies – Innovafeed receives US grant: "An affirmation"

Nutrition made from insects has been around for a while, with big promises to reduce the carbon footprint of food production and agriculture. As with many innovative sectors, however, it’s yet to quite ‘make it’ and see widespread adoption. At a time of some uncertainty amid slackening investment, one French company has received an endorsement from across the Atlantic.  

The United States Department of Agriculture has awarded a grant worth $11.7m (around €11m) to the US subsidiary of French biotech company Innovafeed, founded In 2016 by Aude Guo, Bastien Oggeri, and Clément Ray.

Innovafeed, reportedly valued at $1-1.6b after its latest funding round and employing around 350 people, uses its proprietary technology to produce insect-based animal and plant nutrition. 

The USDA grant was awarded as part of the Fertilizer Production Expansion Program, which promotes US-based production of fertiliser to safeguard domestic supply. Among its other products, Innovafeed uses black soldier flies (Hermetia illucens) to turn agricultural by-products (think the leftover material from corn harvesting, for instance) into a carbon-efficient fertiliser. The grant will be used to support production at Innovafeed’s main US facility in Decatur, Illinois as well as scaling up other facilities to meet US demand. 

"Innovafeed offers an excellent example of how a group of talented French entrepreneurs can successfully partner with the United States to help change the world producing food more sustainably", said the USDA’s David Leishman in a press release.

Investors more cautious

The grant comes at a pivotal moment for the French insect nutrition sector. 

France has birthed several notable insect-based nutrition startups. Major players Ÿnsect, Agronutris and Innovafeed have raised over €1bn in funding between them in recent years. In contrast to the previous decade however, when investor enthusiasm saw a lot of 'easy money' poured into the French agri-tech scene, the past two years have seen investors becoming more cautious, amid global turbulence and rising interest rates. 

In September, Ÿnsect, the ‘poster child’ of insect protein in France, revealed it was struggling to raise the capital it needed to get to profitability. This came after the company cut 70 jobs and closed a plant in the Netherlands. The news frayed nerves among impact startups in France, with some wondering what it could mean for the funding landscape in general, not just for insect protein, if Ÿnsect are unable to get over the line.

Affirmation of the insect protein sector

Insect nutrition is still a developing sector, with hesitance over adoption being one of the main obstacles, particularly when it comes to human nutrition. Even for animal and plant nutrition, there is still the need for buy-in at the governmental, investor and consumer levels for firms in the sector to reach profitability.

While acknowledging these obstacles, Nadège Audiffren, Head of Global Communications for Innovafeed, told Impact Loop they’re confident in their strategy, focussing on industrial symbiosis – locating their facilities near both sources of raw materials and buyers of their products – and partnerships with major food corporations like ADM and Cargill to undergird their growth.

She says this USDA grant is a mark of confidence, not just in Innovafeed but in the sector overall.

"We see this grant as an affirmation of the importance and potential of the insect protein sector”, says Audiffren. “I think it's a great step to see that America has the sense of climate change, it’s a great green light."