Mealworm Biorefinery

Mealworms will turn out-graded food and feed by-products into poultry feed, crop fertiliser, and animal health products. This matters because the UK poultry industry relies heavily on imported soy protein for feed, which carries a high carbon footprint from deforestation and long-distance shipping. Meanwhile, food manufacturers discard tonnes of by-products that could be repurposed. The project addresses both problems by creating a local, circular system: waste from one process becomes input for another. If successful, the mealworm biorefinery model could reduce emissions from feed production, cut food loss, and lower the UK’s dependence on imported protein. The bio-stimulant derived from mealworm waste could improve crop yields without synthetic chemicals, and the exoskeleton-derived animal health product offers a natural alternative to conventional treatments. These changes would affect supply chains and farming practices that most consumers never see, but that quietly underpin food security and environmental targets. The project is applied and commercially focused—it tests the products on farms and with animal health experts, aiming for near-term adoption by the Agri-tech cluster in North and Mid Wales.