Netherlands: where Black soldier flies are pampered like babies

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Thirteen winners of the 2024 best farmers competition travelled to the Netherlands on October 4-11. They were grouped into five clusters, that is, dairy, coffee, poultry, beekeeping and entrepreneurship, for each to explore innovations in their respective fields.

In the past three weeks, we have covered the dairy, coffee and poultry cohorts. In the fourth of a five-part series, Joshua Kato focuses on Insect Engineers, a facility that breeds larvae for feeding livestock, plus fertilisers.

Excitement filled the air on the morning of Friday, October 10, as a group of Ugandan farmers boarded a luxurious bus in Doorwerth, in the Netherlands.

Their destination: Insect Engineers, a Dutch firm pioneering the breeding of insects as sustainable livestock feed.

After a one‑and‑a‑half‑hour drive to Nijverheidsstraat, the farmers arrived full of anticipation, eager to see how insect farming could transform agriculture back home.

At Insect Engineers

The farmers were welcomed by Bob Holtermans, founder and chief executive officer of Insect Engineers. Though some Ugandans already breed black soldier flies, the visitors were awed by the sophistication of the Dutch facility.

This included climate‑controlled breeding rooms, automated feeding systems and computerised monitoring of insect life cycles.

“Through a full range of solutions — from breeding, production to processing — Insect Engineers supports clients worldwide in creating sustainable feed systems,” Holtermans explained. The system costs over $2m.

“Obviously, we cannot afford the cost of setting up those sophisticated facilities, but we can still produce larvae using our cheaper available materials,” one of the best farmers, Tom Okao observed.

Tenywa explaining how he breeds soldier flies. (File photo)

Such materials include basins, nets and concrete bowls at less than sh2m.

Why black soldier flies?

While none of the visiting farmers had yet ventured into commercial insect farming, they were familiar with others doing so, such as Martin Tenywa at Kabanyoro in Wakiso district and Marula Proteen, a Dutch‑Ugandan company in Kampala’s industrial area.

“The insects contain protein, fat, vitamins and minerals, which are vital for poultry health, feather growth and egg production. This means you can make them an essential part of your chicken’s diet,” Tenywa said.

Holtermans uses a highly controlled system to prepare specialised feed from organic waste to ensure consistency.

In contrast, in Uganda, Tenywa feeds his larvae on kitchen waste and spoilt market produce.

“As one of the world’s most efficient organisms in converting organic waste, black soldier fly larvae can completely process waste in just 14 days and increase their weight by up to 10,000 times,” Holtermans told the group.

“This makes them black soldier fly larvae can completely process waste in just 14 days and increase their weight by up to 10,000 times,” Holtermans told the group.

“This makes them rack system, which processes massive amounts of waste, while minimising methane emissions, which is a sharp contrast to the rudimentary methods used in Uganda. Overcoming misconceptions Insect farming in Europe faces misconceptions as is the case in Uganda.

“Many people assume insect farming is ‘dirty’ farming,” Holtermans said.

“We recycle food waste for animal feed, closing the loop in organic waste management.”

Tenywa added: “Many Ugandans are scared of touching the insects. Yet beyond breeding, these insects help manage waste and can be a major source of income.”

With Kampala alone producing at least 1,500 tonnes of garbage daily, according to the Kampala City Council Authority, the potential for waste‑to‑feed solutions is enormous.

Holtermans urged the farmers to sensitise others and return for training.

“The industry is still new and needs real‑world examples,” he added.

However, challenges remain, for example, a lack of shared knowledge slows progress. Holtermans emphasised collaboration as key to advancing sustainable insect farming; an opportunity Ugandan farmers could seize by partnering with Insect Engineers.

Protein scarcity

According to Dr Samuel Ssewagudde, the commercial manager at Tunga Nutrition, while base feeds like maize are readily available in Uganda, they are not highly nutritious ones like soya and silverfish (mukene), which provide protein.

“Uganda requires at least 40,000 tonnes of soya for livestock feeds. However, the entire national production averages 30,000 tonnes per year,” he says.

Some of the soya is processed for human consumption, with the remainder used for livestock feeds. This means that innovating with the highly nutritious black soldier flies larvae is welcome.

Overall, according to a report by Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), the estimated potential of Uganda’s animal feed basket in 2022 at 121.173 million tonnes of dry matter.

The report also estimates 78% of the feed potential to be made up of crop source roughage, 13% of crop source concentrates and 9% by grazing biomass.

Despite this huge potential, the report said Uganda’s actual feed basket was estimated at 48.287 million tonnes, which is 40% of the possible national feed output potential.

What farmers say

Martha Namabiro Matovu

Insect breeding using waste has big potential in Uganda. It gives proteins to poultry and fish, but also produces fertilisers for crop farmers. I can use cow dung from farms to produce fertilisers for sale.

The flies produce larvae for feeding livestock and fertilisers nourish the soils.

Apollo Gabazira

The practice helps in managing waste at the farm. We have got a lot of kitchen waste lying around our neighbourhoods, so I think this is one of the ways of disposing it off profitably.

Tom Okao

I have a lot of waste on my farm that I can use to breed the larvae to feed my chicken.

Abbas Ssekagya

As a farmer involved in processing feeds, I know how scarce protein sources are, so I consider this initiative to be very important.

Fact file

The 2024 winners that travelled to the Netherlands included Professor Paul Kibwika (overall winner), Brenda Tusiime (first runner-up, Kabarole), Meridah Nandudu (second runnerup, Bulambuli) and Abbas Sekajja (Wakiso/Luwero).

Others were Tom Okao (Lira), Janny Oyella (Gulu), Joyce Omiat (Bukedea), Emmanuella Oroma (Nebbi), Allen Atuhaire (Sheema), Joseph Nkandu (NUCAFE), Godfrey Bwaya (Elgon Coffee Growers), Apollo Gabazira (Iganga) and Martha Matovu Namabiro (DAFAN).

They were joined by two self-paying agripreneurs, James Kanyije and Pius Kwesiga of Nile Fresh. The best farmers competition is organised by Vision Group in partnership with the Embassy of Netherlands, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, dfcu Bank and Koudjis Nutrition BV.

Each year, the winners share sh150m in prize money and get an all-expenses-paid learning tour to the Netherlands. Since the competition began in 2014, there have been 121 winners, with 111 having travelled to the Netherlands.