Our story
In 2022, seeing the right demand and regulatory environment, they launched InsectBiotech to address agricultural residues and produce sustainable protein, oil, and fertilizer, leveraging their extensive experience with the world’s largest companies.
InsectBiotech is dedicated to converting agricultural residues into sustainable protein, oil, and fertiliser using Black Soldier Fly larvae.
We’ve identified Andalusia’s abundant olive pomace as an ideal feedstock and developed proprietary pre-treatment methods to optimise larvae growth and waste conversion.
With successful trials and patent filings underway, we now operate two small farms to demonstrate their process. InsectBiotech seeks additional funding and partnerships to expand operations and build a large-scale factory.
The founders
All three of us have a long standing professional and personal interest in helping businesses protect and enhance nature and communities.
We’ve worked with many of the world’s largest companies for more than fifty years, combined. We know just how supply chains are fast evolving to demand more sustainable products that help reduce emissions and shift towards restoring nature and the environment.
Early years
We started researching how we would make InsectBiotech work, years ago. We waited until the demand, the supply chain and the regulatory environment were right.
2022 – Present
In 2022 that moment arrived. We realised it was time to get started. The stars had aligned.
First, we had to figure out how – and why – we are different from other companies.
That’s because we want to REALLY tackle two problems at the same time: Removing agricultural residues, and make much needed, sustainable protein, oil and fertiliser.
How it came together
Ben took a holiday in Andalusia. He saw our future amongst the olive groves of Spain. Andalusia produces the largest amount of olive pomace residue in the world, in one place. So we bet on olive crop residues. There’s 4.8m tonnes of it per year in Andalusia alone.
Converting crop residues
Once we’d decided on olive crop residues, we had to decide how to convert them to protein and fertiliser and how we’d make that both profitable and sustainable. We chose the Black Soldier Fly. The larvae eat fast and are amazing bio-converters. They eat the crop residues, and we harvest their manure as fertiliser, and the larvae itself as protein, oil and chitin.
Testing
After that we had to figure out how to get the larvae to eat the crop residues effectively, so we could make our products. We asked a laboratory in Denmark to test some olive pomace, which is created after the ‘first cold press’ of olives from the harvest. It’s around 80% of the fruit, and the stone is taken out, for use in bioenergy. So, there is a lot of it.
Our first samples
Our first samples sent to the lab got lost in the mail for a week. That delay made the trial a success. Our delayed pomace samples performed far better than we, or the lab, thought. Accidental innovation. This was how we knew that if we pre-treated the olive pomace correctly, we could make it work for the larvae to eat it and produce our sustainable products. So now, once the lab test results came through, we knew the larvae will eat the crop residues, and grow as we want, to make our products.
Trials
We needed to run lots of trials, tests and develop our ‘secret sauce’ of how we pre-treat olive crop residues, before the larvae eat them. So far, we’ve run more than 200 such trials with the university. We’ve had such success we are filing patents this summer.
Results
The capital we raised has also meant we could buy two small factories and use them to prove that our plans work. One is at the University, with half a dozen scientists working in it. The other is at an Olive oil mill in Andujar, Spain, called Casa Grande, where we are testing our lab results in real world conditions. The process works, in both places. It works way better than we had thought. That brings us to today. That’s our story so far.
So, what happens now?
We need to raise more capital to extend our trials, hire key people, and begin raising capital to build our first big factory. We’ve found exactly where we want to put that factory, and we’re working out just when to get started on building it.
How you can help
Contact us if you want to help with that. You can help by: Funding us, supplying us, working for us, partnering with us, or buying from us.
