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Aquaculture industry is one of the world’s fastest and largest growing food producing sector. Most importantly, the usage of fish meal in aquaculture has been replaced with alternate protein sources due to their production cost, demand of raw materials and various environmental issues. The insect black soldier fly (Hermetia illucens) larval (BSFL) meal is being recognized as a feed ingredient in aquafeeds for their protein rich content similar to fish meal (FM). BSFL meal has been utilized as a fish meal or soy meal substitution in aquaculture to improve the nutrition. The culture of H. illucens larvae can be achieved using various biodegradable wastes and converted into a valuable biomass. In addition, the proximate analysis of H. illucens has been analyzed for its multifaceted role in poultry, cattle feed preparation and human consumption. The effectiveness of BSFL diet was analyzed for final body weight (FBW), specific growth rate (SGR), feed conversion ratio (FCR), feed intake (FI), feed efficiency (FE) and survival (SUR) of different fish and shrimp used as an experimental models with FM as the control diet. However, there is no comprehensive review available on the BSFL as an alternate protein source in aquaculture till date. Hence, the present review aimed to evaluate the feasible role of BSFL in feed, its sustainable production and challenges of BSFL meal in aquaculture sector along with their merits and demerits.

Fish feed has always been the highest operational cost to a farmer, and depending on the species, it can range anywhere from 50-70% of the total of the production cost to a farmer, meaning that from all the expenses a farmer needs to analyze, feed is always the number 1 priority. And since December of 2021, we’ve seen the commodity price of fishmeal climb steadily almost 30% from $1.4k / metric ton to the last reported price of $1.8k metric ton. This is the result of a few different factors.

The cancellation of the first Peruvian anchovy season and the current high prices of fishmeal and fish oil brought new challenges to the aquafeed industry. In this context, what are the alternatives?