If the thought of eating a witchetty grub or a scorpion¹ makes your skin crawl then you might need to get used to the thought pretty sharpish, at least according to some experts.

如果你一想到吃木蠹蛾幼虫和蝎子就头皮发麻，你也许要抓紧时间让自己适应了，至少某些专家是这么想的。

By 2050, the population of the world is expected to hit 9 billion people. And that’s a lot of mouths to feed. Experts believe we will have to turn more and more to entomophagy, or using insects as food, in order to sustain humanity.

到2050年世界人口预计将突破90亿，这意味着有很多张嘴等着吃饭。专家认为，为了维系人类的生命，越来越多的人将不得不转变为“食虫族”，把虫子作为食物。

The diets in high-income countries filled with meat, which are being replicated² in low and middle-income countries, doesn’t seem sustainable considering the toll³ it takes on the environment and on our health.

高收入国家的一日三餐充斥着肉食，这种饮食结构也被中低收入国家所复制。但是考虑到这种饮食结构对环境和人体健康的危害，这看起来并不是能够长期持续下去的。

And when you consider that snails⁴ are a delicacy⁵ in nations including France, people in Thailand already happily tuck into grasshoppers⁷ and crickets, and not much separates a prawn⁸ from a scorpion, then it all seems a lot more palatable⁹.

但当你想到蜗牛在法国等国家被看作美食，泰国人津津有味地享用蚱蜢和蟋蟀，明虾和蝎子的样子差别也不大，这么一想吃虫子好像也没那么恶心了。

There are also health benefits to tucking into creepy crawlies. There are around 27g of protein per 100 grams, but between 35 to 48g in chapuline grasshoppers. And insects take up a lot less room than bigger livestock¹⁰, like chicken, cows and pigs. In addition, most countries have access to or can import edible¹¹ insects, with countries including Australia, China, and Mexico having a particularly large variety already available.

吃爬行动物对健康很有好处。每100克虫子中就含有约27克的蛋白质，而每100克chapuline草蜢蛋白质含量可达35至48克。而且，虫子占用的空间比鸡、牛、猪等牲畜少得多。此外，大多数国家都能抓捕或进口到可食用的昆虫。包括澳大利亚、中国、墨西哥在内的国家都拥有种类繁多的可食用昆虫。

Designer Kobayashi Wataru is offering a small solution to the problem of making insects seem palatable for cultures where they aren’t yet widely eaten which his creation BugBug utensils¹². The range, which isn’t available in shops, includes especially designed chopsticks, a spork for picking up bugs¹³, and a set of claws which slide over the fingers and help when eating bugs like crisps. He won UCL’s Institute of Making 'Cutlery Design Challenge' with his design last year.

通过发明“虫虫”餐具，设计师Kobayashi Wataru希望能够让虫子在食虫文化不发达的国家看起来可食用性更强。“虫虫”系列餐具包括专为吃虫设计的筷子，用来挑起虫子的叉勺，还有戴在手指上用来吃硬壳虫类的“爪套”。Kobayashi Wataru去年凭借这一作品赢得了伦敦大学学院“餐具设计挑战”奖。不过这个餐具系列目前还无法在商店里购买到。

But he says that people who have interacted with his project haven’t been entirely¹⁴ convinced to ditch their chicken for insects. Not yet, at least.

但是这位设计师表示，和他的项目有过互动的人对不吃鸡肉改吃虫肉的想法还不是很信服。至少目前还不太信服。

“I saw a girl covered her mouth while she was looking at the BUGBUG project,” he says of an incident when he was showing his work at the New Designers festival in London last year.

他提到了去年在伦敦的新设计师节上展示他的作品时发生的一件事情：“我看见一个女孩在看‘虫虫’项目时捂住了自己的嘴。”

“Some people have said it’s interesting or that it’s scary. And other people just said 'sorry I’m vegetarian¹⁵'."

“一些人说这挺有趣或这真吓人。还有一些人直接说：‘对不起，我是素食者。’”

At the same time, his work has also sparked debate. People have been surprisingly accepting, he says.

与此同时，他的作品也引发了讨论。他表示，人们的接受能力还是挺强的，这让人惊讶。

"At Designers block as part of London Design Festival, a Mexican lady told me they eat insects in her country already. Another Italian guy told me some Italian people ate cats long time ago in Venice.”

“在伦敦设计节的设计师展区内，一位墨西哥女士告诉我，在她的国家人们早就开始吃虫子了。还有一位意大利男士告诉我，在威尼斯很久以前就有人吃猫。”

“If Western people and those in developed countries eat bugs, it might be possible to balance food resources across the world. Of course it wouldn’t be enough to only eat insects, as we have to reduce food wastes as well.”

“如果西方人和发达国家的人以虫子为食，那么将可以更好地平衡全世界的食物资源。当然只靠吃虫子是不够的，我们还需要减少食物浪费。”

Those who are keen to get stuck in, he adds, shouldn’t attempt to eat bugs without doing some research beforehand.

他补充说，那些跃跃欲试的人在没有做好调查研究之前，不应该轻易尝试吃虫子。

“If someone have an allergy¹⁶ for seashells, they might have the allergy from eating insects. Raw insects are also dangerous. So insects are not perfect foods. But if people don’t have allergy, they are worth trying. They taste good and they are nutritious¹⁷. They just look bad. But if they were cheap and convenient to get, I would buy and eat them in my daily life. I’ve eaten grasshopper⁶, mealworms, buffalo¹⁸ worms and crickets for my project.”

“如果有人对贝类食物过敏，他吃虫子可能也会过敏。吃生虫子也是危险的。从这个意义上来说虫子并不是完美的食物。但如果你不过敏的话，吃虫子值得一试。虫肉味美又有营养，只是看上去很恶心。但如果虫肉便宜又很容易买到，我在日常生活中也会买来吃。为了这个项目，我吃过草蜢、粉虱、水牛蠕虫和蟋蟀。”

He says he was inspired by ancient objects like stone axes and hand tools, as well as cutlery used to snap open crabs¹⁹ and scoop²⁰ the flesh from snails.

他称发明这套餐具是受打开螃蟹壳和挖蜗牛肉的餐具的启发，还从石斧和手工具等远古物件上获得了灵感。

“Entomophagy is one of the most difficult food plans to be adopted in society because nobody takes eating bugs seriously in daily life.”

“食虫是社会上最难推行的食物计划之一，因为日常生活中没人会把吃虫子当真。”

“I’d like to change the perception people have so they accept insects as meals in the future because we don’t have a lot of time until 2050.”

“我想改变人们的观念，让他们在未来接受昆虫食品，因为在2050年到来之前我们并没有太多时间。”