Fly farmer begins insect meal production for aquafeed at new facility
A Spanish company has started producing insect meal in Galicia for use in aquafeed and pet food after obtaining authorisation for the process.
The new Bioflytech facility at Palas de Rei is initially being supplied with dried black soldier fly (BSF) larvae from the company’s fly farm in Fuente Álamo, Murcia, but will grow its own BSF once the necessary permission for production has been given.
The Galician site has six larvae production units, a processing facility, and a storage facility for frass (larvae excreta) which is used as a fertiliser. The site has capacity to produce 12,000 tonnes of BSF larvae per year – three times the capacity of the Murcia farm - and an expansion is planned to increase capacity to 100,000 tonnes.
Bioflytech is 75% owned by Moira Capital Partners, a Madrid-based investor focused on sustainable, high growth projects.
Local support
The fly farmer obtains four main products from BSF. These are: dried larvae, which are obtained after almost complete drying of the fresh larvae and have highly digestible protein and all the necessary components for the diet of poultry, fish and other animals; high protein meals (flours); fats, which are obtained from the larvae without using chemical agents or solvents; and compost (frass).
Bioflytech’s dried larvae is a product designed as a feed diet for laying hens and broilers, while the protein meals are aimed at the petfood, aquaculture and poultry industries, and to a lesser extent at animal feed for the fur industry. Fats are mainly used in animal feed, but also in the pharmaceutical and cosmetics industry.
The company said that the support of the Xunta de Galicia and the City Council of Palas de Rei determined its site choice for its new facility, for which different locations in the north of Spain and also Portugal were considered.
More eggs
Bioflytech is using two rendering machines at Palas de Rei, one of which is unique and of the company’s own design and will enable tailor-made insect meals to be manufactured with specific percentages of protein and fats according to the customer’s demands. A third rendering machine will be assembled in the next few days.
At the Fuente Álamo facility in Murcia an investment of €2.8 million is planned for the second half of the year to increase the production capacity of the hatchery that supplies larvae eggs to the facility in Galicia.
The Fuente Álamo facility produces 180 kilos of eggs per month, which Bioflytech says is already a milestone in the sector worldwide, given the complexity of guaranteeing stable and continuous production throughout the year. The objective of the expansion is to reach 350 kilos of eggs per month, something unprecedented in the sector.
