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According to Christine Middlemiss – the United Kingdom’s chief veterinary officer – African swine fever presents such a threat of spreading even further in Europe and beyond, that she can barely sleep at night. The cause for her concerns isn’t unfounded: as of today, there is still no vaccine against the “pig virus”, and the wild boar population is so dense in Eastern Europe, that the disease basically sustains itself.

If you have ever wondered about how companies like Celitron can convert animal tissue waste into stable, reusable materials, it is all thanks to the process of rendering. Any method that processes animal by-products into something useful can be treated as such.

Regardless of the activity in question, all industries produce waste. However, the impact of that waste can be even more dangerous in the case of healthcare facilities.

Insect farming can be a touchy subject with most people, as our first reaction (understandably) isn’t to view anything with six legs as food. However, the irrefutable benefits of insects like the black soldier fly larvae (often abbreviated as BSFL) may soon overshadow the negative perceptions commonly associated with insects as a source of food.

Animal health and disease prevention are one of the main concerns for agricultural industries working with livestock. Although governments and international organizations set standards to hinder the pathogens causing a threat to animal welfare, sometimes the regulations for disease prevention are not enough. The recent incident in New Zealand, a country heavily relying on its farming industry, is a great example of large and wasteful disease prevention. The government has decided to kill 150,000 cows to eradicate the hazardous bacteria from the national herd and save the economy. There are 24,000 cows already slaughtered. Some of them are transported and slaughtered in processing plants for meat, while some will be killed and buried in animal waste incinerator. For New Zealand, dairy is the main export good, and the eradication program is estimated to cost 886 million New Zealand dollars (€513 million.) Although rendering animals is a common practice to further convert the animal by-product into useful materials and profit, the livestock rendering is currently not carried out.