Question: Just listening to the radio, there was again the claim that two billion people eat (daily) regularly insects. After having lived in a few parts of this world, I do not believe that anymore.

Some sources for this claim: The Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education [has a page](https://scienceinpoland.pap.pl/en/news/news%2C28495%2Cexpert-more-2-billion-people-worldwide-eat-insects-every-day.html) titled:

> 
> Expert: More than 2 billion people worldwide eat insects every day
> 
> 
> 

Some scientific citations go back to: FAO's ["Edible insects"](http://www.fao.org/3/i3253e/i3253e00.pdf) publication (which doesn't explain how they end up with that number). In its Executive Summary it says:

> 
> It is estimated that insects form part of the traditional diets of at least 2 billion people.
> 
> 
> 

In chapter 3 it's added that

> 
> insect consumption is commonplace in the tropics, while in temperate zones it is often absent
> 
> 
> 

So is it true or not? Sometimes people claim countries like Thailand, etc, but from my understanding people not originating from Isan province do not do that. This is 20 Million people (and my suspicion is, that in the wild 2 billion claim they just include the whole country). Also, e.g. in China, while sometimes insects are eaten, this is a rare occurrence, and not a source of protein. (You wouldn't count the worm in the tequila bottle, would you?)

Answer: 
2 billion is far too low an estimate.

If you've ever eaten anything that contains red die (e.g. maraschino cherries, red candy, soft drinks, apple cider), unless the container is marked Vegan or Kosher, there's a good chance you were eating deliberately added insects. This can include products that say "natural color".

For more information, see: [Red Dye: A Moment in Science - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YzM1Edb6mo&feature=emb_logo&ab_channel=NorthCarolinaMuseumofNaturalSciences)

### NOTE:

I originally submitted this answer, perhaps deliberately misinterpreting the intent of the question, in order to present a possibly interesting but not well known fact.

I certainly didn't and don't think it's worthy of the bounty it received by virtue of being the only answer.

If someone ever submits an answer that the OP accepts, let me know and I'll offer a bounty and regift it to that answer.
According to [The psychology of eating insects: A cross-cultural comparison between Germany and China](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodqual.2015.04.013) *Food Quality and Preference* Volume 44, September 2015, Pages 148-156:

Based upon a survey conducted by this research,

67.7% of Chinese and 13.3% of Germans have consumed insects.

However, only 12.9% of Chinese and 0% of Germans consume insects "regularly".

Regarding Laos, according to [Insect Consumption to Address Undernutrition, a National Survey on the Prevalence of Insect Consumption among Adults and Vendors in Laos](https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0136458)

> 
> A total of 1025 (96.8%) lay people were currently insect consumers, 135 (13.0%) daily or weekly consumers, and 322 (31.1%) consumed several times per month. For the majority (575, 55.6%) the consumption was infrequent (less than a few times per year) and only 22 (2%) had never eaten insects.
> 
> 
>