Black soldier fly larvae are increasingly farmed for protein and waste processing, raising welfare questions given the scale of production and uncertainty about insect sentience.
Black soldier fly welfare sits at the frontier of animal welfare science. Evidence for BSF sentience is weak but not absent - larvae show behavioral responses to noxious stimuli and have simple nociceptive systems. The precautionary principle is especially relevant given the extraordinary numbers involved in industrial production. Killing method welfare matters: freezing larvae causes slower death than high-temperature blanching, but high-temperature methods may cause more acute distress. Facility design that provides appropriate thermal gradients and substrate depth may improve larval welfare regardless of sentience certainty.