Question: how many different foods are there in total in the whole world?

Michael Schubert answered on 10 Mar 2020:

I would say that the number of different foods in the world is pretty much unlimited! We can eat all kinds of plants, animals, fungi, and more. There are about nine million different animal species, nearly 400,000 different plant species, and millions of fungi as well. We’re not sure exactly how many of them we can eat – some cannot be eaten because they’re poisonous, while others are endangered or just don’t taste very good. We are always discovering new species, though, so the number of foods we can eat is always growing.

Humans don’t take advantage of all the food options we have, though. Insects are a great example of this – most of us would never consider eating a bug! You might be surprised to hear that insects are a great food source with lots of protein, and they actually taste pretty good. This doesn’t mean you should go out and start eating bugs – but if you want to learn more about insects as food, why not start by reading this article with your parents or teacher?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insects_as_food