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Certhon Wraps Up 7th Raspberry Trial Successfully
After successfully growing strawberries in the Certhon Innovation Centre (CIC), the company has decided to take on another trial of growing fruits indoors.
“Raspberry isn’t the first crop that comes to mind when figuring out which crops to grow indoors,” Andrea Huegler, R&D Engineer and Agronomist at Certhon said. “However, we accepted the challenge and decided to go for it as there are a lot of benefits to growing it in a controlled environment.”
After successfully growing strawberries in the Certhon Innovation Centre (CIC), the company has decided to take on another trial of growing fruits indoors. Certhon has been doing lots of research on indoor farming for a long time now. This has allowed them to investigate how to grow more complex crops in a controlled environment without daylight.
Andrea Huegler
Trial results
The main advantage of growing this crop indoors is having higher yields and consistent quality year-round. Certhon sees great opportunities ahead for the crop, due to its premium status and short shelf life. “It makes it a perfect candidate to be grown indoors.” During this trial, common raspberry cultivars were chosen. Certhon used chilled raspberry canes from a propagator, pollination by bumblebees and top and interlighting was used to flourish the crops. The harvesting period comprises 10 weeks, out of a total cultivation cycle of 21 weeks and is expected to end in July 2021.
Cultivation risks
The research was mainly about investigating the right transition of the vegetative state of the crop to the generative state. Andrea says that balancing the climate and light with energy consumption is the trickiest part here. “Ever since the first raspberry trial we’ve been trying to balance out the reduction of energy use, having an X amount of yield at a great quality and extending the harvesting period. Throughout the trials, we have obtained nearly twice as much yield compared to the traditional Dutch polytunnel producers in the summer,” Andrea notes.
However, raspberry cultivation isn’t without challenges. “One of the risks that could come up is growing grey mold,” explains Andrea. “If nectar isn’t removed well from the flower, the fruit can grow mold or have a grey undertone. However, if you manage your humidity wisely, the incidence is severely reduced. That’s the idea behind the CIC, optimizing growing recipes and eventually expanding the product portfolio because we want to provide a wide selection of product options to our clients.”
Greenhouse application
The knowledge that is generated in the CIC can also be applied to the cultivation of raspberries in greenhouses. Growing these crops indoors allows Certhon to generate ideal growing conditions and maximum potential for raspberry cultivation. With this knowledge, Certhon generates a blueprint that growers can follow in greenhouse cultivation as well.
Andrea explains, “For instance, the blueprint can be followed when growers want to know when to: provide extra lighting, shading, or adjust the humidity. In this way, ideal growing conditions can be mimicked to achieve the highest quality and yield possible in a greenhouse.”
Cane risk
Another, very important aspect is the quality of the raspberry canes. In order to have good production, your raspberry canes need to be of good quality and pest-free. “This cannot always be guaranteed, '' says Andrea, “since they are propagated outdoors and therefore bound to the pressures of external influences, such as climate. Although we have not tried it ourselves yet, we think the next step is to also propagate raspberry canes in a controlled environment without daylight.”
For more information:
Andrea Huegler, R&D Engineer and Agronomist
Certhon
andrea.huegler@certhon.com
ABC Westland 555
P.O. Box 90
2685 ZH Poeldijk
The Netherlands
Tel: +31 174 22 50 80
www.certhon.com
Publication date: Mon 7 Jun 2021
Author: Rebekka Boekhout
© HortiDaily.com
Vertical Farming On The Rise: Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station And 80 Acres Farms Enter Research Agreement
Utilizing world-class technology and analytics to offer customers a wide variety of pesticide-free food with a longer shelf-life that exceeds the highest food safety standards
80 Acres Farms enters into a master research agreement with the Experiment Station at The University of Arkansas with scientists to propose collaborative vertical farming research projects aimed to advance the science of vertical farming
NEWS PROVIDED BY 80 Acres Farms
HAMILTON, Ohio, April 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Vertical farming business 80 Acres Farms has entered into a collaborative research agreement with the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station to advance the science of vertical farming.
Scientists with the experiment station, the research arm of the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture, will coordinate with 80 Acres Farms researchers to pursue a variety of vertical farming research topics, said Bryan Renk, director of commercialization for the division's Technology Commercialization Office.
Utilizing world-class technology and analytics to offer customers a wide variety of pesticide-free food with a longer shelf-life that exceeds the highest food safety standards.
"Vertical farming is growing and trending," Renk said. "There are multiple companies forming across the U.S. that are trying to take advantage of that trend."
Jean-François Meullenet, senior associate vice president for agriculture research and director of the experiment station, said the agreement provides a unique opportunity for research.
"We are very excited about this new research partnership with 80 Acres Farms," Meullenet said. "Protected farming is a strategic research direction for the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station, and 80 Acres Farm is a leader in this area."
Renk said that the initial round of proposed and current research includes a project analyzing the chemical components of 80 Acres produce, an exploration into new protocols for vertical farming, and evaluation of novel blackberry variety selections that are suited for the vertical farming environment.
"We have a great multidisciplinary team of faculty that can make great contributions to the development of vertical farming technology," Meullenet said. "I look forward to seeing the impact we can have through this research."
"80 Acres is expanding its vertical farming R&D facility in Springdale, Arkansas to develop the growing recipes for multiple leafy and fruiting produce crops," said Victor Verlage, senior vice president for operations, agronomy, and research and development at 80 Acres Farms. "We are calibrating and aligning all the growing conditions, incorporating several proprietary AgTech capabilities that were not available until recently, to bring hyper-fresh fruits and vegetables loaded with taste and nutrition so our consumers can indulge in healthy diets," he said.
Margaret Worthington, assistant professor of fruit breeding and genetics in the horticulture department for the experiment station and Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences at the University of Arkansas, is evaluating blackberry varieties that may perform well in these novel growing conditions.
"We hope to identify blackberry breeding selections that perform well in fully-controlled indoor environments and vertical farms," Worthington said.
"Fruit breeding is a long-term effort," she said. "We need to be forward-thinking and consider how the potential varieties moving through our breeding pipeline are going to fit into new markets and productions systems that are just beginning to develop.
"The Arkansas Fruit Breeding Program has a history of mutually beneficial public-private research collaborations and I am looking forward to working with this new partner," she said.
In addition to collaborating on research, 80 Acres Farms also plans to create internship opportunities for Bumpers college students.
"80 Acres Farms is eager to provide opportunities for the next generation of farmers where they will have access to best-in-class vertical farming technology," said Verlage. "The students will have immersive training right here in Northwest Arkansas, minutes from the university campus."
To learn more about the Division of Agriculture research, visit the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station website: https://aaes.uark.edu. Follow us on Twitter at @ArkAgResearch and Instagram at ArkAgResearch.
About the Division of Agriculture
The University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture's mission is to strengthen agriculture, communities, and families by connecting trusted research to the adoption of best practices. Through the Agricultural Experiment Station and the Cooperative Extension Service, the Division of Agriculture conducts research and extension work within the nation's historic land grant education system.
The Division of Agriculture is one of 20 entities within the University of Arkansas System. It has offices in all 75 counties in Arkansas and faculty on five system campuses.
The University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture offers all its Extension and Research programs and services without regard to race, color, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, religion, age, disability, marital or veteran status, genetic information, or any other legally protected status, and is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer.
About 80 Acres Farms
80 Acres Farms is a vertical farming leader providing customers with the freshest and most nutritious fruits and vegetables at affordable prices. Utilizing world-class technology and analytics, the Company offers customers a wide variety of pesticide-free food with a longer shelf-life that exceeds the highest food safety standards.
For further information, please contact us at:
Rebecca Haders / rebecca.haders@eafarms.com / +1 513-910-9089
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80 Acres Farms' Vertical Farming Technology
Utilizing world-class technology and analytics to offer customers a wide variety of pesticide-free food with a longer shelf-life that exceeds the highest food safety standards.
SOURCE 80 Acres Farms
Vertical Farming Startup Oishii Raises $50m In Series A Funding
“We aim to be the largest strawberry producer in the world, and this capital allows us to bring the best-tasting, healthiest berry to everyone.”
By Sian Yates
03/11/2021
Oishii, a vertical farming startup based in New Jersey, has raised $50 million during a Series A funding round led by Sparx Group’s Mirai Creation Fund II.
The funds will enable Oishii to open vertical strawberry farms in new markets, expand its flagship farm outside of Manhattan, and accelerate its investment in R&D.
“Our mission is to change the way we grow food. We set out to deliver exceptionally delicious and sustainable produce,” said Oishii CEO Hiroki Koga. “We started with the strawberry – a fruit that routinely tops the dirty dozen of most pesticide-riddled crops – as it has long been considered the ‘holy grail’ of vertical farming.”
“We aim to be the largest strawberry producer in the world, and this capital allows us to bring the best-tasting, healthiest berry to everyone. From there, we’ll quickly expand into new fruits and produce,” he added.
Oishii is already known for its innovative farming techniques that have enabled the company to “perfect the strawberry,” while its proprietary and first-of-its-kind pollination method is conducted naturally with bees.
The company’s vertical farms feature zero pesticides and produce ripe fruit all year round, using less water and land than traditional agricultural methods.
“Oishii is the farm of the future,” said Sparx Group president and Group CEO Shuhei Abe. “The cultivation and pollination techniques the company has developed set them well apart from the industry, positioning Oishii to quickly revolutionise agriculture as we know it.”
The company has raised a total of $55 million since its founding in 2016.
Gotham Greens Goes West To Unlock Next Growth Chapter: ‘The Indoor Environment Is Relatively Unexplored But Offers Fantastic Opportunities’
Expanding to Solano, California, where the greenhouse will be co-located with the University of California-Davis (UC Davis), is a significant milestone for the company that has thus far built greenhouses in its home state of New York, Rhode Island, Maryland, Illinois, and Colorado
By Mary Ellen Shoup
02-Mar-2021
Photo Credit: Gotham Greens
Using funding from its recent $87m Series D capital raise, indoor agriculture company Gotham Greens has expanded operations to Northern California – its first West Coast greenhouse location – opening a 10-acre facility, which will bring its total annual production to 40 million heads of lettuce and herbs.
Expanding to Solano, California, where the greenhouse will be co-located with the University of California-Davis (UC Davis), is a significant milestone for the company that has thus far built greenhouses in its home state of New York, Rhode Island, Maryland, Illinois, and Colorado.
“California is a significant contributor to the nation’s produce industry in several ways. Not only is California responsible for growing one-third of the country’s vegetables and two-thirds of the nation’s fruits, but also it is home to numerous research institutes, industry groups, and suppliers,” Gotham Greens co-founder and CEO Viraj Puri told FoodNavigator-USA.
While working to produce hydroponic indoor lettuce on a mass scale for West Coast consumers is a major goal with the new greenhouse facility, Puri added that its partnership with UC Davis will help drive the next wave of innovation in controlled environment agriculture (CEA).
“The location of this new greenhouse uniquely enables opportunities for Gotham Greens to play a greater role in the produce industry as well as collaborate on research and innovation with the University of California system focused on advancing the science, workforce, technology, and profitability of indoor agriculture globally,” he said.
'Over time, we’ve increased the use of automated systems'
As the top producing state of lettuce, the California agriculture industry has battled with many issues such as heavy rains and flooding to months-long drought periods that have resulted in supply shortages and price increases.
Indoor agriculture such as the greenhouse hydroponic solution Gotham Greens has brought to market could provide a viable solution to all these issues, it claims.
Gotham Greens grows its greens uses natural sunlight and hydroponic systems which uses 95% less water and 97% less land than conventional farming.
“Over time, we’ve increased the use of automated systems to ensure that temperature, humidity and light levels, as well as air composition, are exactly the right balance,” said Puri.
The end product is packaged fresh greens which are beginning to reach cost parity with commoditized field-grown lettuce. A 4.5-ounce package of Gotham Greens Romaine lettuce for example costs $3.49 on average compared to a head of conventional Romain lettuce which retails for $2.28 (in Chicago), according to USDA market price data.
Consumers also have the extra security of knowing that the lettuce they purchased is fresh since the produce traveled a much shorter distance and passed through fewer hands than is typically required for field-grown lettuce, noted Gotham Greens.
Gotham Greens Product Shot_Photo Credit Gotham Greens
Size of the prize
Puri noted that while just a small fraction of the overall lettuce category, the potential addressable market for indoor-grown, packaged leafy greens and herbs in the US and Canada is $15bn.
"While indoor farming currently represents a small portion of the salad and leafy greens market, Gotham Greens is growing +70% year over year and the indoor farming sector is growing more than +50% year over year*, far outpacing the overall category (+15% YoY) as well as the organic segment (+9% YoY)," he said.
*Nielsen Total US xAOC Lettuce and Pre Packaged Salads, Dollar Sales, Latest 52 weeks ending 1/23/21
Advantages of greenhouse farming
Asked whether the company would ever explore a vertical farming model, which in theory could use less land to produce equal amounts of lettuce, Puri noted that its greenhouse method mixed with technology is a more flexible and economic solution.
“Vertical farming is an exciting extension of modern greenhouse farming with many shared principles, but it is still a relatively young industry with open questions around technology and financial sustainability. Fully indoor environments that rely on artificial light and HVAC systems can theoretically offer much higher yields and levels of climate control, pest management, and food safety. However, these benefits currently come with significantly higher capital and operating costs,” said Puri.
Plant varieties optimized for indoor growing
The company has proved its system can work at a large scale (Gotham Greens products are available in 40 states and at 2,000 retail stores), but there are many new areas it can explore to further optimize its growing methods.
“One area of particular interest for UC Davis is the breeding of improved crop varieties for indoor agriculture. For several centuries, plant breeders have focused on selecting and breeding crops suited to outdoor conditions, where they have been successful. The indoor environment, in contrast, is relatively unexplored but offers fantastic opportunities to use lights and nutrients to modify plant development, nutritional quality, yield, and shelf-life,” said Professor Gail Taylor, chair of the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences.
“Much remains to be explored over the coming years to ensure safer, cleaner, and more sustainable food.”
‘We are interested in the complementary nature of indoor and outdoor agriculture’
Gabe Youtsey, chief innovation officer, UC Agriculture, and Natural Resources, believes the CEA industry a new and exciting frontier for agriculture.
“New genetics, data-driven intelligent farming, farm automation, energy optimization, and other technologies can all be brought together to create a range of new tasty, healthy, and sustainable food products. We are interested in the complementary nature of indoor and outdoor agriculture, and the opportunity to help expand a local footprint of food production that is less resource-intensive and create a new generation of diverse young farmers,” Youtsey told FoodNavigator-USA.
The greenhouse will generate 60 new full-time jobs and create a new type of opportunity for UC Davis students that want to pursue CEA as a career.
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RELATED TAGS: indoor farming, greenhouse farming, Gotham Greens
Little Leaf Farms Raises $90M to Grow Its Greenhouse Network
Massachusetts-based Little Leaf Farms has raised $90 million in a debt and equity financing round to expand its network of hydroponic greenhouses on the East Coast. The round was led by Equilibrium Capital as well as founding investors Bill Helman and Pilot House Associates. Bank of America also participated.
by Jennifer Marston
Image from: Little Leaf Farms
Massachusetts-based Little Leaf Farms has raised $90 million in a debt and equity financing round to expand its network of hydroponic greenhouses on the East Coast. The round was led by Equilibrium Capital as well as founding investors Bill Helman and Pilot House Associates. Bank of America also participated.
Little Leaf Farms says the capital is “earmarked” to build new greenhouse sites along the East Coast, where its lettuce is currently available in about 2,500 stores.
The company already operates one 10-acre greenhouse in Devins, Massachusetts. Its facility grows leafy greens using hydroponics and a mixture of sunlight supplemented by LED-powered grow lights. Rainwater captured from the facility’s roof provides most of the water used on the farm.
According to a press release, Little Leaf Farms has doubled its retail sales to $38 million since 2019. And last year, the company bought180 acres of land in Pennsylvania on which to build an additional facility. Still another greenhouse, slated for North Carolina, will serve the Southeast region of the U.S.
Little Leaf Farms joins the likes of Revol Greens, Gotham Greens, AppHarvest, and others in bringing local(ish) greens to a greater percentage of the population. These facilities generally pack and ship their greens on the day of or day after harvesting, and only supply retailers within a certain radius. Little Leaf Farms, for example, currently servers only parts of Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New York, and New Jersey.
The list of regions the company serves will no doubt lengthen as the company builds up its greenhouse network in the coming months.
Agritech: Precision Farming With AI, IoT and 5G
For a company that grows and delivers vegetables, Boomgrow Productions Sdn Bhd’s office is nothing like a farm, or even a vertical farm. Where farms are bedecked with wheelbarrows, spades and hoes, Boomgrow’s floor plan is akin to a co-working space with a communal island table, several cubicles, comfortable armchairs, a cosy hanging rattan chair and a glass-walled conference room in the middle
Image from: Photo by Mohd Izwan Mohd Nazam/The Edge
For a company that grows and delivers vegetables, Boomgrow Productions Sdn Bhd’s office is nothing like a farm, or even a vertical farm.
Where farms are bedecked with wheelbarrows, spades and hoes, Boomgrow’s floor plan is akin to a co-working space with a communal island table, several cubicles, comfortable armchairs, a cosy hanging rattan chair and a glass-walled conference room in the middle.
At a corner, propped up along a walkway leading to a rectangular chamber fitted with grow lights, are rows of support stilts with hydroponic planters developed in-house and an agricultural technologist perched on a chair, perusing data. “This is where some of the R&D work happens,” says Jay Dasen, co-founder of the agritech start-up.
But there is a larger farm where most of the work behind this high-tech initiative is executed. Located a stone’s throw from the city centre in Ampang is a 40ft repurposed shipping container outfitted with perception technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities that mimic the ideal environment to produce more than 50,000kg of vegetables a year.
Stacked in vertical layers, Boomgrow’s vegetables are grown under artificial lights with Internet of Things (IoT) sensors to detect everything from leaf discolouration to nitrate composition. This is coupled with AI and machine learning algorithms.
Boomgrow is the country’s first 5G-connected vertical farm. With the low latency and larger bandwidth technology, the start-up is able to monitor production in real time as well as maintain key parameters, such as temperature and humidity, to ensure optimal growth conditions.
When Jay and her co-founders, K Muralidesan and Shan Palani, embarked on this initiative six years ago, Boomgrow was nowhere near what it is today.
The three founders got together hoping to do their part in building a more sustainable future. “I’ve spent years advising small and large companies on sustainability, environmental and social governance disclosures. I even embarked on a doctorate in sustainability disclosure and governance,” says Jay.
“But I felt a deep sense of disconnect because while I saw companies evolving in terms of policies, processes and procedures towards sustainability, the people in those organisations were not transforming. Sustainability is almost like this white noise in the background. We know it’s important and we know it needs to be done, but we don’t really know how to integrate it into our lives.
“That disconnect really troubled me. When we started Boomgrow, it wasn’t a linear journey. Boomgrow is something that came out of meaningful conversations and many years of research.”
Shan, on the other hand, was an architect who developed a taste for sustainable designs when he was designing modular structures with minimal impact on their surroundings between regular projects. “It was great doing that kind of work. But I was getting very dissatisfied because the projects were customer-driven, which meant I would end up having debates about trivial stuff such as the colour of wall tiles,” he says.
As for Murali, the impetus to start Boomgrow came from having lived overseas — while working in capital markets and financial services — where quality and nutritious produce was easily available.
Ultimately, they concluded that the best way to work towards their shared sustainability goals was to address the imminent problem of food shortage.
“By 2050, the world’s population is expected to grow to 9.7 billion people, two-thirds of whom will be in Asia-Pacific. Feeding all those people will definitely be a huge challenge,” says Jay.
“The current agricultural practice is not built for resilience, but efficiency. So, when you think of farming, you think of vast tracts of land located far away from where you live or shop.
“The only way we could reimagine or rethink that was to make sure the food is located closer to consumers, with a hyperlocal strategy that is traceable and transparent, and also free of pesticides.”
Having little experience in growing anything, it took them a while to figure out the best mechanism to achieve their goal. “After we started working on prototypes, we realised that the tropics are not designed for certain types of farming,” says Jay.
“And then, there is the problem of harmful chemicals and pesticides everywhere, which has become a necessity for farmers to protect their crops because of the unpredictable climate. We went through many iterations … when we started, we used to farm in little boxes, but that didn’t quite work out.”
They explored different methodologies, from hydroponics to aquaponics, and even started growing outdoors. But they lost a lot of crops when a heat wave struck.
That was when they started exploring more effective ways to farm. “How can we protect the farm from terrible torrential rains, plant 365 days a year and keep prices affordable? It took us five years to answer these questions,” says Jay.
Even though farmers all over the world currently produce more than enough food to feed everyone, 820 million people — roughly 11% of the global population — did not have enough to eat in 2018, according to the World Health Organization. Concurrently, food safety and quality concerns are rising, with more consumers opting for organically produced food as well as safe foods, out of fear of harmful synthetic fertilisers, pesticides, herbicides and fungicides.
According to ResearchAndMarkets.com, consumer demand for global organic fruit and vegetables was valued at US$19.16 billion in 2019 and is anticipated to expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6.5% by 2026.
Meanwhile, the precision farming market was estimated to be US$7 billion in 2020 and is projected to reach US$12.8 billion by 2025, at a CAGR of 12.7% between 2020 and 2025, states MarketsandMarkets Research Pte Ltd.
Malaysia currently imports RM1 billion worth of leafy vegetables from countries such as Australia, China and Japan. Sourcing good and safe food from local suppliers not only benefits the country from a food security standpoint but also improves Malaysia’s competitive advantage, says Jay.
Unlike organic farming — which is still a soil-based method — tech-enabled precision farming has the advantage of catering for increasing demand and optimum crop production with the limited resources available. Moreover, changing weather patterns due to global warming encourage the adoption of advanced farming technologies to enhance farm productivity and crop yield.
Boomgrow’s model does not require the acres of land that traditional farms need, Jay emphasises. With indoor farms, the company promises a year-round harvest, undisturbed by climate and which uses 95% less water, land and fuel to operate.
Traditional farming is back-breaking labour. But with precision technology, farmers can spend less time on the farm and more on doing other things to develop their business, she says.
Boomgrow has secured more than RM300,000 in funding via technology and innovation grants from SME Corporation Malaysia, PlaTCOM Ventures and Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation, and is on track to build the country’s largest indoor farms.
Image from: Boomgrow
The company got its chance to showcase the strength of its smart technology when Telekom Malaysia Bhd (TM) approached it to be a part of the telco’s Smart Agriculture cluster in Langkawi last October.
“5G makes it faster for us to process the multiple data streams that we need because we collect data for machine learning, and then AI helps us to make decisions faster,” Jay explains.
“We manage the farm using machines to study inputs like water and electricity and even measure humidity. All the farm’s produce is lab-tested and we can keep our promise that there are no pesticides, herbicides or any preserving chemicals. We follow the food safety standards set by the EU, where nitrate accumulation in plant tissues is a big issue.”
With TM’s 5G technology and Boomgrow’s patent-pending technology, the latter is able to grow vegetables like the staple Asian greens and highland crops such as butterhead and romaine lettuce as well as kale and mint. While the company is able to grow more than 30 varieties of leafy greens, it has decided to stick to a selection of crops that is most in demand to reduce waste, says Jay.
As it stands, shipping containers are the best fit for the company’s current endeavour as containerised modular farms are the simplest means of bringing better food to local communities. However, it is also developing a blueprint to house farms in buildings, she says.
Since the showcase, Boomgrow has started to supply its crops to various hotels in Langkawi. It rolled out its e-commerce platform last year after the Movement Control Order was imposed.
“On our website, we promise to deliver the greens within six hours of harvest. But actually, you could get them way earlier. We harvest the morning after the orders come in and the vegetables are delivered on the same day,” says Jay.
Being mindful of Boomgrow’s carbon footprint, orders are organised and scheduled according to consumers’ localities, she points out. “We don’t want our delivery partners zipping everywhere, so we stagger the orders based on where consumers live.
“For example, all deliveries to Petaling Jaya happen on Thursdays, but the vegetables are harvested that morning. They are not harvested a week before, three days before or the night before. This is what it means to be hyperlocal. We want to deliver produce at its freshest and most nutritious state.”
Plans to expand regionally are also underway, once Boomgrow’s fundraising exercise is complete, says Jay. “Most probably, this will only happen when the Covid-19 pandemic ends.”
To gain the knowledge they have today, the team had to “unlearn” everything they knew and take up new skills to figure what would work best for their business, says Jay. “All this wouldn’t have been possible if we had not experimented with smart cameras to monitor the condition of our produce,” she laughs.
How This Vertical Farm Grows 80,000 Pounds of Produce per Week
To some, the pristine growing conditions and perceived mechanical interference of a vertical farm can seem unnatural, but at Bowery Farming “interference” is actually not the goal at all. “We don’t really think about how people are involved in the growing process, but how to take people out of the growing process”
Bowery Farming uses technology to prioritize accessibility and sustainability in their produce growing operations
To some, the pristine growing conditions and perceived mechanical interference of a vertical farm can seem unnatural, but at Bowery Farming “interference” is actually not the goal at all. “We don’t really think about how people are involved in the growing process, but how to take people out of the growing process” says chief science officer Henry Sztul. “Our goal is actually to have as few people walking around our plants as possible.”
Bowery Farming is a network of vertical farms working to reengineer the growing process. Using a system of light and watering technology, Bowery is able to use 95 percent less water than a traditional outdoor farm, zero pesticides and chemicals, and grow food that tastes as good as anyone else’s.
Bowery Farming uses vertical farm-specific seeds that are optimized for flavor instead of insect resistance and durability. Seeds are mechanically pressed into trays of soil, and sent out into growing positions, or racks within the building that have their own lighting and watering systems. Each tray gets its own QR code so that they can be monitored and assigned a customized plan for water and light until they’re ready to be harvested.
Irving Fain, Bowery Farming’s founder and CEO contemplates the prediction from the United Nations that 70 to 80 percent of the world’s population will be living in and around cities in the next 30 years. “Figuring out ‘how do you feed and how do you provide fresh food to urban environments both more efficiently as well as more sustainably?’ is a very important question today, and an even more important question in the years to come.”
Bringing The Future To life In Abu Dhabi
A cluster of shipping containers in a city centre is about the last place you’d expect to find salad growing. Yet for the past year, vertical farming startup Madar Farms has been using this site in Masdar City, Abu Dhabi, to grow leafy green vegetables using 95 per cent less water than traditional agriculture
Amid the deserts of Abu Dhabi, a new wave of entrepreneurs and innovators are sowing the seeds of a more sustainable future.
Image from: Wired
A cluster of shipping containers in a city centre is about the last place you’d expect to find salad growing. Yet for the past year, vertical farming startup Madar Farms has been using this site in Masdar City, Abu Dhabi, to grow leafy green vegetables using 95 per cent less water than traditional agriculture.
Madar Farms is one of a number of agtech startups benefitting from a package of incentives from the Abu Dhabi Investment Office (ADIO) aimed at spurring the development of innovative solutions for sustainable desert farming. The partnership is part of ADIO’s $545 million Innovation Programme dedicated to supporting companies in high-growth areas.
“Abu Dhabi is pressing ahead with our mission to ‘turn the desert green’,” explained H.E. Dr. Tariq Bin Hendi, Director General of ADIO, in November 2020. “We have created an environment where innovative ideas can flourish and the companies we partnered with earlier this year are already propelling the growth of Abu Dhabi’s 24,000 farms.”
The pandemic has made food supply a critical concern across the entire world, combined with the effects of population growth and climate change, which are stretching the capacity of less efficient traditional farming methods. Abu Dhabi’s pioneering efforts to drive agricultural innovation have been gathering pace and look set to produce cutting-edge solutions addressing food security challenges.
Beyond work supporting the application of novel agricultural technologies, Abu Dhabi is also investing in foundational research and development to tackle this growing problem.
In December, the emirate’s recently created Advanced Technology Research Council [ATRC], responsible for defining Abu Dhabi’s R&D strategy and establishing the emirate and the wider UAE as a desired home for advanced technology talent, announced a four-year competition with a $15 million prize for food security research. Launched through ATRC’s project management arm, ASPIRE, in partnership with the XPRIZE Foundation, the award will support the development of environmentally-friendly protein alternatives with the aim to "feed the next billion".
Image from: Madar Farms
Global Challenges, Local Solutions
Food security is far from the only global challenge on the emirate’s R&D menu. In November 2020, the ATRC announced the launch of the Technology Innovation Institute (TII), created to support applied research on the key priorities of quantum research, autonomous robotics, cryptography, advanced materials, digital security, directed energy and secure systems.
“The technologies under development at TII are not randomly selected,” explains the centre’s secretary general Faisal Al Bannai. “This research will complement fields that are of national importance. Quantum technologies and cryptography are crucial for protecting critical infrastructure, for example, while directed energy research has use-cases in healthcare. But beyond this, the technologies and research of TII will have global impact.”
Future research directions will be developed by the ATRC’s ASPIRE pillar, in collaboration with stakeholders from across a diverse range of industry sectors.
“ASPIRE defines the problem, sets milestones, and monitors the progress of the projects,” Al Bannai says. “It will also make impactful decisions related to the selection of research partners and the allocation of funding, to ensure that their R&D priorities align with Abu Dhabi and the UAE's broader development goals.”
Image from: Agritecture
Nurturing Next-Generation Talent
To address these challenges, ATRC’s first initiative is a talent development programme, NexTech, which has begun the recruitment of 125 local researchers, who will work across 31 projects in collaboration with 23 world-leading research centres.
Alongside universities and research institutes from across the US, the UK, Europe and South America, these partners include Abu Dhabi’s own Khalifa University, and Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence, the world’s first graduate-level institute focused on artificial intelligence.
“Our aim is to up skill the researchers by allowing them to work across various disciplines in collaboration with world-renowned experts,” Al Bannai says.
Beyond academic collaborators, TII is also working with a number of industry partners, such as hyperloop technology company, Virgin Hyperloop. Such industry collaborations, Al Bannai points out, are essential to ensuring that TII research directly tackles relevant problems and has a smooth path to commercial impact in order to fuel job creation across the UAE.
“By engaging with top global talent, universities and research institutions and industry players, TII connects an intellectual community,” he says. “This reinforces Abu Dhabi and the UAE’s status as a global hub for innovation and contributes to the broader development of the knowledge-based economy.”
Vertical Farming: Ugandan Company Develops Solution for Urban Agriculture
We speak to Lilian Nakigozi, founder of Women Smiles Uganda, a company that manufactures and sells vertical farms used to grow crops in areas where there is limited space
We speak to Lilian Nakigozi, founder of Women Smiles Uganda, a company that manufactures and sells vertical farms used to grow crops in areas where there is limited space.
Image from: How We Made It in Africa
1. How Did You Come Up with the Idea to Start Women Smiles Uganda?
Women Smiles Uganda is a social enterprise formed out of passion and personal experience. I grew up with a single mother and eight siblings in Katanga, one of the biggest slums in Kampala, Uganda. I experienced hunger and poverty where we lived. There was no land for us to grow crops and we didn’t have money to buy food. Life was hard; we would often go to sleep on empty stomachs and our baby sister starved to death.
Growing up like that, I pledged to use my knowledge and skills to come up with an idea that could solve hunger and, at the same time, improve people’s livelihoods, particularly women and young girls living in the urban slums. In 2017, while studying business at Makerere University, I had the idea of developing a vertical farm. This came amid so many challenges: a lack of finance and moral support. I would use the money provided to me for lunch as a government student to save for the initial capital of my venture.
I managed to accumulate $300 and used this to buy materials to manufacture the first 20 vertical farms. I gave these to 20 families and, in 2018, we fully started operations in different urban slums.
2. Tell Us About Your Vertical Farms and How They Work.
Women Smiles vertical farms are made out of wood and recycled plastic materials. Each unit is capable of growing up to 200 plants. The product also has an internal bearing system which turns 360° to guarantee optimal use of the sunlight and is fitted with an inbuilt drip irrigation system and greenhouse material to address any agro-climatic challenges.
The farms can be positioned on a rooftop, veranda, walkway, office building or a desk. This allows the growth of crops throughout the year, season after season, unaffected by climatic changes like drought.
In addition, we train our customers on how to make compost manure using vermicomposting and also provide them with a market for their fresh produce.
Image from: How We Made It in Africa
3. Explain Your Revenue Model.
Women Smiles Uganda generates revenue by selling affordable, reliable and modern vertical farms at $35, making a profit margin of $10 on each unit. The women groups are recruited into our training schemes and we teach them how to use vertical farming to grow crops and make compost manure by vermicomposting. Women groups become our outgrowers of fruits and vegetables. We buy the fresh produce from our outgrowers and resell to restaurants, schools and hotels.
We also make money through partnering with NGOs and other small private organisations to provide training in urban farming concepts to the beneficiaries of their projects.
4. What Are Some of the Major Challenges of Running This Business?
The major challenge we face is limited funds by the smallholder farmers to purchase the vertical farms. However, we mitigate this by putting some of them into our outgrower scheme which helps them to generate income from the fresh produce we buy. We have also linked some of them to financial institutions to access finance.
5. How Do You Generate Sales?
We reach our customers directly via our marketing team which moves door to door, identifying organised women groups and educating them about the benefits of vertical farming for improved food security. Most of our customers are low-income earners and very few of them have access to the internet.
However, we do also make use of social media platforms like Facebook to reach out to our customers, especially the youth.
In addition, we organise talk shows and community gatherings with the assistance of local leaders with whom we work hand in hand to provide educational and inspirational materials to people, teaching them about smart agriculture techniques.
6. Who Are Your Main Competitors?
Just like any business, we have got competitors; our major competitors include Camp Green and Spark Agro-Initiatives.
Image from: The Conversation
7. What Mistakes Have You Made in Business and What Did You Learn From Them?
As a victim of hunger and poverty, my dream was for every family in slums to have a vertical farm. I ended up giving some vertical farms on credit. Unfortunately, most of them failed to pay and we ended up with huge losses.
This taught me to shift the risk of payment default to a third party. Every customer who may need our farms on credit is now linked to our partner micro-finance bank. By doing this, it is the responsibility of the bank to recover the funds from our customers and it has worked well.
8. Apart from This Industry, Name an Untapped Business Opportunity in Uganda.
Manufacturing of cooler sheds for the storage of perishable agricultural produce is one untapped opportunity. Currently, Ugandan smallholder farmers lose up to 40% of their fresh produce because of a lack of reliable cold storage systems.
Providing a cheap and reliable 24/7 cold storage system would dramatically reduce post-harvest losses for these farmers.
Is AppHarvest the Future of Farming?
In this video from Motley Fool Live, recorded on Jan. 28, Industry Focus host Nick Sciple and Motley Fool contributor Lou Whiteman discuss AppHarvest, one such SPAC that is looking to disrupt the agriculture industry. Here are the details on what AppHarvest wants to do, and a look at whether the company represents the future of farming.
Special purpose acquisition companies, or SPACs, are red-hot right now, with investors clamoring to get into promising young companies.
In this video from Motley Fool Live, recorded on Jan. 28, Industry Focus host Nick Sciple and Motley Fool contributor Lou Whiteman discuss AppHarvest, one such SPAC that is looking to disrupt the agriculture industry. Here are the details on what AppHarvest wants to do, and a look at whether the company represents the future of farming.
Nick Sciple: One last company I wanted to talk about, Lou, and this is one I think it's -- you pay attention to, but not one I'm super excited to run in and buy. It was a company called AppHarvest. It's coming public via a [SPAC] this year. This vertical farming space. We talked about Gladstone Land buying traditional farmland. AppHarvest is taking a very different approach, trying to lean into some of the ESG-type movements.
Lou Whiteman: Yeah. Let's look at this. It probably wouldn't surprise you that the U.S. is the biggest global farm exporter as we said, but it might surprise you that the Netherlands, the tiny little country, is No. 2. The way they do that is tech: Greenhouse farm structure. AppHarvest has taken that model and brought it to the U.S. They have, I believe, three farms in Appalachia. The pitches can produce 30x the yields using 90% less water. Right now, it's mostly tomatoes and it is early-stage. I don't own this stock either. I love this idea. There's some reasons that I'm not buying in right now that we can get into. But this is fascinating to me. We talked about making the world a better place. This is the company that we need to be successful to make the world a better place. The warning on it is that it is a SPAC. So it's not public yet. Right now, I believe N-O-V-S. That deal should close soon. [Editor's note: The deal has since closed.] I'm not the only one excited about it. I tend not to like to buy IPOs and new companies anyway. I think the caution around buying into the excitement applies here. There is a Martha Stewart video on their website talking up the company, which I love Martha Stewart, but that's a hype level that makes me want to just watch and see what they produce. This is just three little farms in Appalachia right now and a great idea. This was all over my watchlist. I would imagine I would love to hold it at some point, but just be careful because this is, as we saw SPACs last year in other areas, people are very excited about this.
Sciple: Yeah. I think, like we've said, for a lot of these companies, the prospects are great. I think when you look at the reduced water usage, better, environmentally friendly, all those sorts of things. I like that they are in Appalachia. As someone who is from the South, I like it when more rural areas get some people actually investing money there. But again, there's a lot of execution between now and really getting to a place where this is the future of farming and they're going to reach scale and all those sorts of things. But this is a company I'm definitely going to have my radar on and pay attention to as they continue to report earnings. Because you can tell yourself a story about how this type of vertical farming, indoor farming disrupts this traditional model, can be more efficient, cleaner, etc. Something to continue paying attention to as we have more information, because this company, like you said, Lou, isn't all the way public yet. We still got to have this SPAC deal finalized and then we get all our fun SEC filings and quarterly calls and all those sorts of things. Once we have that, I will be very much looking forward to seeing what the company has to say.
Whiteman: Right. Just to finish up along too, the interesting thing here is that it is a proven concept because it has worked elsewhere. The downside of that is that it needed to work there. Netherlands just doesn't have -- and this is an expensive proposition to get started, to get going. There's potential there, but in a country blessed with almost seemingly unlimited farmland for now, for long term it makes sense. But in the short term, it could be a hard thing to really get up and running. I think you're right, just one to watch.
Advice For New Vertical Farmers: Grower Spotlight on Andrew Worrall
Andrew is LettUs Grow’s Farm Manager, he manages two of our sites across Bristol and has brought a wealth of knowledge into the company through his previous experience in indoor farming roles across the UK including at Grow Up, Raynor Foods & RootLabs. In this three part interview, we explore what it’s been like to move from animal husbandry to indoor farming, the lessons he’s learned along the way, what it’s like working at LettUs Grow and his advice for those new to indoor growing.
Last week we spoke about running a farm at LettUs Grow. What excites you about vertical farming?
It’s the future of the industry. Also, the amount of salad that these farms can produce for their local community. We want to be able to eat salad all year round and we import to make that happen. However, just a small farm can easily provide for its local community, very efficiently and all year round. The sustainability element is also exciting: with our salad there’s no food miles, it’s very minimalistic. You could use an electric van or bike to distribute this crop if you wanted to. It’s a step forward in terms of what we need to do to take care of our planet.
What do you think are the biggest downsides to vertical farming?
It’s still a new technology and it can be expensive. The biggest roadblock facing the industry is that we need more people and companies to collaborate together to make sure we can build these farms at a sensible rate, so we can provide farms to anyone. We want to be able to provide farms to people, communities and countries that don’t have a lot of money, so that they can provide affordable fresh produce to local people.
How has vertical farming impacted your life?
Massively! I wanted to find my passion, a job that I loved - that was very important to me. It’s satisfying to be in a position now where I’m very happy to be doing what I do and I look forward to going into work. I was happy to make the move from London to Bristol. I would have moved even further if it meant being able to continue working within this industry.
Image from: LettUs Grow
How do you see vertical farming playing a part in the future?
When indoor farming first came about, it had a reputation of being competition for outdoor farming, which just isn’t the case. There’s so much we can’t grow that outdoor farming can provide, such as cereal crops. I’m glad we’re at a stage where indoor and outdoor farms can start to work together to optimise both methods. With these new relationships, there should be a good increase in the amount of indoor farms you’ll be seeing. What LettUs Grow offers with DROP & GROW™ is an exciting project because that’s a 40ft shipping container which can be placed pretty much anywhere. It’s not that big - it could go in a car park or behind a restaurant, but actually provide quite a lot of salad to that area.
How much of our food should be grown this way?
Good question. If you had asked me a while back I would have just said salad, but now I’ve changed my mind. Indoor farming can have a massive impact on propagation, especially aeroponics, because of how we aerate and nourish our roots. We could start lettuce for greenhouse projects and we can also propagate tomatoes, strawberries and tree whips. Propagating trees in this way could potentially be hugely beneficial and it’s something we want to do more of.
We can also quickly grow large amounts of microgreens, baby leafs, herbs and we can grow fruiting crops like strawberries. We are slowly chipping away and it’s really exciting. I’m waiting to see if I can ever say I’ve grown or propagated every crop that can be grown in these farms!
What do you think are the biggest benefits of vertical farming?
How fast these crops can grow! The turnover can be as short as 5 days from seed, depending on the crop. Also how clean it can be - I’m very dedicated to making sure these farms are built to ensure they are easy to be maintained and clean. The most exciting part is the crop growth rate though - it’s incredible how fast our crop grows from seed to plate. In a very well maintained growing calendar, which Ostara® is great for supporting, you can optimise your beds so that the day you harvest can also be the day you germinate onto that same bed. Your farms can be forever providing salad at very fast rates.
Image from: LettUs Grow
What was the biggest change you encountered during your years indoor farming?
Moving from being a production grower to an R&D grower. It has been a great change! As a production grower I knew what I needed to know about growing the plant safely and getting it onto a plate so it was good for the consumer. Now I’m fully optimising, learning and understanding the plants completely, so that I can help the grower that I used to be. We spend a lot of time on crop recipes to make sure that whoever we sell our farms to can start up very quickly and they won’t have to spend months developing their crops. If they have the customers and clients behind them, they can buy DROP & GROW and start producing salad as soon as it's been commissioned.
What was the biggest change you encountered in the industry?
More and more people are speaking about what’s going on in the industry and getting involved. I get so many messages on LinkedIn with people who want to get into this career. It’s exciting to see that indoor growing is a career people can access now. When I was developing my skills I didn’t know I would end up in indoor farming. There are more opportunities than ever before. For example, our Crop Technician is doing a placement here for 2 years. The aim is that they can gain the skill sets and knowledge they need to then go off and do the same practice in any farm they want.
What advice do you have for people who are looking to start a career in growing?
Reach out to companies who are already out there. You could start off part-time or as an assistant. If you are patient and dedicated then it’s a journey I promise you won’t regret. It takes a lot of work, but the outcome is amazing - you’ll be learning so much about this new technology. You’ll also build great relationships: there are so many amazing people in this industry who are so interesting, with different backgrounds, who are willing to share their knowledge. You can always learn more and other people are a great source of that.
What about for those looking to start a vertical farming business?
Do your homework. There are people out there who you can reach out to and it’s very easy to get information. It’s very easy to get excited about the idea and jump straight into it, because it is exciting and can be very rewarding, but it’s really important to do it step by step. Know how to scale properly, learning the differences between a small and larger farm. Understand how many people you’ll need and the logistics. I’d also advise people to get some practical work experience before you buy. You want to start the company knowing the tricks of the trade.
Image from: LettUs Grow
LettUs Grow Blog: www.lettusgrow.com/blog/advice-for-vertical-farmers
IGS Signs Significant Export Deal With Jungle To Supply French Retail Market
The first growth towers will be in production by early 2021, scaling incrementally to a minimum of 17 towers by the end of 2021
Scottish Technology to Create One of
Europe’s Largest Vertical Farms
Edinburgh, Scotland – 17 September 2020 - Indoor agritech specialist IGS has today announced a significant export deal with experienced French urban agriculturalists, Jungle. The multi-million-pound deal will introduce IGS indoor growing platforms to Jungle’s operations, initially outside Paris, to grow a variety of crops to supply major French retailers.
The first growth towers will be in production by early 2021, scaling incrementally to a minimum of 17 towers by the end of 2021. Jungle will grow a range of herbs and salads to supply select retailers across France. The company will utilize the patented IGS plug-and-play vertical farming platform to widen its portfolio and produce new varieties through an ongoing program of crop trials.
Jungle’s indoor growing operations will also develop a variety of botanicals to provide natural ingredients to a world-leading flavor and fragrance business.
Jungle’s ethos is focused on sustainable food production, with superior quality of crops grown through a more efficient model, re-localizing the supply chain, considerably reducing waste and using no chemicals. With extensive experience in the indoor growing space, the company has achieved recognition in the highly competitive retail market in France for the quality of its produce.
To increase the scale of production sustainably, while maintaining its commitment to high-quality, delicious, and pesticide-free produce, the company conducted an extensive search to identify the best technology partner.
After a thorough and competitive review of the market, IGS was selected as the most economically viable and environmentally friendly system capable of meeting Jungle’s requirements to reach the industrial scale required by its customers. IGS offers its customers a highly controllable platform, designed to maximize productivity whilst minimizing energy and water consumption.
When completed, the nine-meter-high growth towers will be housed alongside a 1,500 m2 service area on Jungle’s site outside Paris. This will provide approximately 5,200 m2 of growing space, producing up to 425 tonnes per annum when fully operational, making it one of the largest vertical farms in Europe.
IGS CEO, David Farquhar, commented: “In recent months, global markets have been challenged considerably and export agreements have become more difficult to fulfill. The announcement of this deal is an exciting one not just for IGS, but also for the UK’s Agri-tech sector as we showcase our international capability to support economic recovery post-coronavirus. The Jungle team has a strong reputation for excellence and sustainability both of its produce and approach.
“Jungle needs a reliable, productized system that can meet its ambitious growth plans in France and beyond and IGS has proven to be exactly that, following a rigorous selection process. This deal is proof that our unwavering commitment to innovative, practical design, based on a deep understanding of delivering optimum growing conditions, is what customers want. The deployment of the system for Jungle begins immediately and I am encouraged by how well our teams are collaborating as we move forward together.”
Gilles Dreyfus, CEO of Jungle commented: “This partnership agreement is a significant step forward for Jungle and our ability to deliver at scale for our customers. We have established Jungle as a grower of superior produce with major French retailers and have plans to build on this reputation as we look at operations in other regions. We are proud to be innovators in our sector and it is important that we find people and organizations that share this same vision.
“We undertook a very serious assessment of the market and IGS was a clear leader in our eyes. What we can offer our customers through the partnership with IGS puts us at a different level in terms of scale, flexibility, and potential to expand and develop our produce portfolio. The IGS approach, both with the technology and the team, is such that we feel completely aligned and able to work collaboratively now and into the future.”
IGS has received recognition from the Scottish Government for the exciting export opportunities it is bringing to the Scottish market. Trade Minister Ivan McKee MSP said: “This significant contract underlines IGS’ standing as a global leader in agricultural innovation which will help everyone farm more sustainably. IGS’ growth has been driven by a focus on quality, innovation and scientific expertise and shows what Scottish companies can achieve with the right support in place.
“International exports have a central role to play in our economic recovery from COVID-19. The Scottish Government has set an ambitious target of increasing the value of exports from 20 percent to 25 percent of GDP by the end of the decade and I look forward to IGS helping us achieve that goal.”
In addition, Scottish Enterprise which has worked closely with IGS since 2018, welcomes this strategic export announcement. Neil Francis, International Trade Director at Scottish Enterprise, said: “We congratulate IGS on securing this export deal, which will ensure the company’s innovative technology is delivered to a global marketplace.
“Scottish Enterprise has worked closely with IGS over the past couple of years, both through our investment arm, the Scottish Investment Bank, and Scottish Development International. We look forward to continuing support IGS as it demonstrates its capabilities in the agritech sector.
“International trade will be key to Scotland’s economic recovery and help deliver the future, sustainable growth we all want to see. Working with our partners, Scottish Enterprise will continue to do all we can to support companies access overseas markets.
Ends
Notes to editors:
For more information: please contact Kate Forster, IGS on kate@intelligentgrowthsolutions.com or call +44 7787 534 999 or Gilles Dreyfus, Jungle on gdreyfus@jungle.bio.
About IGS:
Founded in 2013, IGS brought together decades of farming and engineering experience to create an agritech business with a vision to revolutionize the indoor growing market. Its commitment to innovation has continued apace and it has evolved the applications of its technology beyond agriculture to create solutions for a wide variety of indoor environments which enhance life for plants and people alike.
IGS launched its first vertical farming demonstration facility in August 2018.
For more information visit www.intelligentgrowthsolutions.com or connect with us on Twitter and LinkedIn.
About Jungle:
Jungle originated in Portugal in 2016 and maintains a Research and Development facility in Lisbon. It identified strong demand from the retail market in France and opened operations there in 2019. Further European operations are under consideration as the demand for healthy, sustainable and locally-sourced produce increases.