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How VeggiTech Contributes To UAE's Agenda To build Food And Water Security
VeggiTech's produce utilizes less than 10 percent of the water used in traditional farms
VeggiTech farm - Image Credit: Supplied
VeggiTech's Produce Utilizes Less Than 10 Percent
of The Water Used In Traditional Farms
August 31, 2020
VeggiTech is an agrotech company with the sole aim of disrupting the agriculture industry. VeggiTech focuses on addressing the key challenges of traditional farming – soil, temperature, and water through its design of protected hydroponics and grow lights-assisted hydroponics. We have chosen the challenging conditions of the UAE to demonstrate the positive use of agro-technology to create sustainable farms aligned to the UAE’s vision of food security.
In the last 18 months, VeggiTech has built and is operating over 30 hectares of farms with protected hydroponics. It is in the process of going live with 4,500 sq meters of indoor vertical farms that employ grow light-assisted hydroponics. We produced over 1.6million kilograms of produce last year and this year (including the summer months), we are delighted to produce over 1.9million kilograms with over 500+ tones of organic produce from our farms between August 2020 and July 2021.
VeggiTech's produce utilizes less than 10 percent of the water used in traditional farms and is pesticide-free. In addition, we have deployed technology for complete food transparency through QR codes that give complete visibility of the growing process of the vegetable produced in our farms.
VeggiTech's current operations and plans in H1 2021
VeggiTech is in the business of offering farming as a service, where it builds and operates digital smart farms that are sustainable and environmentally-friendly for our customers. With a team of over 160+ professionals; and one of the strongest agronomy and engineering teams in the region, we are poised for growth over the next 3 – 5 years.
In the first half of 2020, despite the COVID–19 circumstances we have signed contracts for 13,000 sq.ft. grow area of indoor vertical farms, and are building protected hydroponic farms of 80,000 sqft. You will experience buying live produce from our indoor vertical farm installations in all Sharjah Co-operative Society stores soon with the first one going live in Al Rahmaniya Mall, Sharjah, next month.
We opened our Helsinki, Finland, offices in March 2020; joined the Association of Vertical Farming (AVF) headquartered in Munich, Germany, where we have been invited to play a lead role in creating industry standards for Indoor Vertical farms world-wide.
VeggiTech was invited by the Ministry of Education and Food and Water Security Office to host a webinar series “Grow Your Food” for students in the Youth Summer Camps across July and August 2020. We live-streamed the informative sessions from our farms providing insights on achieving food security through technology. The audience was segregated into three batches of 6 – 10-year-olds; 10 – 14-year-olds and 14 – 18-year-olds.
We are currently in advanced discussions with private investors and government organizations in Sharjah, Dubai and Abu Dhabi on large scale projects to make UAE food secure with good quality local food.
Sustainable Communities
VeggiTech has recently signed up for designing and developing sustainable grow areas with major players that specialize in developing sustainable communities in UAE. This exciting development underlines our vision of bringing “grow” spaces close to our “living” spaces.
Sustainable agro - Economic model
Dubai SME, the agency of Dubai Economy, mandated to develop the small and medium enterprise (SME) sector, collaborated with VeggiTech through their Innovation Accelerator program and commissioned it to install an Indoor Vertical farm in their Business Village campus in Deira Dubai (scheduled to go live in Q4 2020). This set-up would showcase the circular farm-to-fork economic model with the Indoor Vertical farm (IVF), growing green leafy, herbs, and microgreens, and these are converted into end consumer produce in the form of farm-fresh salads / curated recipe packages.
Food security
We are upbeat on the current pipeline of projects (10M+ sqft of farms - protected hydroponics; 200,000+ sqft of Indoor vertical farms) to be signed in Q3 / Q4 2020 and these would start producing over 25million kgs of produce every year from 2021 - 2022. The optimal use of land assets combined with the reduction in water resources and pesticide-free crops are an ideal example of using technology to align with UAE’s food security goals.
Social impact
While the COVID – 19 circumstances are charting unprecedented scenarios across our lives; we, as the local farmers, were privileged to work with Sharjah Charity Association, Shurooq, The Noodle House, and Dubai Police to support our heroes, our frontline healthcare workers, and families, with over 20 tons of our farm fresh vegetables delivered contactless.
VeggiTech is privileged to play its role in this journey.
Source Courtesy of Gulf News
VeggiTech Builds and Operates Digital Smart Farms For Customers
In conversation with Hemant Julka, Chief Operating Officer, VeggiTech
By GN Focus | May 28, 2020 | Gulf News
In conversation with Hemant Julka, Chief Operating Officer, VeggiTech
Could you tell us about VeggiTech and its operations in the UAE?
VeggiTech is an agro-tech organisation focused on disrupting the agriculture industry to create sustainable and eco-friendly farms. We focus on LED-assisted hydroponics for indoor vertical farms and protected hydroponics to farm sustainably even in the UAE’s challenging conditions, where soil, temperature and water are not conducive to traditional farming. Our farming landscape has grown to over 60 acres of protected hydroponic farms and more than 45,000 sq ft of indoor vertical farms, with a team of over 150 qualified agronomists, engineers and farmers.
How could you help traditional farms in the country incorporate hydroponic farming practices?
VeggiTech’s business model is to build and operate digital smart farms for our customers. We drive the transformation of farms with these innovative technologies in a cost-effective manner. The year 2019 saw more than 35 acres of traditional farms converted into protected hydroponics and the introduction of 45,000 sq ft of indoor vertical farms in Sharjah alone.
Given our expertise, we ensure the latest innovation in farming technology is delivered with optimal return on investment for our customers.
Could you talk about a couple of key projects that you have handled recently?
Some of our recent successes were the conversion of a traditional farms (640,000 sq ft) into modern protected hydroponic farms and the commissioning of the indoor vertical farm of 25,000 sq ft grow area. Our protected hydroponics technologies provide a harvest of 40-45kg per sq m per annum, while our indoor vertical farms provide a harvest of 85-90kg per sq m per annum using less than 5 percent of the water used in traditional farming.
What initiatives have you taken to create more awareness on hydroponics and other innovative farming technologies for a sustainable agricultural ecosystem in the UAE?
Education is key for long term sustainable impact. We work closely with the Ministry of Climate Change and Environment (MOCCAE). Our Chief Agronomy Officer, Bhaskar Rao, leads our Learning Hub platform that hosts the Urban Grower’s programme for students, parents and teachers. We have had more than 50 graduate participants from the programme.
