Hedging Against Global Supply Chain Shortages

By Rebekka Boekhout

August 9, 2021

COVID-19 has had an enduring, adverse impact on global supply chains. What started as a hand sanitizer and toilet paper shortage has evolved into a multifaceted supply chain breakdown affecting numerous manufacturing pipelines. At the heart of these disruptions is something small and unsuspected by those unaccustomed to tech design: semiconductor chips.

Semiconductor memory chips store data on computers and storage devices. They play a pivotal role in various technologies; everything from smartphones to cars to, you guessed it, container farms need semiconductors to function. A shortage of something this essential can upend the market as we know it and slow the pace of indoor agriculture’s growth.

Jumpstarted by pandemic mayhem, supply chain failures have become a consistent cause for concern for businesses across the globe. How has this issue become the norm in the current business landscape? Well, the answer comes down to simple economics: supply cannot meet demand.[1]

Read the rest of the article here

Farm Tech Investing Is Accelerating Faster Than Ever – New Report

By Jessica Pothering & Louisa Burwood-Taylor

August 4, 2021

We’ve been watching the surge of investor interest in upstream, close-to-the-farm technologies since the Covid-19 pandemic started. We now have numbers that show just how significant that farm tech investor interest is.

‘Farm tech’ investing soared to $7.9 billion in 2020, topping 2019 investments by $2.3 trillion, or 41%, according to AgFunder’s latest Farm Tech Investment Report. [Disclosure: AgFunder is AFN‘s parent company.]

To put this in perspective, farm tech’s acceleration was about six percentage points greater than agrifoodtech overall — that’s foodtech and farm tech combined — and 37 percentage points higher than global VC’s year-over-year increase in 2020 (which Crunchbase pegged at just 4%.)

Much of the investment activity was led by two sectors: Ag Biotechnology and Novel Farming Systems (mostly the indoor farming of crops and insects). Investors pumped more than $1.5 billion into each category. Ag Biotech companies attracted particular interest from investors: 173 deals closed, representing 58% growth from 2019. Novel Farming Systems deal activity grew by 47% year-over-year.

As difficult as 2020 was globally (2021 hasn’t been pretty in many parts of the world), the pandemic seems to have buoyed farm tech because it “exposed cracks in the industrial agricultural system,” particularly the vulnerability of the food supply chain, Infarm’s CEO Erez Galonza told AFN in an interview featured in the report. The German hyper-local vertical farming venture, whose modular units can be found in grocery stores across Europe, secured $170 million from investors last year.

“[The pandemic] highlighted the need for resilient, localized solutions,” he added.

Farm tech funding 2012-2020

Yellow bar denotes projected total by end of 2021 as more 2020 data come to light. Credit: AgFunder

SPACs for best-funded farm tech categories

Perhaps the biggest winner, in that sense, was US-based high-tech greenhouse operator, AppHarvest. The company announced plans to go public last September via a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC. It officially listed on the Nasdaq stock exchange in January, just weeks after shipping its first harvest.

AppHarvest recently purchased robotics leader and AgFunder portfolio company Root AI, making founder Josh Lessing the publicly listed company’s new CTO. Read more here.

AppHarvest kicked off a SPAC trend for Farm Tech companies, and Novel Farming ventures specifically. We’ve since seen four other agrifoodtech companies announce plans to go public through SPACs: agbiotech companies Benson Hill and Gingko Bioworks and novel farming ventures AeroFarms and Local Bounti. (Keep up to date with agrifoodtech SPAC news here.)

It is interesting to see public listing activity happening in the two agrifoodtech sectors that surged the most in terms of deal activity last year; it signals that there could be more to come if the process proves successful for these early case studies. For now, it’s certainly providing an exit opportunity to early agtech ventures that bet on deep technologies requiring significant amounts of time (and certainly hefty commitments of resources) to become revenue-generating, much less profitable.

That in and of itself is a significant milestone for a maturing agtech industry.

Pandemic pivots

It isn’t all about Ag Biotech and Novel Farming Systems; the biggest deals of 2020 were in the Agribusiness Marketplace sector. Boston-based Indigo Ag raised two investment rounds, totaling $535 million last year, and San Carlos, Calif.-based Farmers Business Network raised $250 million.

Indigo Ag’s executive team told AFN that because it deals directly with the food supply chain, the company confronted an immediate shock from the pandemic.

“The global pandemic was an external challenge that required our team, like many others, to quickly adapt to ensure that our customers and employees were supported,” they said in a special interview featured in the report. “While we were fortunate that our operations were not significantly impeded by the pandemic, we did have to quickly expand our support services and tap our creativity to enable our farmers, buyers and partners to manage their business with confidence during the early stages of Covid-19.”

The company launched a transport support hotline for grain growers, carriers and shippers to ensure the supply of grain could continue to move as efficiently as possible. It also focused on developing pricing tools, access to grain marketing advisors, and even a podcast to help growers grapple with pandemic-related market volatility.

Indigo Ag isn’t a stranger to unchartered business terrain. The company has put itself in the middle of the evolving but murky carbon markets. “With new players entering the carbon space nearly weekly – many taking less rigorous approaches to verification and measurement – Indigo has remained steadily focused on enabling farmers to make informed decisions about how, when and why to participate in the carbon market,” the Indigo Ag team told AFN.

They added: “By leveraging our scientific insight, technological capabilities, and use of industry-leading carbon accounting protocols, Indigo ensures farmers are supported with the right tools and information to take advantage of the opportunity to raise a new and increasingly valuable crop: carbon.”

Food’s sustainable future

Verification of carbon-capture accounting is indeed getting increased attention and scrutiny. It’s likely to be a key theme in the agriculture industry going forward, and it’s one of AgFunder’s key trends to watch in 2021, alongside overall food system sustainability.

“We can invent a new, sustainable food industry, feeding the planet all the while protecting its biodiversity, and combatting climate change,” the executive team behind French insect farming venture Ynsect told AFN. The company sees insects as a crucial component of food’s sustainable future.

“Insects can aid food security and be a part of the solution to food shortages, given their high nutritional value, low requirements for land and water, low emissions of greenhouse gases, and the high efficiency at which they can convert feed into food,” the Ynsect team argued in an interview featured in the report.

Investors seem to agree: Ynsect scored the largest amount of funding in the novel farming sector in 2020, raising $222 million in 2020, taking its Series C total to $372 million, to build an industrial-sized farm for its Molitor mealworms near the city of Amiens. Ynsect went on to acquire Dutch insect farming company Protifarm in April of this year.

Many of the world’s consumers may as yet be skeptical of insects as a protein source. But consumer consciousness and demand for high-quality, low-environmental impact foods is certainly a trend influencing the evolution of Farm Tech, as evidenced by the range of startups that attracted funding in 2020.

Ag Biotech ventures like Benson Hill, GreenLight Biosciences, and Pivot Bio secured investor backing for helping to diversify crop input technology away from environmentally-harmful synthetic chemicals.

Novel Farming ventures are developing highly efficient and resource-conservative approaches to growing fresh foods.

Farm Management Software, Sensing & IoT companies like ICEYE, Aclima and Cervest are illuminating climate change impacts and helping companies anticipate and forecast climate-related disruptions.

Food preservation technologies like Apeel Sciences’s are helping reduce food waste, as are e-grocery services like Misfits Market and Imperfect Foods, which sell “ugly produce” that would otherwise be wasted among their fresh foods and grocery offerings.

Companies like Celtic Renewables are turning farm waste into a resource through the production of biofuels.

“As companies increasingly make commitments to improve their environmental impact – and governments at all levels enact policies to encourage climate-smart agriculture,” said the Indigo Ag team, “the opportunity for agriculture to act as a climate solution will only become more apparent.”

COVID-19 Crisis Has Led to Food Crisis, Says Italy's Draghi

By Maytaal Angel

July 26, 2021

LONDON (Reuters) - The world must ensure access to food supplies as forcefully as it moved to ensure access to vaccines, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi said at the opening of the United Nations Food Systems Pre-Summit in Rome.

"The health crisis (COVID-19) has led to a food crisis," he said, citing data showing malnutrition in all its forms has become the leading cause of ill health and death in the world.

The U.N.'s first ever Food Systems Summit will take place in September, with the aim of delivering progress on the body's 2030 sustainable development goals (SDGs).

According to the latest U.N. data, the world's food system, which involves cutting down forests to plant crops, is responsible for a third of global greenhouse gas emissions, making it a leading cause of climate change.

"We are off track to achieve the SDGs," said U.N. Secretary General António Guterres, who first announced his plan to convene the Food Systems Summit in October 2019, before COVID-19 dramatically slowed progress towards SDGs like zero hunger.

After remaining virtually unchanged for five years, world hunger and malnutrition rose last year by around 118 million people to 768 million, with most of the increase likely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a major U.N. report. read more

On internationally traded markets, world food prices were up 33.9% year-on-year in June, according to the U.N food agency's price index, which measures a basket of cereals, oilseeds, dairy products, meat and sugar. read more

There is increased diplomatic momentum to tackle hunger, malnutrition and the climate crisis this year with summits like the current one, but the challenge is huge.

Guterres said the pre-summit will assess progress towards achieving the SDGs by transforming global food systems, which, he noted, are also responsible for 80% of the world's biodiversity loss.

Italy's Prime Minister Mario Draghi gestures as he speaks at a news conference where he is expected to map out the country's next moves in loosening coronavirus disease (COVID-19) restrictions, in Rome, Italy, April 16, 2021. REUTERS/Remo Casilli

Lead Photo: Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi arrives for the virtual G20 summit on the global health crisis, at Villa Pamphilj in Rome, Italy, May 21, 2021. REUTERS/Yara Nardi

Vertical Farming: Growing Up After The Pandemic

July 29, 2021

The Top 5 Benefits of Vertical Farming for Building a Sustainable and Resilient Fresh Food Supply Chain

“The COVID-19 crisis has really shown the cracks in the system. And I think that it was a test by Mother Nature to say, ‘Humanity, get your act together because your food systems are pretty fragile.’" This was an observation made by Dr. Nate Storey, co-founder and Chief Science Officer at Plenty, one of America’s leading indoor farming companies. Dr. Storey participated in a recent vertical farming webinar, co-presented by Heliospectra and the Association for Vertical Farming (AVF). Its purpose was to discuss the road ahead for vertical farming and building a sustainable blueprint to supply food to the world.

 The global response to the pandemic had an impact on all industries, and the food supply chain was not exempt:

• Laborers were unable to tend to the crops.

• Farmers were unable to get their produce to market.

• Restaurants, schools, and independent stores were shuttered.

• Consumers had to adapt to different ways to source their food.

As COVID-19 restrictions are easing around the globe, one of the things we have learned from the pandemic is that it is time to redesign and reengineer the food supply chain. Vertical farming may be the answer. Here are the top 5 benefits of vertical farming for building a sustainable and resilient fresh food supply chain:

1.) Proximity to Markets Results in Efficient Distribution

Transportation channels were disrupted as governments responded to the pandemic, which made it difficult for rural farmers to get their fresh produce to market. Vertical farms have a much smaller footprint compared to traditional field farms, which means they can be established inside, or closer to, urban areas. Heliospectra’s CEO, Ali Ahmadian, remarked during the webinar that “Urbanization is increasing, and by 2050 we're going to have close to 70% of the world’s population concentrated in urban areas. The population is growing, and COVID-19 has shown us that current food supply logistics are not sustainable when under stress. Going forward, we need to find ways to produce more food locally, where the population lives.” Proximity to market should also help reduce transportation costs and CO2 emissions, while time to market and produce freshness should improve.

2.) Innovative Technology Boosts a Growing Industry

Vertical farming is still in its infancy, but Dr. Storey noted, “We’re on the cusp of huge growth and expansion as an industry. In the next 10 to 15 years, vertical farming will rise as one of the dominant forms of agriculture.” He continued, “Technology has caught up with the vertical farming vision, and we're going to start to see tremendous growth over the next decade. I'm pretty excited about that.”  

Some of the fundamental technologies available to vertical farmers today include the ability to control and monitor:

• Lighting

• Irrigation

• Nutrients, PH, and CO2 levels

• Air temperature and humidity

• AI, big data, and intelligent controls

Vertical farms address many of the shortcomings of traditional field farms. Dr. Joel Cuello, a Professor of Bio-Systems Engineering at the University of Arizona, noted that “Vertical Farming is where artificial intelligence (AI) really has a big role to play. A lot of folks have already done optimizations in terms of lighting, temperature, relative humidity, but they are really done in a very limited scale. With big data and then applying AI, that is really a breakthrough waiting to happen in terms of vertical farming.”  

LED grow lights and recent advances in AI and intelligent control technology have been catalysts for sustainable year-round growing, enabling vertical farmers to maximize crop yields, refine crop quality, and standardize production with no seasonal downtime. By providing the light spectra that plants need and a controlled growing environment in which they flourish year-round, commercial vertical farming equipment can provide a sustainable and resilient way to feed the ever-changing world.

3.) Modern LED Systems Increase Energy Efficiency and High-Quality Crop Yields

The quantity, quality, duration, and distribution of light that each plant receives can be optimized. Innovative lighting technology developments have enabled vertical farmers to produce more quality food with less. Dr. Storey commented, “At Plenty, the primary tech inputs are LEDs and semiconductor technologies. As the cost of LEDs goes down and the efficiencies go up, we reap the benefits with very little investment on our part.” He continued, “We have created our own technology cost curve around indoor agriculture, which shows costs going down and quality going up. An illustration of that would be yield at Plenty has gone up 12X in the last 18 months. We have improved yield to the same unit of energy by 12X.”

4.) Labor Profile Shift Reduces Operational Overheads

There has been more recognition since COVID-19 of the inherent benefits of indoor/vertical farming, which can produce more with fewer hands. Lack of labor, particularly in times of global crisis, is a big contributor to food insecurity. The promise of vertical farms is that they could become a factor for resilience in any food supply chain. Dr. Storey commented, “With vertical farming, the supply chain is less complicated. It changes the shape of the labor profile of the business, from employing many workers in the field, which is a source of instability for field production, to employing much smaller numbers of very highly trained people that are operating robotics and managing production lines.”

5.) Modular and Scalable Design to Meet Changing Market Demands

Another benefit of vertical farming is its ability to quickly respond to food demand. Vertical farms can be modularized, and the modules can be shipped on pallets and quickly set up where the demand lies. They can also be added to and scaled to accommodate the rotation of crops according to market needs. This scalability enables farmers to establish vertical farms quickly and anywhere there is a need for food. It can also help farmers meet latent market demands. Storey commented, “When we look at the market, we see a world that consumes only 30% of what it should in terms of fresh fruits and vegetables. So, as we talk about scaling farms, we also have to talk about latent demand, like how much demand is out there that isn't being accessed because of low quality or just the lack of access to fresh food.” The potential for scalable, modular farms to fill this market need is enormous.

The COVID-19 crisis revealed weaknesses in the food supply chain. Storey commented, “We already had a system under stress that was beleaguered by rising labor prices, by the extended supply chains, and the fact that most of the consumers have been separated from the producers.” He continued, “The places where we produce the food and the places where we consume the food have been stretching out further and further and further. In many cases, it's a global supply chain now. We've been pushing the field to its max.”  

Want to know more? Watch the entire webinar: The Road Ahead for Vertical Farming Building Tomorrow's Industry Blueprint Today. WATCH NOW  

Hydroponic Farming: Need of The Hour During Pandemic And Its Growing Trend In India

May 19, 2021

According to the World Economic Forum, the global population is expected to reach nearly 10 billion by 2050, making the requirement of food 60 percent higher than it is today.

Agriculture in India has always been governed by variables - weather, quality of soil and seed, availability of water, skilled labour, etc.

By Shivendra Singh,

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic has made everyone housebound. Right after the announcement of the lockdown, people rushed to grocery stores to stock up shelf-stable items like packed, frozen food and other essentials. That’s when many Indians realised the need for nutrition, health outcomes of food and how vulnerably it is dependent on supply chain and climate change.

On the other hand, scientists are stressing over the past decades that human actions are pushing life towards disaster. The steep surge in the demand for food production, transportation and processing are putting enormous pressure on the planet. According to the World Economic Forum, the global population is expected to reach nearly 10 billion by 2050, making the requirement of food 60 percent higher than it is today. The report also suggests that there will be a shortage of arable land to meet this burgeoning demand for food production.

The anticipated scenario of food requirement and shortages spurred many Indians to consider planting vegetables in their backyard or rooftop. This has enabled people to invest in high tech urban farming systems and produce fresh vegetables more efficiently.

The Revolution of Hydroponic Farming

Agriculture in India has always been governed by variables – weather, quality of soil and seed, availability of water, skilled labour, etc. Additionally, the increase in food production in India has always been at the expense of the water supply. As per the estimates, around 70 percent of the world’s freshwater is used for agriculture, on the other hand, the 70percent of water contamination also comes from agriculture. With the integration of technology in agriculture, it has become easier to grow food in cities through urban farming or high-tech hydroponic farms. This is becoming key to improving nutrition and dealing with the disruptions in the food supply chain.

Hydroponic has been around for decades but with the efforts of new-age agritech startups, it is evolving into innovative urban farming methods. Hydroponic farming which simply means growing fresh vegetables and fruits in nutrient-rich water instead of soil requires less space and resources. Based on modernised techniques, soil-less farming results in higher productivity in a controlled climate and with no risk of the attack of the pests and insects. Agritech startups in the market are providing every possible support for hydroponic farming set-up. For the first time in India, few agritech startups are providing Buy Back option for hydroponic produce as well as Bank Guarantee. It will further boost the hydroponic farming technique in the country.

Given the present ‘stay at home’ scenario, hydroponic farming is gradually becoming a household trend in India. The hydroponic systems are designed in a way that provide healthier, fresh and more nutritious produce with longer shelf life. The technology helps in saving valuable water, land and labour resources that further creates an efficient ecosystem. Moreover, the controlled growing system enables the production of food with no use of harmful chemicals resulting in 100 percent residue-free farming.

Immunity has become the new buzzword

The pandemic had made it necessary to understand the importance of adequate nutrition to maximize their health, boost immunity and reduce the risk and impact of the virus. Having a strong and resilient immune system is the need of the hour. Thus, the devastating aftermath of the pandemic should be a catalyst to expand our taste, knowledge and awareness and contribute to building a more efficient and sustainable food system.

Usually, human beings underestimate the power of good choices and individual behavioural change in creating a healthier food system. Adopting a hydroponic farming system helps align the food habits with the wellbeing of the planet and helps people turn from being ‘junk foodies’ to genuine chemical-free food lovers. As a result, it helps consumers become more concerned about the environment and reshape their eating habits to reduce the vulnerability of the disease.

Bottomline

Hydroponic farming is thriving in India. One of the major factors driving its growth is also the technology curve that diminishes costs and helps in scaling its operations. Further, integration of Artificial Intelligence and Data Analytics measure important indicators that help in food/crop planning and hence help connect in the food security ecosystem. Besides the technological factors, the need for creating a smarter and green market in highly populous nations also creates space for hydroponic farming (rooftop or vertical farming) to grow as a trend.

(The author is Founder, Barton Breeze, India’s Fastest Growing Commercial Hydroponic Farm Specialist. Views expressed are personal and do not reflect the official position or policy of the Financial Express Online.)

Investors Seed Indoor Farms As Pandemic Disrupts Food Supplies

Wausau, WI, USA Stevens Point

Feb 18, 2021

By Rod Nickel

(Reuters) - Investors used to brush off Amin Jadavji's pitch to buy Elevate Farms’ vertical growing technology and produce stacks of leafy greens indoors with artificial light.

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"They would say, 'This is great, but it sounds like a science experiment,'" said Jadavji, CEO of Toronto-based Elevate.

Now, indoor farms are positioning themselves as one of the solutions to pandemic-induced disruptions to the harvesting, shipping, and sale of food.

"It's helped us change the narrative," said Jadavji, whose company runs a vertical farm in Ontario, and is building others in New York and New Zealand.

Proponents, including the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), say urban farming increases food security at a time of rising inflation and limited global supplies. North American produce output is concentrated in Mexico and the U.S. Southwest, including California, which is prone to wildfires and other severe weather.

Climate-change concerns are also accelerating investments, including by agribusiness giant Bayer AG, into multi-storey vertical farms or greenhouses the size of 50 football fields.

They are enabling small North American companies like BrightFarms, AppHarvest and Elevate to bolster indoor production and compete with established players AeroFarms and Plenty, backed by Amazon.com Inc founder Jeff Bezos.

But critics question the environmental cost of indoor farms' high power requirements.

Vertical farms grow leafy greens indoors in stacked layers or on walls of foliage inside of warehouses or shipping containers. They rely on artificial light, temperature control and growing systems with minimal soil that involve water or mist, instead of the vast tracts of land in traditional agriculture.

Greenhouses can harness the sun's rays and have lower power requirements. Well-established in Asia and Europe, greenhouses are expanding in North America, using greater automation.

Investments in global indoor farms totaled $394 million in 2020, AgFunder research head Louisa Burwood-Taylor said.

The average investment last year doubled in size, as large players including BrightFarms and Plenty raised fresh capital, she said.

A big funding acceleration lies ahead, after pandemic food disruptions - such as infections among migrant workers that harvest North American produce - raised concerns about supply disruptions, said Joe Crotty, director of corporate finance at investment bank KPMG, which advises vertical farms.

"The real ramp-up is the next three to five years," Crotty said.

Vegetables grown in vertical farms or greenhouses are still just a fraction of overall production. U.S. sales of food crops grown under cover, including tomatoes, cucumbers and lettuce, amounted to 790 million pounds in 2019, up 50% from 2014, according to the USDA.

California's outdoor head lettuce production alone was nearly four times larger, at 2.9 billion pounds.

USDA is seeking members for a new urban agriculture advisory committee to encourage indoor and other emerging farm practices.

PLANT BREEDING MOVES INDOORS

Bayer, one of the world's biggest seed developers, aims to provide the plant technology to expand vertical agriculture. In August, it teamed with Singapore sovereign fund Temasek to create Unfold, a California-based company, with $30 million in seed money.

Unfold says it is the first company focused on designing seeds for indoor lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, spinach and cucumbers, using Bayer germplasm, a plant's genetic material, said Chief Executive John Purcell.

Their advances may include, for example, more compact plants and an increased breeding focus on quality, Purcell said.

Unfold hopes to make its first sales by early 2022, targeting existing farms, and start-ups in Singapore and the United Kingdom.

Greenhouses are also expanding, touting higher yields than open-field farming.

AppHarvest, which grows tomatoes in a 60-acre greenhouse in Morehead, Kentucky, broke ground on two more in the state last year. The company aims to operate 12 facilities by 2025.

Its greenhouses are positioned to reach 70% of the U.S. population within a day's drive, giving them a transportation edge over the southwest produce industry, said Chief Executive Jonathan Webb.

"We're looking to rip the produce industry out of California and Mexico and bring it over here," Webb said.

Projected global population growth will require a large increase in food production, a tough proposition outdoors given frequent disasters and severe weather, he said.

New York-based BrightFarms, which runs four greenhouses, positions them near major U.S. cities, said Chief Executive Steve Platt. The company, whose customers include grocers Kroger and Walmart, plans to open its two largest farms this year, in North Carolina and Massachusetts.

Platt expects that within a decade, half of all leafy greens in the United States will come from indoor farms, up from less than 10% currently.

"It's a whole wave moving in this direction because the system we have today isn’t set up to feed people across the country," he said.

'CRAZY, CRAZY THINGS'

But Stan Cox, research scholar for non-profit The Land Institute, is skeptical of vertical farms. They depend on grocery store premiums to offset higher electricity costs for lighting and temperature control, he said.

"The whole reason we have agriculture is to harvest sunlight that’s hitting the earth every day," he said. "We can get it for free."

Bruce Bugbee, a professor of environmental plant physiology at Utah State University, has studied space farming for NASA. But he finds power-intensive vertical farming on Earth far-fetched.

"Venture capital goes into all kinds of crazy, crazy things and this is another thing on the list."

Bugbee estimates that vertical farms use 10 times the energy to produce food as outdoor farms, even factoring in the fuel to truck conventional produce across country from California.

AeroFarms, operator of one of the world's largest vertical farms, a former New Jersey steel mill, says comparing energy use with outdoor agriculture is not straightforward. Produce that ships long distances has a higher spoilage rate and many outdoor produce farms use irrigated water and pesticides, said Chief Executive Officer David Rosenberg.

Vertical farms tout other environmental benefits.

Elevate uses a closed loop system to water plants automatically, collect moisture plants emit and then re-water them with it. Such a system requires 2% of the water used on an outdoor romaine lettuce operation, Jadavji said. The company uses no pesticides.

"I think we're solving a problem," he said.

(Reporting by Rod Nickel in Winnipeg, Manitoba; additional reporting by Karl Plume in Chicago; Editing by Caroline Stauffer and Lisa Shumaker)

How The Pandemic Has Accelerated The Next Generation of Farming

Vertical farming has provided an innovative

way to serve customers and ensure clean food

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By Sumner Park FOXBusiness

Coronavirus puts farmers in 'dire need' of help from government: Farm Bureau president

Farm Bureau President Zippy Duvall discusses how coronavirus is challenging farmers, trade with China, and reopening the economy.

The foodservice industry is betting big on vertical farming as the pandemic ushers in a heightened awareness of food safety and cleanliness.

Vertical farming, or the practice of cultivating crops in vertically stacked shelves and often in a controlled indoor environment, allows produce to be shipped to grocery stores, restaurants and other dining services in a matter of minutes.

EVEN WITH A STRONG CROP THIS YEAR, US FARMERS ARE SUFFERING

A new report by Allied Market Research shows that the global market for vertical farming crops is projected to reach $1.38 billion by 2027 with a compounded annual growth rate of 26.2% from 2021 to 2027. Last year alone, the industry was estimated to be around $212.4 million.

Amid the trajectory for growth, the coronavirus outbreak has accelerated the demand for fresh and locally grown produce. And as restaurants reopen, vertical farming has provided an innovative way to serve customers and ensure clean food.

“The pandemic has certainly shed light on the fact that everybody is very aware of cleanliness and safety, and food is no exception,” CEO of Kalera Daniel Malechuk told FOX Business. “What vertical farming can offer is something that is local, something that hasn’t been in a journey to get to the end  or touched by a significant number of people and something that is grown in a clean room where the product is not subject to harmful elements or exposure.”

TRUMP ANNOUNCES $13B WORTH OF NEW RELIEF FUNDING FOR US FARMERS

Kalera, an indoor vertical farming company with hydroponic technology, is on track for rapid growth, particularly in high dense urban markets. After opening the largest vertical farming facility in Texas, the ag-tech company has plans to expand to Atlanta where it will be the highest production volume vertical farm in the Southeast, as well as Denver by 2021. Aside from its typical operations providing lettuce and microgreens to theme parks and restaurants, Kalera has also entered the grocery space marked by a deal with Publix that went into effect in April.

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(Credit: Kalera)

“We love supporting our local growers—whether they are growing in a field or on top of a  hotel,”  Business Development Director Produce and Floral of Publix Super Markets Curt Epperson told FOX Business. “Our customers really appreciate hydroponically grown leafy greens, not only because they are flavorful  but because they are sustainable. We’re excited to see where vertical farming goes in the future. Wherever that is, you can be sure that we’ll be keeping in touch with our local hydroponic farmers, finding out what they’re doing, and talking about how we can work together.”

Hydroponically grown greens emerged in grocery stores prior to COVID-19, but the global health crisis has only accentuated the need to know where food comes from and how it is grown.

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(Credit: Kalera)

With technology that doesn't require soil to grow plants and consumes up to 10 times less water compared to traditional soil-based growth, hydroponic systems are not only sustainable but also can be controlled to minimize pesticides and other dangerous chemicals.

Additionally, the minimal transport involved allows produce to reach store shelves without traveling thousands of miles and being exposed to more touchpoints.

Global supply chain disruption has also forced retail chains like Publix to secure produce that does not conflict with restrictions on transportation, which particularly came to light during the first phase of lockdown and with varying state travel mandates.

US FARMERS SCRAMBLE FOR HELP AS COVID-19 SCUTTLES IMMIGRANT WORKFORCE

On top of that, more customers are turning to vertical farming solutions like Kalera for lettuce due to the shortage caused by the California wildfires, where the ash in the fields have affected the growth and safety of the traditional product.

And as vertical farming becomes more attractive in light of the pandemic, more cities will tap into these alternative methods, according to Kalera’s Daniel Malechuk.

“What Kalera is able to do is to offer and shed new light on farming is the backbone of American society and one of our strengths as a nation,” Malechuk said. And leading the wave of the ag-tech revolution is what vertical farming companies like Kalera are doing.”

Urban Farming: Four Reasons It Should Flourish Post-Pandemic

Since lockdown, public interest in growing fruit and vegetables at home has soared. Seed packets are flying off shelves and allotment waiting lists are swelling, with one council receiving a 300% increase in applications. Fear of food shortages will have motivated some, but others with more time on their hands at home will have been tempted by the chance to relieve stress doing a wholesome family activity.

The seeds of enthusiasm for home-grown food may have been sown, but sustaining this is essential. Urban farming has much to offer in the wake of the pandemic. It could help communities boost the resilience of their fresh fruit and vegetable supplies, improve the health of residents and help them lead more sustainable lifestyles.

Here are four reasons why food growing should become a perennial feature in our gardens, towns and cities after COVID-19.

1. Growing greener towns and cities

More than half of the global population lives in urban areas, and this is expected to rise to 68% by 2050. For the UK, this is even higher – nine out of 10 people are expected to live in towns and cities by this time.

Weaving food growing into the fabric of urban life could bring greenery and wildlife closer to home. The COVID-19 lockdown helped reawaken interest in growing at home, but one in eight UK households have no access to a garden. Thankfully, the opportunities for urban farming extend beyond these: rooftops, walls – and even underground spaces, such as abandoned tunnels or air raid shelters, offer a range of options for expanding food production in cities while creatively redeveloping the urban environment.

Edible rooftops, walls, and verges can also help reduce flood risk, provide natural cooling for buildings and streets, and help reduce air pollution.

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Paris hosts the largest urban rooftop farm in Europe. EPA-EFE/Mohammed Badra

2. Resilient food supplies

Diversifying where and how we grow our food helps spread the risk of disruption to food supplies.

The UK’s reliance on imports has been growing in recent decades. Currently, 84% of fruit and 46% of vegetables consumed in the UK are imported. Brexit and COVID-19 could threaten the steady supply, while the problems created by climate change, such as water scarcity, risk disrupting imports of food from abroad.

Growing fruit and vegetables in towns and cities would help resist these shocks. The harvest labour shortages seen during the pandemic might not have been felt as keenly if urban farms were growing food right where people live.

Vertical and underground crops are more resilient to extreme weather or pests, indoor growing environments are easier to control than those in the field, and temperature and humidity is more stable underground. The high start-up costs and energy bills for this type of farming has meant that indoor farms currently produce a small number of high-value crops, such as leafy greens and herbs. But as the technology matures, the diversity of produce grown indoors will expand.

À lire aussi : Vertical farms offer a bright future for hungry cities

3. Healthier lives

Getting out into nature and gardening can improve your mental health and physical fitness. Our research suggests that getting involved in urban food growing, or just being exposed to it in our daily lives, may also lead to healthier diets.

Urban growers may be driven to make healthier food choices for a whole range of reasons. They have greater access to fresh fruit and vegetables and getting outdoors and into nature can help reduce stress, making people less likely to make unhealthy food choices. Our study suggested that urban food growing can also help change attitudes towards food, so that people place more value in produce that’s sustainable, healthy, and ethically sourced.

4. Healthier ecosystems

While urbanization is regarded as one of the biggest threats to biodiversity, growing food in towns and cities has been shown to boost the abundance and diversity of wildlife, as well as protect their habitats.

A recent study found that community gardens and allotments act as hotspots for pollinating insects, because they tend to contain a diverse range of fruiting and native plants.

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Vegetables, like this courgette, can produce flowers for pollinators to enjoy. Natakim/Shutterstock

If designed and implemented properly, allotments and community gardens can really benefit biodiversity. Not only should barren spaces be converted into green and productive plots, it’s also important that there are connections between these environments to help wildlife move between them.

Canals and cycle paths can act as these wildlife corridors. As we begin to diversify the spaces used to grow food, particularly those on our rooftops and underground, an exciting challenge will be finding novel ways of connecting them for wildlife. Green bridges have been shown to help wildlife cross busy roads – perhaps similar crossings could link rooftop gardens.

All these reasons and more should compel us to scale up food production in towns in cities. COVID-19 has given us cause to reevaluate how important local urban green spaces are to us, and what we want from our high streets, parks, and pavements. Judging by the garden center sales, allotment lists, and social media, many people have decided they want more fruit and veggies in those spaces. The opportunity is there for urban planners and developers to consider what bringing farming to urban landscapes could offer.

Lead photo: Joshua Resnick/Shutterstock

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Déclaration d’intérêts

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Dan Evans

Senior Research Associate in Physical Geography, Lancaster University

Does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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Jess Davies

Chair Professor in Sustainability, Lancaster University

Receives funding from the UK Research and Innovation Council and the European Commission. The research described here was funded under the Global Food Security’s ‘Resilience of the UK Food System Programme’, with support from BBSRC, ESRC, NERC, and The Scottish Government (BB/S01425X/1).

Smart Acres CEO on The launch of The UAE’s Latest Vertical Smart Farm

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August 24th, 2020

Smart Acres Is Here With Lettuce At The Helm. In An Exclusive Interview With Abu Dhabi World, Smart Acres CEO Abdulla al Kaabi Reveals What This Means To Abu Dhabi And The Farming Community On The Whole. 

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words Derek Issacs

If you love healthy produce, and who doesn’t, then this news is going to please you and your tastebuds no end. The only draw back at the moment is they’re not for sale in supermarkets just yet, but it won’t be long before they are.

The launch of Smart Acres, the UAE’s latest addition to the hydroponic vertical farming industry, this week means that a line of the freshest, most nutrient-dense greens for UAE residents and businesses alike is now being produced in containers on the Armed Forces Officers Club in Abu Dhabi, with the aim to expand across the UAE.

So we headed over to the St. Regis Abu Dhabi to meet Smart Acres CEO Abdulla al Kaabi to find out more.

Tell us about your background?

I am from tech and farm background. My father has a passion for farming and gardening; he’s very  strict about anybody who messes around with his garden or farm. My father has a few farms across the UAE, where he grows crops and dates.  When he heard that I was pursuing a project in the agriculture sector he got excited and actually gifted me a farm, which I am grateful for and will keep. However, Smart Acres, rather than the farm my father gifted me, is an urban farm.

How was Smart Acres first developed?

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CEO Abdulla al Kaabi (centre)

Smart Acres was founded in 2017 and local testing began in July 2019. Smart Acres was developed by a team of experts,  including myself, Director Sean Lee and Lead Project Manager, Aphisith Phongsavanh with the aim of improving food security within the United Arab Emirates and developing the country’s farming capabilities, providing a solution to potential socioeconomic threats such as pandemics and climate limitations the Middle East currently endures.

Tell us more

We planted lettuce and after a few harvests, we decided to expand from two containers to eight containers. From the two insulated containers the yield was 3.5 tons annually, which was our proof of concept. For the proof of concept, our target weight for each lettuce head was 140g. However, we have reached an average of 200g per head. I don’t think any other vertical farm here reached that quality or weight in terms of vegetables at this size.

How would you describe Smart Acres?

It is a one-of-a-kind agriculture system that is designed to produce some of the highest yields of crops within the UAE’s vertical farming industry, while introducing a new future for clean foods and allowing both business to business (B2B) and business to consymer (B2C ) sectors to locally source produce.

Tell us about the containers

We invested heavily in the containers, not just financially, and it took us a while to partner up with n.thing, a South Korean vertical farming technology company, to bring the best vertical farm here in the UAE. We had talks with other companies before and we decided to go with this one, in terms of risk, in terms of technology they are using. And the system we are using in the containers is hydroponics (growing plants without soil)  which has been used by growers for hundreds of years.  Techno advancements means we were able to implement the Internet of Things for operations, which helps us to monitor the entire farm in terms of humidity, temperature, and even the nutrients that goes inside the plants. Now we have our expansion plan from eight to 78 containers, which eventually will produce more than 140 tons of produce annually. We are currently in talks with private and public entities in terms of the expansion. We are also planning to have a research and development centre in order to start growing our own potato seeds in a controlled environment.

Will Smart Acres just be growing lettuce?

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In our current eight containers, we grow four types of lettuce;  Lolo rosso , green glace, oakleaf Batavia, but we are able to grow 30 types of lettuce.  Currently we are testing new methods to improve quality and weight of the existing lettuce. The results of last month’s test resulted in lettuce whose individual heads weighed  more than 200 grams on average. However, we aim to grow more than just lettuce. We have plans to eventually grow baby spinach, mature spinach, and baby arugula. Smart Acres’ vision is to expand to meet the demand of popular produce in the region such as strawberries,  and, as I previously mentioned, a shift and emphasis on cultivating potato seeds.

Where can we buy your smart lettuces? 

We are now supplying restaurants and hotels for free to get ourselves known, and we have had great feedback from them. We have also partnered with several restaurants and cafes around the country including Inked and Fae Cafe, and have plans to have our produce in the kitchen of dozens of other F&B outlets. The recent initiative by HH Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Presidential Affairs, and Abu Dhabi Agriculture and Food Safety Authority (ADAFSA), stating that all major grocery stores in the capital must allocate space for local produce means we are perfectly poised to enter local supermarkets. We have had lots of offers from Abu Dhabi Holding and other government entities that are members in the food security committee to buy our whole produce. Currently we are focused on our actual produce itself, in terms of quality, weight.

Posted in Features, Food, Life, News

Tagged agriculture system Abu Dhabi, CEO Abdulla al Kaabi, Clean foods UAE, food security UAE, SMART ACRES Abu Dhabi, st regis abu dhabi, UAE Climate Change Risks and Resilience, UAE farms, UAE’s vertical farming industry, vertical farming Abu Dhabi

Piero Lissoni Designs Conceptual New York Skyscraper To Be "Self-Sufficient Garden-City"

Eleanor Gibson | 14 August 2020

Italian architect Piero Lissoni's studio has designed a conceptual skyscraper in New York as a self-contained community and vertical urban farm that would provide an example of living in the post-COVID era.

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Lissoni Casal Ribeiro, the architecture arm of Lissoni's studio, imagine Skylines to be a self-sufficient skyscraper by providing its own energy and resources as well as facilities for occupants to live, like school, sports facilities and a hospital.

The studio said the idea of self-sufficiency within a building has become even more important in light of the global coronavirus pandemic in 2020.

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"Covid-19 has made us reflect on how weak we are in the face of a pandemic and has served as a warning after the whole planet essentially closed down for three months, teaching us that the infrastructures of the future must also be imagined to take account of life in the possible event of another lockdown," said Lissoni Casal Ribeiro.

"The year 2020 and the arrival of a global pandemic have indeed highlighted our weaknesses and shortcomings at a structural level, causing us to devise new ways of thinking the city and the infrastructures."

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Designed for an imaginary urban plot in New York City measuring 80 by 130 metres, the scheme uses geothermal energy and photovoltaic panels for power and would use a rainwater recovery system and water use management for water.

A curtain of steel cables would form the tapered structure and would hold up hanging garden platforms that run around a glazed tower in the centre.

According to the studio, the idea is that over time these platforms would be covered with trees and shrubs to create a "vertical urban forest".

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"The equilibrium between the external and internal spaces gives life to a sort of self-sufficient garden-city," it said.

"A system that produces, optimises and recycles energy, a perfect microclimate that filters the air, absorbs carbon dioxide, produces humidity, reuses rainwater to irrigate the greenery, in addition to providing protection from the sun’s rays and the noise of the city."

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Within the glass tower, the living spaces would be arranged vertically, with public and cultural activities on the lower levels and the soilless vegetable gardens and sports facilities above this.

Next would be the hospital "which is also immersed in greenery and well-equipped to face any health emergency".

Above this, there would be schools and a university and spaces for offices and co-working, which the studio argued would be an important part of the programme post-Covid.

Residences, meanwhile, are placed on the top floors to take advantage of the views.

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Lissoni Casal Ribeiro designed Skylines for the international architecture competition Skyhive 2020 Skyscraper Challenge and received an honorable mention.

Lissoni founded his interdisciplinary practice Lissoni Associati in 1986. In recent years, he has become better known for his product design and interiors, working with a host of leading brands like Cappellini, Flos, Kartell, and B&B Italia.

His other architecture projects include a proposal for a submerged circular aquarium, which won a speculative competition for a site on New York's East River, and a curved residential building that will be built in Vancouver's new Oakridge community.

Project credits:

Design team: Piero Lissoni and Joao Silva with Fulvio Capsoni

Read more:  Architecture Conceptual architecture Skyscrapers News Conceptual skyscrapers Piero Lissoni New York skyscrapers Coronavirus

Coronavirus Crisis Fuels Interest In Vertical Farming

The coronavirus pandemic has been a major worry for many British farmers, threatening access to agricultural labor and complicating international supply chains. But for proponents of indoor farming, the crisis has offered an opportunity.

David Farquhar, chief executive of technology developer Intelligent Growth Solutions, says the pandemic has prompted a spike in interest in ‘vertical farms’, where batches of crops can be individually watered, fed and lit using LED lights, allowing them to be grown year-round with minimal labor near their markets, regardless of local soil or weather conditions.

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At the company’s demonstration farm in Invergowrie near the Scottish city of Dundee, trays of produce stacked in 9 meter-tall towers are managed remotely from seeding to packaging. Humans only need to enter the towers for occasional maintenance. “You can run it entirely on robotics . . . You probably need to go in once every six months,” Mr. Farquhar said. 

This higher productivity will have particular appeal to British farmers, who are facing a steep increase in costs because coronavirus restrictions have affected the arrival of seasonal workers from eastern Europe. Brexit may also make it more difficult to access labor from the bloc when the UK’s transition period expires at the end of the year.

Colin Campbell, chief executive of the James Hutton Institute, a research organization that hosts the IGS farm and another vertical farming company, Liberty Produce, said the global food supply system had generally worked well during the pandemic. But he added that the crisis had highlighted worries about food safety and the risks of relying on seedlings or produce grown far away from where it is consumed. “Covid-19 is making a lot of people rethink how we want to grow our food,” he said. 

Read more at FT (Emiko Terazono)

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Publication date: Tue 18 Aug 2020

The New Wave Of Urban Farms Sprouting Strong Community Connections

By Greg Callaghan | The Sydney Morning Herald | June 5, 2020

If there’s one thing the global pandemic has taught us, it’s the importance of being as self-sufficient as possible, especially when it comes to putting food on the table.

While community gardens and urban farms have been sprouting up across our cities in recent years, driven by an increasing demand for fresh, locally sourced vegetables and fruits, the coronavirus lockdown really struck a nerve about grow-your-own, according to operators of nurseries, community gardens and commercial urban farms in Sydney and Melbourne.

Tending the veggie garden at Camperdowns Commons, Sydney. Louise Kennerley

Emma Bowen, co-founder of Pocket City Farms in inner Sydney, which is part of Camperdown Commons, a former lawn bowls club turned urban farm and restaurant, says growing food forges a stronger sense of community.

“We’ve seen a really huge shift in mindset towards urban farms in the eight years we’ve been working here,” she notes. “We have many more developers and local councils reaching out about incorporating both urban farms and community gardens into new developments.”

While Camperdown Commons’ on-site restaurant and workshops have been put on hold since the lockdown, produce from the farm has been selling out every week, says Bowen. “Growing food where we live and building resilient communities are more important than ever.”

Before the pandemic, Farmwall, an agrifood-tech start-up in Melbourne, was predominantly selling its vertical aquaponic farming kits to businesses in office buildings. Now the company’s market has shifted to apartment blocks, enabling those without backyards or even balconies to grow microgreens, herbs and leafy greens.

“We show people how to grow food indoors, in limited spaces, in a naturally contained eco-system,” says Geert Hendrix, founder of Farmwall.

Adds Serena Lee, the firm’s non-executive director, “We may never go back to the corporate environment.”

But the urban farming phenomenon isn’t restricted to inner-city hipsters. Five percent of Australia’s biggest urban park, the Western Sydney Parklands, which covers more than 50 square kilometres, has been set aside for urban farming. In the heart of Parklands, 16 existing urban farms supply fresh fruit, vegetables and flowers to surrounding areas.

“Our urban farmers have experienced an upswing in customers at their roadside stalls, with the community choosing to shop locally and away from the traditional supermarkets,” says Parklands executive director Suellen Fitzgerald. “It reduces transport costs and allows children to see where their food comes from.”

To read more from Good Weekend magazine, visit our page at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and Brisbane Times.

PAKISTAN: Responding Creatively To Crisis With Non-Traditional Farming

27/05/2020

Rehman produces okra, gourds, melons, and tomatoes in the two tunnel garden units he built in the back yard of his home in Aka Khel, a town in one of Pakistan’s most food-insecure regions. Each less than a meter wide, these creative and economical structures are a type of low-technology greenhouse, consisting of steel tubes clad with a plastic covering and lined with irrigation hoses.

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FAO helped him install these earlier this year and now “it’s a relief at a time when markets and transports are closed due to the pandemic,” he says. He is one of the millions of people around the world responding creatively to mitigate the pandemic’s disruptions to the food supply chain, which risk making food less available where it is needed most due both to logistical bottlenecks and declining incomes triggered by the health emergency. In this scenario, solutions that shorten the food supply chain, including vertical and urban farming have taken on new importance.

Despite the fact that prices for wheat and rice, staple foods for Pakistani families, rose sharply in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province due to COVID-19 restrictions on movement, Rehman was still able to feed his family. With the produce from his garden, they also have a more diversified diet. FAO, working with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), also helped 75 of Rehman’s neighbors build tunnel farms, which help lengthen cropping seasons, intensify yields and boost local availability of fresh nutritious produce.  Rehman says his tomato plants are producing five to ten times as much as they would in an open field.

Farming vertically

Vertical gardens and microgardens have enjoyed new popularity in recent years, which the COVID-19 pandemic may catalyze further. The former are often high-tech urban facilities allowing vegetables to grow indoors or outdoors using hydroponics while the latter are tiny farming plots that fit in urban settings. Both can offer high-yield opportunities to grow leafy green vegetables and other high-value food crops. Restaurants are even engaging in a type of microgarden, also called “precision indoor farming”, thanks to a company in Budapest, Tungsram, that was the first to patent the modern light bulb. Today it produces a closet-sized cabinet with computer-controlled lighting and temperatures and an integrated hydroponics system that allows businesses to create their own indoor gardens with minimal labor. Vertical farms, on the other hand, are often large urban operations, housed in old warehouses or basements. Some practitioners can even duplicate conditions needed to grow the world-famous basil from Italy or the prized Omakase strawberry from Japan.

But vertical farming isn’t just a trend in developed countries. In Kibera, a densely populated part of Nairobi, households use sack gardens made from local sisal fibers to grow onions and spinach without blocking alleyways. In Kampala, locals stack wooden crates around a central composting chamber and use old plastic water bottles for a precision-drop irrigation system to grow kale. 

In Dakar, FAO helped galvanize microgardens as a food and nutrition strategy for poor households vulnerable to malnutrition. Today the city, with the participation of thousands of middle-class families, runs that program, which relies on one square meter structures made of coconut fibers to facilitate soil-less cultivation. “It’s ideal for short-cycle, high-value horticultural crops, including mushrooms and spices,” says Rémi Nono Womdim, Deputy Director of FAO’s Plant Production and Protection Division. 

There are a host of extra benefits compared to open-field farming, including the possibility to reduce water use, limit pesticide applications and produce year-round, garnering additional income and insurance against temporary interruptions of normal access to food, he says. In Cairo, elaborate rooftop gardens can reduce ambient temperatures by as much as seven degrees Celsius.

Urban farming & greener cities

A longtime advocate of engineering greener cities and a lead author of FAO’s landmark report on efforts to do so in lower-income cities, Nono Womdim estimates that more than 360 million urban residents in Africa and Latin America alone already engage in some form of urban or peri-urban horticulture. The trick is to recognize their efforts with policy frameworks that ensure they have access to necessary inputs – including some form of land tenure as well as access to water and energy. Urban gardens and shorter food supply chains also underscore how food security depends on access to nutritious food, Nono Womdim says. “Additional benefits include reducing food waste and minimizing packaging,” he adds.

Producing locally may not always be the answer, but as the COVID-19 emergency has highlighted, in times of crisis, every little bit helps in reducing food insecurity. By the same logic, rudimentary vertical farming makes a lot of sense in extreme and remote conditions. The case is even stronger for ensuring that food systems can innovatively respond to natural disasters, conflict, or the chronic stresses expected to intensify with climate change. 

That is why FAO is urging policymakers to facilitate shorter supply chains as a complement that can add sustainability, inclusion, and nutritional value to the world’s remarkably efficient production systems for staple carbohydrates. In the Khyber highlands, Rehman agrees. He’s already installed an additional tunnel unit at his own expense and enjoys his transformation from someone who always had to look for extra income to support his family to someone keen to keep his children in school and who people in the region seek out for advice. “I am very motivated now,” he says.

FAO News

Tags: COVID-19, FOOD CRISIS, FOOD INSECURITY, FOOD SECURITY, VULNERABLE COMMUNITIES, FOOD CHAIN, AGRICULTURE, FARMERS, CLIMATE CHANGE, CLIMATE-SMART AGRICULTURE,

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Show Gives Grower a Chance to Show Off its Uniqueness

For one vertical indoor organic grower, this year’s United Fresh LIVE! is a chance to potentially reach a broader audience.

“We want to be able to talk to a wider span of people with this show,” says Don Helms of Rockingham, VA-based That’s Tasty. “It’s new territory so we’re looking at interesting and unique ways to interact with people.”

The show, taking place this year June 15-19, gives That’s Tasty a chance to share with participants how it differs from others in the marketplace. “We call our facilities BioFarms because unlike other indoor growers, we are USDA Certified Organic and grow in a soil medium” says Helms. “It’s vertically growing in soil and it’s different in that regard. It makes the plants heartier with better flavors and colors and shelf life is also improved.”

Leafy options
That’s Tasty will be part of the Controlled Environment Pavilion where it hopes to display its line of culinary herbs that are living plants and fresh-cut as well as its leafy greens including large-leaf lettuce filets, cut-leaf iceberg, a red and green lettuce mix and more. The show is timed well in that these leafy greens, which are in limited distribution currently and grown in That’s Tasty’s Elkwood, VA BioFarm will be moving into the next phase of distribution.

Helms says that while demand recently for herbs and leafy greens had been erratic due to the pandemic-related shift in the way consumers were buying food, it’s more recently leveled out. “Overall, business is back on a similar track to where we were,” he says.

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In fact, the recent spike in home cooking that North Americans have taken to during the pandemic may be something for That’s Tasty to tap into. “We think a lot of those behaviors are going to continue as people are more into cooking at home and being more adventurous with culinary creations involving fresh herbs and greens,” says Helms.

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For more information:
Don Helms
That’s Tasty
Tel: +1 (540) 896-6939 ext. 2130
dhelms@thatstasty.com
www.thatstasty.com

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Publication date: Tue 26 May 2020
Author: Astrid Van Den Broek
© HortiDaily.com

Farmers Markets Across the US Face Potential Economic Crisis from COVID-19

Across the US, farmers markets operators–the organizations and individuals who plan, coordinate, and run America’s farmers markets, are engaging in herculean efforts to protect their communities from COVID-19. But even as interest in local foods spikes nationwide, many market operators face the double threat of increased costs to operate during a pandemic, in addition to declining income. To make matters worse, many aren’t eligible for current federal relief efforts.

Farmers markets have always been a hub for innovation. When farmers have opted or been forced out of the traditional supply chain, farmers markets have served as a lifeline to their business, filling a vital role to move their goods from field to plate. Now, in this time of crisis, farmers markets are at the forefront of adapting rapid solutions and innovation to protect staff, customers, and community. Apart from these efforts, emerging research suggests sunlight  effectively kills COVID-19, adding more support to the idea that farmers markets may be the safest place to shop for groceries during the pandemic: 

“There are benefits to visiting a farmers market in light of coronavirus in terms of the fact that you’re outside, there’s fresh air moving and the supply chain is shorter,” said Yvonne Michael, an epidemiologist at Drexel University School of Public Health. “…so I would definitely encourage people during the coronavirus to visit a farmers market.”

But changes come with both increased costs and decreased revenue for organizations that run farmers markets. According to a Farmers Market Coalition member survey, 74% of respondents reported decreased income, while 93% report added costs, including the purchase of PPE for market staff, rental of more handwashing stations, new software or services, and additional staff to rearrange market layouts and monitor customer traffic. The need to reduce the number of vendors to enforce physical distance requirements, while other vendors are unable to attend markets due to health concerns, age, and labor shortages, points to a steep decline in revenue for market organizations. In a similar survey by the California Alliance of Farmers Markets, nearly 20% of respondents reported concern that they may not survive the economic impacts of COVID-19.

“We expect to lose almost $200,000 by the end of the year” said Kate Creps, Executive Director of the Heart of the City Farmers Market, in San Francisco, an organization that distributes $1.5 million in food assistance through its markets each year. “Only 50% of our vendors are able to continue selling during this crisis. At the same time, we anticipate over $60,000 in additional expenses to maintain strict social distancing protocol to protect customers, vendors, and staff.”

To make matters worse, farmers markets operators have largely been left out of relief efforts, both public and private. “Farmers markets are probably the safest place to shop now, but that hasn’t happened by accident. It’s thanks to the committed efforts of the community based farmers market operators who deliver for their communities,” said Ben Feldman, Executive Director of the Farmers Market Coalition, a nonprofit representing 4,500 farmers markets across the country. “These are very lean organizations and we are close to a breaking point for many of them, especially if they continue to be shut out of support other sectors of the economy are receiving.”

The impact of losing farmers markets would be massive. Farmers markets facilitate an estimated $2.4 billion dollars in sales for farmers each year. “Without direct assistance for our state’s farmers markets, many of which already operate on a shoestring budget and an all-volunteer staff, we risk losing this vital outlet, drastically affecting the livelihoods of farmers,” according to Robbi Mixon, a farmers market manager and Director of the Alaska Farmers Market Association. “Small to medium scale farmers are the cornerstone of local food systems. If farmers markets disappear, these farmers lose market access and economic stability”

“We are imploring state and federal governments to keep farmers markets in their mind as they develop relief packages,” said Feldman. “Please help markets keep their communities safe and thriving.” 

For more information:
Farmers Market Coalition
farmersmarketcoalition.org

Monday, May 11, 2020

UAE Farm Tech To The Fore

New technologies are helping the country make more of its own produce

Over a span of just six months, Covid-19 has not only changed the way we work, celebrate occasions and stay healthy but also forced countries to take a hard look at how they feed their residents. “I believe the current pandemic has provided us the opportunity to completely reimagine the global food system,” says Tony Hunter, a global food futurist.

Going urban

One of the factors pushing the global agri-tech agenda is the growth and increasing density of cities. “By 2050, more than two thirds of the world’s population is forecasted to live in cities,” explains Smitha Paresh, Executive Director of Greenoponics, a UAE-based retailer of commercial and consumer hydroponics systems, adding that urban agriculture will be crucial for feeding burgeoning urban populations.

“On a macro level, we will see a rise in urban farming, mostly using high-tech farming methods such as hydroponics, aeroponics or aquaponics.” Paresh cites Singapore’s conversion of car parks into urban farm centres as an example. “In the UAE, as per the national food security strategy for 2017-2021, we have already witnessed a huge increase in climate-controlled greenhouses all over the country.”

Arable environments

For Hunter, who spoke about potential silver linings of Covid-19 at a recent Gulfood webinar, new technologies present the best means of achieving domestic self-sufficiency. “They can release countries from the tyrannies of arable land and water stress.” He singles out algal products that rely on low rainfall and can use seawater; cultivated meat and biomass products; cell-based products such as milk proteins; and synthetic biology that can manufacture a range of food products.

Over the long term, Ravindra Shirotriya, CEO, VeggiTech, believes there are three critical areas for sustainable farming in the UAE. The first is precision agriculture, which focuses on growing conditions for plants using hyperbaric chambers and nanotechnology-based organic nutrition. Photo bio-reactors, meanwhile, can cultivate food-grade algae such as spirulina. Finally, Shirotriya cites smart farms, which work with smart cities to create harvest plans based on real-time data on food demand and consumption within communities. “This will address our current broken food ecosystem, where we waste 35 percent of food while 15 percent of the world population goes to sleep hungry.”

VeggiTech’s primary focus is on setting up LED-assisted hydroponics for indoor vertical farms and protected hydroponics for sustainable farming in the UAE.

In terms of crop production, Avinash Vora, Co-founder of Aranya Farms, says new technologies aim to boost yields, reduce waste and grow produce entirely. “Technology is being applied at every stage, whether for plant seeding, monitoring growth, managing water, energy conservation, harvesting and packaging. “We are making huge strides adapting all of them here in the UAE; the interest and investments in agriculture prove that.”

For Philippe Peguilhan, Country Manager of Carrefour UAE at Majid Al Futtaim Retail, the UAE had already been seeking self-reliance in food production, but coronavirus amped up its importance. “The disruption that Covid-19 caused to the supply chain highlighted the importance of local produce and presented an excellent opportunity for local farmers to grab a greater share of the market.” Majid Al Futtaim recently made headlines for opening the UAE’s third, and Dubai’s first, in-store hydroponics farm.

Hydroponic hope

Hydroponics is one agri-tech that’s attracting keen investor interest. “As an indicator, Madar Farms’ 7,000-sq-m factory will produce 365 tons of tomatoes a year, and about 14,000 tons of cherry vine tomatoes were consumed in the UAE in 2019,” says Hunter. “There’s therefore the market opportunity for 38 Madar farms in the UAE for tomatoes alone. Add in other nutrient-dense crops such as cucumbers, peppers and leafy greens. Depending upon their size, we could be looking at several hundred businesses.”

On an individual level, more people are leaning towards home farming, especially towards soil-less cultivation since it is simple and easy, according to Paresh. “It guarantees a certain amount of yield. Home farming will be on the rise, considering the disruption we may face in trying times like this.”

As with most technologies, Hunter says the biggest challenge of hydroponics is profitability. “Fortunately, the costs of technology inputs required to optimise hydroponic production efficiencies are falling rapidly. This drop, together with simultaneous increases in performance, is driving down the costs of hydroponics, making acceptable ROIs much easier to achieve.” He adds that economies of scale can help achieve good ROIs. “Currently most farms are in the 1-2 ton per day range but farms of 50 tons per day are being projected by as early as 2025.”

Sustainability challenges

“Challenges in building our own farm were access to sufficient and cost-effective electricity; renewable sources of water; and the availability of locally made raw materials, specifically growing media, nutrients and seeds. With seeds we are adapting — we have been growing our own seeds but having a library of seeds to choose from that are suitable for our climate and environment would be a huge boon to all farmers.”

— Avinash Vora, Co-founder of Aranya Farms

By Riaz Naqvi, Staff Writer | Gulf News | May 28, 2020

VIDEO: Local Hydroponic Farm Continues Pop-Up Produce Markets Through Pandemic

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By Rachael Penton and Ben Gauthier 

May 21, 2020    

ALEXANDRIA, La. (KALB) - The hydroponic tubes at GrayWalk Farms in Alexandria are full of fresh heads of butter and romaine lettuce, mustard greens, and herbs like basil.'

Source: KALB

Lately, all that home-grown goodness has been making it onto dinner plates more often here in Cenla.

Since the coronavirus pandemic began, GrayWalk Farms has been selling their produce at pop-up markets at places like Little Cakes with Big Attitude and Beans N Cream Coffee, while the Alexandria Farmer's Market has been closed."

We've been doing it for about six weeks now and it's really worked out well. The community seems to really embrace it,” said owner Jay Pearson.

The farm is a mostly wholesale produce operation, selling their vegetables in bulk to be distributed around the region, but they say they felt a need to keep local produce flowing into the community, while many chain grocery store shelves were running low."

Since the pandemic we've seen that there is a big need since they've shut down the farmer's markets, to be able to go out and open ourselves to the community and give them some fresh produce,” added Pearson.

According to a new report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, food prices in America during the month of April saw the biggest one month increase since 1974, increasing by 2.6 percent.

While the prices of many grocery items continue rising in the U.S. because of supply chain disruptions and a larger demand for groceries with many people staying home more often, GrayWalk said they expect to produce prices to remain steady. Especially on produce here at home, where it's harvested on a weekly basis in a sterile environment, with no travel time to your table."People really appreciate that and there's a big difference in taste too,” says Pearson. "There's nothing like supporting your local businesses. There's going to be a big shift in this community going local and trying to seek out that fresh produce. Whatever may be in season, they're going to be looking for it because they've gotten a taste."

To find out where the next pop-up produce market is, follow GrayWalk Farms on Facebook.

Western South Dakota Aquaponic Farm Floats Fresh Food

May 23, 2020

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Photo: Lacey Peterson, AP | Chris Garro shows off the long root under some herbs growing at the aquaponic greenhouse at Garro Farms in Nisland, S.D. (Lacey Peterson/Black Hills Pioneer via AP

BELLE FOURCHE, S.D. (AP) — A Butte County couple is putting fish to work in a new aquaponic greenhouse, growing fresh, locally-grown lettuce that now lines Northern Hills grocery shelves.

He is a Black Hills and Wyoming native, she’s from northeast Iowa, and together, Chris and Alexa Garro, owners of Garro Farms, have mastered the art of mimicking a natural ecosystem that combines traditional aquaculture with hydroculture in the ultimate symbiotic system.

It just so happens that the work fish naturally do, eating and producing waste, is the perfect fertilizer for growing plants. And boy do those fish grow a lot of plants when they get to work.

The best of both worlds

Aquaponics uses the best of all the growing techniques, utilizing the waste of one element to benefit another, mimicking a natural ecosystem.

Alexa told the Black Hills Pioneer it represents the relationship between water, aquatic life, bacteria, nutrient dynamics, and plants that grow together in waterways all over the world. Taking cues from nature, aquaponics harnesses the power of bio-integrating those individual components — exchanging the waste byproduct from the fish as a food for the bacteria, to be converted into a perfect fertilizer for the plants, and return the water in a clean and safe form to the fish — just like mother nature does in every aquatic ecosystem.

“If we were to let this system just hang out and never touch it, it (the bacterial symbiotic process) would happen naturally,” Alexa said. “It’s kind of like nature wants to make it work, and then we just provide the facilities.”

The system has found shortcuts around common agricultural issues.

While gardens can be located in your backyard, industrial farms are often thousands of miles from where their food is consumed. This requires extensive transportation, refrigeration, and packaging to get the food from farm to table.

Hydroponics is a method of growing plants without soil, by instead using mineral nutrient solutions in a water solvent. While hydroponics solves many soil-based issues, it also offers its own problems.

Traditional hydroponic systems rely on the careful application of expensive, man-made nutrients made from mixing together a concoction of chemicals, salts, and trace elements. For the Garros, through aquaponics, they merely feed the fish and monitor the system carefully, and grow fresh, bountiful greenery that you could have on your table the day after harvest.

The Arpan setup

Garro Farms, located approximately 18 miles northeast of Belle Fourche on Arpan Road, is home to the 2,400 square-foot commercial-scale greenhouse. Chris, utilizing second-hand materials, built the greenhouse with the ultimate goal — to supply fresh produce to the Northern Hills and Wyoming areas all year long.

“It took some imagination to get it to this,” Chris said. “And I hope other people follow suit, too.”

Although there are numerous types of aquaponic systems, the Garros selected deep-water culture, or raft-based growing, that uses a foam raft which floats in a 12-inch deep channel filled with fish effluent water that has been filtered to remove solid wastes. Plants are placed in holes in the raft and the roots dangle freely in the water.

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Photo, Chris and Alexa Garro have opened a commercial-scale aquaponic greenhouse to offer fresh, locally-grown lettuce and herbs to Northern Hills and Wyoming communities pose at the farm in Nisland, S.D. (Lacey Peterson/Black Hills Pioneer via AP)

In 2018, Chris implemented a smaller backyard experiment in aquaponics and found the plentiful rewards it could provide. He said the property had only a limited amount of available space, forcing him to get creative, making aquaponics the perfect solution to offer healthy, high-yielding fresh produce.

The system’s water starts out in a 500-gallon in-ground tank and is pumped into the tank where the fish thrive. From there, the nutrient-rich water flows through a solids filter and into a bacterial conversion tank before being piped into the “beds” where the plants roost while they grow.

“And then back again,” Alexa said. “So, it’s all a big cycle. The plants clean out that nitrate, and it comes back to the fish.”

The system circulates approximately 4,500 gallons of water each hour, Chris said.

And the system works well.

“Almost every single thing that comes out of this, there’s no waste byproduct,” she said, adding that other than adding iron to the water, Garro Farms doesn’t provide any additives to the process. “Otherwise, it’s completely self-sustaining. The older the system gets, the more efficient it works, and the more balanced it gets.”

“We figured out how to basically get as much production in this size (of) greenhouse as we would get out of something four times this size,” Alexa said. “So, by taking the square footage and doing a certain crop rotation that he did, that’s how we get (the amount of production).”

Currently, the farm grows six types of lettuce — green oakleaf, rouxai, adriana, salanova red incised, green incised and butter crunch. They also cultivate microgreens, grown under natural sunlight in the greenhouse, including pea shoots, purple-stemmed radish and sunflower. But that’s not all; the Garros are experimenting with herbs like cilantro and culinary sage.

“To be this new and have the right levels and everything producing was a stroke of genius on Chris’ part,” Alexa said.

Without the rotation the Garros utilize, Chris said it would be next to impossible to get the amount of growth production.

“We can do between 50,000-74,000 heads of lettuce out of here a year,” he said. “And if I had done it the conventional way and not moved anything, if we just put in the water and let it grow … they need quite a bit of room when they get bigger and we’d of cut that (production) in a quarter.”

From the time the seeds are planted, the plants are full grown and ready for market in about 35 days, Chris said.

“We’re not using any special seed or anything like that,” he said. “We’re trying to provide ideal conditions, and if you give something ideal conditions, … it just does better.”

What about the fish?

As one of the main components in an aquaponic system, the fish are an important focus for the Garros.

Chris said he stocked his 1,500-gallon fish tank, which is above ground and separate from the water tank, with 50 pounds of fathead minnows three or four months ago.

The type of fish is atypical for an aquaponic setup, Chris said.

“This is pretty experimental, too, because I haven’t read about anybody doing that with bait fish,” he said.

Due to the proximity to the Belle Fourche Reservoir and wanting to keep product procurement as local as possible, the farm gets the minnows from the Wheel In Bait Shop.

The local supply is handy but, Alexa said the fish species is particularly hardy when it comes to handling the area temperatures, whereas other fish species typically used in other aquaponic setups like tilapia, koi or goldfish would struggle in the South Dakota conditions.

So, what happens when the fish get too big and the balance is thrown off?

“The cool thing about it is we’ll trade these out for smaller ones with the bait shop,” Chris said.

A 50-pound batch of minnows will likely thrive in the greenhouse for around six months before needing to be traded out for smaller ones, he said.

“Most people factor in because they either do a huge, massive, million-dollar scale building, or they have a little backyard system,” Alexa said. “So, they either want to eat the fish or they’re factoring it into their revenue plan. For us … it’s so weird fitting that middle ground where we’re not a million-dollar facility but we’re not a 500-gallon backyard system. What worked for everybody else will not quite work here, especially in South Dakota in the wintertime.”

Pandemic curveball meets ingenuity

The current pandemic conditions put a slight kink into the Garros’ plans.

Chris said that the pandemic conditions related to COVID-19 have caused a supply shortage for some of the supplies needed for the greenhouse, requiring them to operate on a smaller level until more supplies arrive.

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Photo, Alexa Garro examines the lettuce crop grown at Garro Farms' aquaponic greenhouse in Nisland, S.D. (Lacey Peterson/Black Hills Pioneer via AP)

“And we don’t even have this thing (the aquaponic bed) like a quarter of the way full, and this is (producing) about 860 heads (of lettuce) a week,” Alexa said.

In about a month, Chris anticipated the greenhouse would likely be at around three-quarters capacity.

Even through the rough conditions, Garro Farms is rising above and plowing through the roadblocks. The farm’s produce is already on the shelves of Lueders Food Centers in Spearfish and Belle Fourche, Lynn’s Dakotamart in Belle Fourche, Bee’s Knees Natural Foods in Spearfish, Grocery Mart in Sturgis and Bearlodge Bakery in Sundance, Wyoming.

Soon, that will likely expand. Alexa said they’re in talks with some restaurants all the way to Rapid City, hoping to provide locally grown, healthy options everywhere.

“We had such a good response from everybody. All the stores we’ve sold to … they’re selling out weekly,” Chris said.

The bigger picture

The couple, who, between the two of them, has ranched in Montana, worked in the Bakken oil fields, done professional construction work, and worked in radio and news outlets, decided they wanted a new direction in life.

“It’s good work, and I didn’t mind it,” Chris said. “But, doing something like this, to me, is a bigger thing. Growing food, to me, is more important.”

The farm expects to be able to keep a consistent level of inventory in terms of production, year-round.

“The way that we’re going to get away with that is the grow lights,” Chris said. “In the wintertime, I’ll probably put them over all the beds. You need 10-15 hours of sunlight (each day).”

The couple was uniquely drawn toward growing lettuce. Chris said that around 95% of the country’s lettuce comes from the California region.

“There’s no reason we can’t grow this locally like this,” he said.

“Lettuce is just one crop that you can’t really get it in mass in the winter in South Dakota,” Alexa said. “This is something that everybody that I talked to had the same problem, ‘I buy lettuce, it goes bad; I buy lettuce, it’s not really what I wanted.’ We just kind of went, ‘lets focus on this and get it going.’”

The pandemic conditions have highlighted to the couple the importance of having a local supply chain.

“If we can do this here, I think it’s possible pretty much anywhere,” Chris said.

Chris said he hopes to continue to grow the business, bring on staff, and someday, produce for most of western South Dakota and eastern Wyoming.

Although the farm sold its first batches of lettuce to local stores in mid-April, the couple is already expanding on the greenhouse, planning a 12-foot addition to the front to accommodate a packaging area.

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