Welcome to iGrow News, Your Source for the World of Indoor Vertical Farming
A Manufacturer And A Food Caterer Among New Players Feeding Singapore’s Urban Farming Boom
“We want to bring indoor farming into something more precise, where you calculate the least input for the best output. That is precision farming,”
Tang See Kit
@SeeKitCNA
11 Aug 2021
SINGAPORE: In a small room tucked away on the second floor of a precision engineering factory in Tuas, pots of kale and lettuce stacked in vertical racks grow under the glow of pink-purple lights.
These light-emitting diode (LED) lights have been designed to shine at a customized spectrum that will help crops grow better. Smart sensors also keep tabs on temperature and humidity in the room, while a special water treatment system reduces bacteria growth.
In here, the goal is to find the best way to farm vegetables indoors, all with the use of technology.
“You can control everything, even how much nutrients or water is being used for each plant,” said Mr. Nelson Lim, co-founder of I.F.F.I, which stands for Indoor Farm Factory Innovation.
“We want to bring indoor farming into something more precise, where you calculate the least input for the best output. That is precision farming,” he told CNA.
Mr. Lim is also the chief executive of precision engineering firm TranZplus Engineering, which is the parent company of I.F.F.I. TranZplus’ two-story office in Tuas now houses both a manufacturing facility for semiconductor components and a farming showroom.
“A lot of people ask me: ‘Nelson, are you crazy? You’re in engineering, why suddenly do farming?’ Actually, the two are not unrelated. We can put our engineering skills to good use in indoor farming,” Mr. Lim said while demonstrating the farming racks that can be adjusted according to height and size.
Robotics is another expertise that the company has incorporated into its farming solutions to not just improve the yield and quality of crops, but also workflow efficiencies.
For instance, automated machines that can perform seeding, transplanting, potting and harvesting tasks will be put to work at I.F.F.I’s mega indoor farm when ready at the end of this year.
(Left to right) I.F.F.I's general manager Veronica Lee, chief operating officer Kelvin Ng, and co-founder Nelson Lim. (Photo: Tang See Kit)
SEEDING A DIVERSIFICATION
TranZplus’ venture into agriculture was first seeded in 2016 when it became one of the vendors for Panasonic’s indoor farm in Singapore.
“Initially, they just wanted to have a rack. Then we thought why not have racks that can be customized, why not put in an irrigation system and other types of automation?” Mr Lim recalled. “We worked out a prototype and they were impressed.”
The company kept on with research and development after that, while being involved in setting up three other small-scale farms. In 2019, it decided it had gained enough experience to give it a shot.
Mr. Lim said the decision to venture into indoor farming was driven by “strong business potential”, partly on the back of Singapore’s “30 by 30” goal to produce 30 percent of the country's nutritional needs locally by 2030.
The COVID-19 pandemic has accentuated the potential, with global disruptions to the harvesting, shipping, and sale of food making it even more important for the country to have its own resources. Indoor farms can be the solution, he added.
Last September, I.F.F.I. became one of the nine urban farms to secure grants totaling S$39.4 million from the Singapore Food Agency.
Its 38,000 sq ft indoor farm, which remains under development at the JTC Space @ Tuas, will be using a soil-based cultivation method that allows more vegetable varieties to be planted.
When operational, the mega farm will be able to produce 800 to 1,000kg of vegetables, like nai bai and spinach, per day, said Mr Lim.
Another new player on the field is food caterer Kitchen Haus, which co-founded “farm-to-table” concept brand Frux Earth a few months ago.
With its core business facing a slow recovery amid the pandemic, the company has been diversifying actively in search of new opportunities over the past year.
Agriculture is “not unrelated territory”, chief executive Patrick Chan said. “It’s still part of the food ecosystem so when the opportunity came, I agreed instantly.”
It teamed up with home-grown urban farming company Metro Farm for the new venture. With the latter’s expertise, the farms under Frux Earth – three sites spanning 60,000 sq ft – are powered by an aquaponics system that converts fish waste into nutrients for the vegetables.
For instance, its 12,000 sq ft rooftop farm atop an industrial building in Bendemeer has eight fish tanks with red tilapia and jade perch. These fishes were chosen for their hardiness and ability “to produce more waste”, said Metro Farm’s director Chris Toh.
“We have a filter to separate the fish waste, which is then broken down by bacteria. Our system will then keep the nutrients flowing to the vegetables 24/7,” said the farm’s other director Brandon Toh, who added that the system is “self-sustainable” and keeps costs low.
The Bendemeer farm, with its 720 vertical plant towers, can harvest more than 30,000 stalks of vegetables, including purple lettuce and kale, a month. The fish will also be sold once they reach table size.
Mr. Chan said: “This is a breath of fresh air for us and we pivoted because we want to jump on the trend of food sustainability.
“I think Metro Farm sees the value in us having the know-how of food preparing, catering, and retail. And we partner them because it’s not easy to set up a farm and they are the experts.”
Metro Farm’s director Chris Toh (left) and Kitchen Haus' chief executive officer Patrick Chan (right) joined hands to form a new urban farming company Frux Earth. (Photo: Tang See Kit)
OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES
Metro Farm, which started its first farm in Kranji almost nine years ago, noted that the local agriculture sector has become “much more vibrant”.
While the presence of new and bigger players means greater competition, the increased attention has also made it easier for businesses to secure farming sites in land-scarce Singapore, including vacant rooftops on both public and private buildings.
“In the past, we have to explain what is a rooftop farm and what we are doing but now, more landlords are opening up to the idea,” said Mr. Brandon Toh, although he noted that not all rooftops are suitable given the need to take into consideration the additional loads of farming.
Frux Earth has plans to open three more urban farms over the next few months.
Its “farm-to-table” menu is in the works as it ramps up its crop production, while it is also gauging the interest for a weekly vegetable subscription service, said Mr. Chan.
These “culture boxes”, as they are called, will be filled with 1 to 2kg worth of freshly harvested organic vegetables and delivered to the doorsteps of customers every week. For now, it has started supplying a few restaurants located near its farm at the Marina Country Club.
Frux Earth is planning to launch a weekly vegetable box subscription service. (Photo: Frux Earth)
Over at I.F.F.I, the protracted pandemic and its impact on labour and supplies of raw materials have caused some delays at its mega indoor farm which was initially scheduled to open in the middle of this year.
“We are catching up and hopefully we can have everything ready soon,” said Mr. Lim. “Certainly, costs have also gone up with the increase in raw material prices, but we are managing that."
Meanwhile, the company is working on opening an “indoor farm pro-shop”.
“There will be a mini-farm set up for visitors to understand and raise awareness about indoor farming,” said I.F.F.I chief operating officer Kelvin Ng.
“If they like what they see and want to start their home cultivation system, they will also be able to purchase everything they need at the shop. We will even have consultants ready to guide you. It will be a one-stop shop about indoor farming.”
I.F.F.I. also sees opportunities beyond Singapore where they can serve as consultants or designers to those looking to set up indoor farms. For instance, in Russia where crop production is a challenge due to the cold climate.
Its technologies can also be deployed in “bite sizes” even in traditional food-producing countries as solutions to specific problems, such as water pollution.
Mr. Ng said: “There are many opportunities emerging in the space of indoor farming, and we want to be bold and seize them.”
Source: CNA/sk(cy)
Lead Photo: I.F.F.I, an affiliate of precision engineering firm TranZplus Engineering, is looking to open its mega indoor farm in Tuas by the end of this year. (Photo: Tang See Kit)
Forums And Online Toolkit || Urban Edible Spaces: Growing Food And Happiness In Sustainable Community
HKU Edible Spaces (港大可食空間) has developed an Online Toolkit about urban farming and we hope that it would help those who are interested to start an urban community garden/farm
HKU Edible Spaces (港大可食空間) has developed an Online Toolkit about urban farming and we hope that it would help those who are interested to start an urban community garden/farm. In addition, two forums discussing the positive impacts of edible spaces are now put online (English and Chinese subtitles will be available soon)
Celeste Shai, Senior Programme Officer - General Education
CEDARS, The University of Hong Kong
For any enquiry, please feel free to contact me at cymshai@hku.hk.
Urban Farmers Captured On Canvas
“Re-Enchanting the City,” an exhibition in Chelsea, highlights the visual record of the many vibrant local farms, community gardens, and rooftop plantings around the city by the artist Elizabeth Downer Riker
An Exhibition by The Painter Elizabeth Downer Riker
Documents A Decade of Urban Gardening
April 26, 2021
“Re-Enchanting the City,” an exhibition in Chelsea, highlights the visual record of the many vibrant local farms, community gardens, and rooftop plantings around the city by the artist Elizabeth Downer Riker. About 10 years ago she started painting rooftop farms in Long Island City, Queens, and parts of Brooklyn, and then took her oils and canvas to other neighborhoods in the city, and even upstate. The exhibition features 20 of her works, and they are for sale, from $1,000 to $2,200.
“Re-Enchanting the City: Greening New York City,” April 27 through May 22, Ceres Gallery, 547 West 27th Street, Suite 201, 212-947-6100, ceresgallery.org.
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Florence Fabricant is a food and wine writer. She writes the weekly Front Burner and Off the Menu columns, as well as the Pairings column, which appears alongside the monthly wine reviews. She has also written 12 cookbooks.
Lead photo: “Bird’s-Eye View of Brooklyn Grange-Future,” a portrait of the Brooklyn Grange rooftop farm.Credit...Elizabeth Downer Riker
Feeding A City From The World’s Largest Rooftop Greenhouse
The world’s largest rooftop greenhouse is in Montreal, Canada. It measures more than 15,000m2 and produces more than 11,000kg of food per week. The company behind it had to hire 200 new employees due to pandemic-driven demand
The New Greenhouse Will Accelerate Lufa’s Mission To Grow Food
Image: REUTERS/Mariana Bazo
20 Apr 2021
Senior Writer
The world’s largest rooftop greenhouse is in Montreal, Canada.
It measures more than 15,000m2 and produces more than 11,000kg of food per week.
The company behind it had to hire 200 new employees due to pandemic-driven demand.
Can you grow enough produce for an entire city in rooftop greenhouses? Two entrepreneurs in Montreal, Canada, believe it might be possible.
Lauren Rathmell and Mohamed Hage cofounded Lufa in 2009. The company has four urban gardens in the Canadian city, all in rooftop greenhouses. Lufa’s most recent sits on top of a former warehouse and measures more than 15,000m2 – larger than the other three greenhouses combined. Its main crops are tomatoes and aubergines, producing more than 11,000kg of food per week. It is, the company says, the largest rooftop greenhouse in the world.
Lufa says its new rooftop greenhouse in Saint-Laurent, Montreal, is the largest in the world. Image: Lufa
An ambitious goal
Rathmell says the new greenhouse will accelerate Lufa’s mission to grow food where people live and help it to meet an “ever-growing demand for fresh, local, and responsible foods”.
The company – which says it’s not trying to replace local farms and food makers, acknowledging that not everything can be grown on rooftops – follows what it calls ‘responsible agriculture’ practices. These include capturing and recirculating rainwater, energy-saving glass panels, and an absence of synthetic pesticides. Any waste is composted and reused, and food is sold directly to customers on the day it is harvested. Lufa also has a fleet of electric vehicles to make those deliveries.
“Our objective at Lufa is to get to the point where we’re feeding everyone in the city,” Hage said in an interview in Fortune. Lufa’s fifth greenhouse is due to open later in 2021.
At the moment, Lufa grows food for around 2% of the city’s population. While that might sound like a modest proportion, interest in urban agriculture is on the rise. Presently, agriculture in urban areas tends to be more common in developing countries. But the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) favours an increase in urban agriculture, saying it can have “important benefits for food security”.
Urban farming is often more common among poorer members of society. Image: UN FAO
A growing global trend
Urban agriculture has been taking off in other parts of the world in recent years, too – from shipping containers in Brooklyn, New York City, to allotments in unused spaces in Brussels, Belgium.
And at 14,000 m2, there’s Nature Urbaine in Paris – which claims to be the world’s largest urban rooftop farm. Nature Urbaine rents out growing space to Parisians who want to grow their own crops. Tenant farmers pay around $450 per year per 1m2 sized plot. They get a welcome pack with everything they need to start growing, as well as regular access to the Nature Urbine gardening team who are on hand to offer advice and support.
Lufa produces more than 11,000kg of food per week, including tomatoes and aubergines. Image: Lufa
Lufa’s first greenhouse was opened in 2011, in Montreal’s Ahuntsic-Cartierville borough, to grow herbs, microgreens, cucumbers, and peppers. Two more were added in 2013 and 2017, with the fourth joining last year. It sits on top of a former Sears warehouse in the Saint-Laurent area of the city.
In addition to its own produce, Lufa also sells a selection of other locally made or grown food, including bread, cheese, and drinks to its customers. Rising demand for its service, in the wake of the pandemic, led to the company hiring an additional 200 people, and partnering with 35 new farmers and food makers.
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Three Ways Singapore Is Designing Urban Farms To Create Food Security
Securing food during a crisis and preserving land for a livable climate is changing the focus of farming from rural areas to cities
FARMING IN THE CITY
Urban farming in Singapore
How Singapore has stimulated innovation in urban farming on a massive scale
By Clarisa Diaz | Things Reporter
March 31, 2021
Securing food during a crisis and preserving land for a livable climate is changing the focus of farming from rural areas to cities. At the forefront of this shift is Singapore, a city-sized country that aims to produce 30% of its own food by 2030. But with 90% of Singapore’s food coming from abroad, the challenge is a tall order. The plan calls for everyone in the city to grow what they can, with government grants going to those who can use technology to yield greater amounts.
“This target took into consideration the land available for agri-food production and the potential advances in technologies and innovation,” said Goh Wee Hou, the director of the Food Supply Strategies Department at the Singapore Food Agency. “Local food production currently accounts for less than 10% of our nutritional needs.”
The food items with potential for increased domestic production include vegetables, eggs, and fish. According to the Singapore Food Agency, these three types of goods are commonly consumed but are perishable and more susceptible to supply disruptions. Alternative proteins such as plant-based and lab-grown meats could also contribute to the “30 by 30” goal. In 2020, there were 238 licensed farms in Singapore.
Only 1% of Singapore’s land is being used for conventional farming. That created the constraint of growing more with less. The government has put its hopes in technology, stating that multi-story LED vegetable farms and recirculating aquaculture systems can produce 10 to 15 times more vegetables and fish than conventional farms.
Since 2017, land has been leased in two districts on the edge of the city—Lim Chu Kang and Sungei Tengah—to large-scale commercial farm projects. While the optimization of these farms to produce at maximum capacity is being determined, the idea of growing food in the more urban spaces of Singapore has emerged: from carpark rooftops to reused outdoor spaces and retrofitted building interiors.
Urban farms in Singapore
Urban farms using hydroponics on parking structure roofs
Citiponics is one of Singapore’s first rooftop farms. The hydroponic farm is on top of a carpark, a structure that services almost every neighborhood in Singapore.
Read more: How a parking lot roof was turned into an urban farm in Singapore
Installing urban farms into existing buildings
Sustenir Agriculture has created an indoor vertical farm that can retrofit into existing buildings (including office buildings). The company grows foods that can’t be produced locally, displacing imports and cutting carbon emissions.
Read more: The indoor urban farm start up that’s undercutting importers by 30%
Building a better greenhouse for urban farms in tropical climates
Natsuki’s Garden is a greenhouse in the center of the city, occupying reused space in a former schoolyard. The greenhouse is custom designed for the tropical climate to allow for better air circulation. Yielding 60-80 kg of food per square meter, the greenhouse caters to a small local market.
Read more: How a Singaporean farmer is building a better greenhouse for tropical urban farming
High production urban farms still need to be sustainable
Open to applications later this year, a new $60 million government fund will provide funding for more agritech businesses. According to the Singapore Food Agency, the fund will assist with start-up costs catering to large-scale commercial farms, no matter the location.
But as Singapore tries to advance, there are some left behind. The traditional farms that do exist in Singapore are being displaced, their knowledge no longer valued because they are not seen as hi-tech, according to Lionel Wong, the founding director at Upgrown Farming Company, a consultancy that helps equip new farming business owners across Singapore. “While we are trying to increase production, the net result could actually be reduced production because the traditional growers are being removed from the equation in the long term.”
In the long-run, high production of food within Singapore will need a sustainable market of consumers, to Wong that market isn’t completely clear at the moment. “‘30 by 30’ is really just a vision. The Food Agency deserves a lot of credit in terms of what they’re trying to push, but there’s a lot of room for improvement.” Wong continued, “productivity doesn’t necessarily equate to sustainability or profitability.”
Whether Singapore is able to produce its own food sustainably for the long-run remains to be seen. But the endeavor is certainly an exciting moment for entrepreneurs pushing the boundaries of what farming and cities can be.
Lead photo: COURTESY CITIPONICS | Singapore aims to produce 30% of its food by 2030.
Tanimura & Antle Acquires Boston-Based Green City Growers
The merger of the two companies is based on a common commitment and passion to provide communities, organizations, and individuals with a hands-on educational experience to increase awareness
SALINAS, Ca. (March 9th, 2021) – Employee-owned grower-shipper, Tanimura & Antle BB #:115075 announced today the acquisition of Boston, Massachusetts, based Green City Growers.
The merger of the two companies is based on a common commitment and passion to provide communities, organizations, and individuals with a hands-on educational experience to increase awareness, build engagement and provide education about where food comes from. By providing a path to engagement with hands-on experience, Green City Growers will assist Tanimura & Antle with reaching individuals of all ages, promoting a long-term healthy lifestyle with consumers.
The combined goal of this partnership is to access and serve individuals and local communities not ordinarily provided with the opportunity to connect with their food while strengthening the food supply by providing a supplemental, healthy, and independent food source.
Founded in 1982, the Tanimura and Antle families created a partnership centered on equality, trust and ownership. Since their foundation, Tanimura & Antle has been an industry leader in innovating how food is produced and delivered as well as their first-to-market product offerings.
The Company’s foundation on partnerships has built a culture that carries forward with its employees, customers and suppliers, creating an environment that fosters innovation and willingness to succeed or fail forward.
“Our investment in Green City Growers is our next level of engagement to continue our efforts to impact the lives of all. Our philosophy has always been a learning by doing approach. By reaching children, charitable organizations, corporations, wellness and community outreach programs, we can have a strong impact on promoting a healthy lifestyle,” said Scott Grabau, President & CEO of Tanimura & Antle.
“This partnership and acquisition will also provide our retail and foodservice partners their own opportunity to have an impact in the communities they serve by partnering with us on these programs.”
Founded in 2008 and a certified benefit corporation (B-Corp), Green City Growers started their business by installing and maintaining raised garden beds at people’s homes. From there, the business expanded to include schools, non-profits, corporate clients and real estate companies.
The company provides their customers with the infrastructure, tools, and educational tools required in order to grow their own fresh produce using the principles of organic, regenerative and pesticide free agriculture practices. Green City Growers also offers consulting on design, workshops, virtual engagement and educational opportunities.
With this certification comes a mission that combines bottom-line success with environmental and social responsibility. Green City Growers reaches thousands of children and adults with hands on educational programs about growing healthy food.
As of 2021, Green City Growers has installed hundreds of garden spaces using organic, regenerative and pesticide free agriculture practices and currently services over 150 unique farm and garden locations. The current farms and gardens range from small raised garden beds to rooftop farms and are located throughout New England, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New York.
The Company is proud to service New England’s largest rooftop farm on top of Whole Foods Market in Lynnfield, MA, and be the Red Sox’s “other farm team”, maintaining the rooftop farm at Fenway Park since 2015.
In addition to these unique farm and garden locations, Green City Growers also manages garden education programs for Public Schools, Boys, and Girls Clubs and supports wellness and sustainability programs for property management, real estate companies, and corporations with their own gardens.
“We see innovation in the food production and distribution chains as a societal and environmental necessity. We are implementing creative and realistic solutions that help to meet the multiple challenges food systems currently face. We work towards this while at the same time providing local jobs, sourcing local materials, and supporting local economies”, said Chris Grallert, President and equity partner of Green City Growers.
“With a solid business foundation in our proven and robust soil growing technologies, we can now thoughtfully look into how we can expand our custom services in other areas of urban agriculture including vertical and other indoor technologies. I could not be more excited about this new partnership.”
Under the new ownership, the company will continue doing business as Green City Growers with Chris Grallert as President of this new partnership.
Lead photo: The 5,000-square foot Green City Gowers rooftop farm at Fenway Park is on the roof of the front office on the third-base side.
Tagged mergers & acquisitions, tanimura & antle
7 New HDB Carpark Rooftop Sites Offered For Rental For Urban Farming In Public Tender
More local produce. Part of Singapore's efforts to strengthen its food security is increasing its capability to produce food locally
Part of Singapore's efforts to strengthen its food security is increasing its capability to produce food locally.
To do this, more sites for urban rooftop farms atop multi-storey Housing Development Board (HDB) carparks are being offered for rental, via a public tender process that was launched today (Feb. 23).
Seven new sites
Seven sites have been identified in Jurong West, Bukit Panjang, Sembawang and Woodlands, according to the Singapore Food Agency (SFA) and HDB.
The sites will be used to farm vegetables and other food crops, and will also be used to pack and store produce.
They will be tendered out as a single site (in Jurong West) and three cluster sites (in Bukit Panjang, Sembawang and Woodlands).
Screenshot from SFA and HDB
Tenderers who successfully bid for cluster sites will be awarded all sites within the cluster, to allow them to cut costs through production at scale.
Single-site farms, on the other hand, provide opportunities to "testbed innovative ideas".
Tenderers must submit their proposals via GeBiz before the tender closes on Mar. 23, 4pm.
Proposals will be assessed on their bid price, production output, design and site layout, as well as their business and marketing plans.
More information can be found on SFA's website here.
Producing food locally
This is the second time tenders were launched for rooftop urban farms on carparks here — the first took place in Sep. 2020, with nine sites being awarded.
Collectively, the nine farming systems can potentially produce around 1,600 tonnes (1,600,000kg) of vegetables per year.
Having more space for commercial farming in land-constrained Singapore is one of SFA's strategies to achieve its "30 by 30" goal — which is to produce 30 percent of Singapore's food locally by 2030.
The move is also in line with HDB’s Green Towns Programme to intensify greening in HDB estates.
“Besides contributing to our food security, Multi-Storey Car Park (MSCP) rooftop farms help to bring the community closer to local produce, thereby raising awareness and support for local produce," said Melvin Chow, Senior Director of SFA’s Food Supply Resilience Division.
Sino Group Presents City-Wide Integrated Green Community Project Farm Together
Ms. Nikki Ng, Group General Manager of Sino Group, says, 'With a vision of Creating Better Lifescapes, the Group focuses its efforts on three interconnected pillars, namely Green Living, Community Spirit, and Innovative Design
January 28, 2021
ACROFAN=PRNewswire | mediainquiries@prnewswire.com | SNS
Dedicated to Creating Better Lifescapes for the community
HONG KONG, Jan. 28, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The year 2021 marks the 50th Anniversary of Sino Group (the 'Group'), commemorating its effort in community-building and dedication to building a more sustainable society. Sino Group today presents Farm Together – an integrated green community project that promotes urban farming and brings the community closer to nature, in keeping with the Group's Sustainability Vision 2030 commitment of Creating Better Lifescapes. With six farms currently operating across its properties in Hong Kong that span over 23,000 square feet, the Group has one of the largest urban farming footprints in the city.
Ms. Nikki Ng, Group General Manager of Sino Group, says, 'With a vision of Creating Better Lifescapes, the Group focuses its efforts on three interconnected pillars, namely Green Living, Community Spirit, and Innovative Design. In collaboration with our green partners and NGO partners, Farm Together aims to encourage our community to re-establish a connection with nature. We promote sustainable living and wellness while celebrating local biodiversity in alignment with the mission of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Through Farm Together, we seek to plant the seeds of sustainability and grow a greener future with our colleagues, residents, tenants, and the wider community.'
Sino Group sees sustainability as the core of its business and has introduced many green initiatives over the past 50 years, including the 'Mission Green Top' that has brought green inspiration to commercial buildings since 2008 and Hong Kong Gold Coast Hotel's outdoor organic farm, launched in 2018, which pioneered the industry. Over 5,000 tenants, hotel guests, students, and colleagues have participated in a variety of green tours, workshops, and educational programmes over the years, and more than 1,000 kg of vegetables have been harvested from rooftop farm that has generated over HK$2 million of sales proceeds for the not-for-profit Hong Chi Association. These meaningful experiences and networks laid a solid foundation for the city-wide Farm Together project.
Urban farming footprint across the city
Farm Together currently operates six farms city-wide, across the Group's commercial and residential properties as well as hotel. The largest farm in the portfolio, spanning 11,840 square feet, is Sky Farm at the Skyline Tower, located in Kowloon Bay. Featuring a wide range of seasonal plants from Romaine lettuce to sweet potatoes as well as being Hong Kong's first rooftop farm at a commercial building to grow indigo plant for tie-dyeing, the farm is managed in collaboration with sustainable social enterprise Smiley Planet and local NGO Hong Chi Association.
Other farms include 148 Farm (1,300 square feet) on 148 Electric Road that is a lush urban garden with mesmerising views of the Victoria Harbour. The Group's Hong Kong Gold Coast is home to four farms: Gold Coast Eco Farm (2,500 square feet), bringing the joy of urban farming to residents at Hong Kong Gold Coast Residences; Gold Coast Fun Farm (1,600 square feet), a green oasis where families and neighbours meet and share wonderful moments together; Gold Coast Farm (3,680 square feet), the first farm within a hotel in Hong Kong using organic farming practice to grow a variety of crops; and Butterflies and Herbs Farm (3,700 square feet) at the Hong Kong Gold Coast Hotel, which features more than 20 types of butterflies and 40 types of flower and plant species.
These farms together grow over 150 plant and crop species including the seasonal plants snow jade cabbage and taro winter melon. Farm Together aims at promoting a more sustainable urban lifestyle through vertical farming practices and farm-to-table experiences. It is expected to generate a total of around 1,000 kg of produce annually to be shared with residents, tenants, and charitable organizations to support the local community.
Following this success, Farm Together has been extended outside of Hong Kong. The Fullerton Farm (2,152 square feet) at The Fullerton Hotel Singapore has been launched to promote the concept of sustainability and biodiversity to the Singapore community.
148 Farm on 148 Electric Road is a lush urban garden with mesmerizing views of the Victoria Harbour.
Wide range of activities to bring the community closer to nature
Committed to creating a better community that thrives in harmony by embracing green living and wellness, the Group's Farm Together project offers a range of community workshops, programmes, and tours – that teach participants everything from the farm-to-table concept to expert farming tips – in collaboration with urban farming experts including Smiley Planet, Rooftop Republic, Fung Yuen Butterfly Reserve and NGO partners including Hong Chi Association, New Life Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association, Warehouse Teenage Club and The Providence Garden for Rehab.
The first round of community activities will open to public this April. Popular workshops that utilize the plants and herbs grown at the farms include the Tie-Dying Workshop where participants can create their own tie-dyed fabrics and accessories with indigo, and the Herb Soap Making Workshop in which participants can create their own sustainable soap using a traditional cold processing method with herbs and flowers. Those who wish to learn more about farming techniques and harvesting can enjoy the Mixed Farm Tour and Urban Farm Tour. Please visit the Farm Together website https://www.farmtogether.com.hk/ for details and fee of the workshops, with online registration starting mid -February on a first-come-first-serve basis. Proceeds from the workshops (deducting administrative cost) will be donated to New Life Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association.
About Sino Group
Sino Group is one of the leading property developers in Hong Kong. It comprises three listed companies – Sino Land Company Limited (HKSE: 083), Tsim Sha Tsui Properties Limited (HKSE: 0247), and Sino Hotels (Holdings) Limited (HKSE: 1221) as well as private companies held by the Ng Family.
The Group's core business is developing residential, office, industrial, and retail properties for sale and investment. In addition to an extensive portfolio in Hong Kong, the Group has footprints in mainland China, Singapore, and Australia. The Group has developed more than 250 projects, spanning a total plot ratio area of over 84.6 million sq ft. Our core business is complemented by the gamut of property services encompassing management, security, and environmental services to ensure a seamless Sino Experience. We are also a key player in hotel and club management.
The Group employs more than 10,000 committed staff members, who share the vision of creating better lifescapes. Lifescape is our vision – to build a better life together, where the community thrives in harmony by embracing green living and wellness, by engaging with all and pursuing meaningful designs, and by seeking innovation while respecting heritage and culture. Committed and together, we create a better community where people live, work, and play. In the year 2021, the Group celebrates its 50th anniversary, commemorating our five decades of community-building and dedication to Creating Better Lifescapes.
The Group focuses its sustainability efforts on three areas, namely Green Living, Innovative Design, and Community Spirit. Sino Land Company Limited (083) has been a constituent member of the Hang Seng Corporate Sustainability Index Series since September 2012 for its continual efforts in promoting sustainability.
About Farm Together
Farm Together is Sino Group's integrated green community project for planting the seeds of sustainability and bringing the community closer to nature.
Farm Together currently comprises 6 farms in Hong Kong and 1 farm in Singapore, spanning over 26,000 sq. ft. and including the Sky Farm at Skyline Tower, the 148 Farm at 148 Electric Road, Gold Coast Fun Farm, Gold Coast Eco Farm, Gold Coast Farm and the Butterflies and Herbs Farm at the Hong Kong Gold Coast Hotel, the Fullerton Farm at the Fullerton Hotel Singapore.
Creating a sustainable future is at the heart of what we do, and Farm Together is one of the ways we are bringing this vision to life. Let's Farm Together!
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A Leading NYC Mayoral Candidate Thinks Roof Farms Can Save America’s Cities
On the Eater’s Digest podcast, Eric Adams talks healthy eating, urban farming, and food deserts
Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams distributing food
Photo by Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis via Getty Images
Later this year, the voters of America’s largest city will elect a new mayor. New York’s next leader will contend with budget crises, a small business sector in a free fall, a struggling mass transit system, a school system in open revolt, and a grieving populous. They also have an opportunity to help the city redefine itself and its values and priorities.
Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, one of the leading candidates in the race right now, believes food is a key component in any future recovery. Passionate about urban farming, he wants to set up a citywide network of vertical and rooftop farms that feed hospitals, schools, prisons, and beyond while educating schoolchildren and getting trucks off the road. He believes in the ability of healthy food to fight the chronic illnesses the plague Black and brown communities across the city, having reversed his diabetes diagnosis with his diet. And he believes in cutting through the bureaucracy of city government to make it all happen.
Last month, Borough President Adams came on the Eater’s Digest podcast to discuss why food needs to be central to any conversation around environmental, economics, and health.
Read below for the full transcript of our conversation with Adams.
Amanda Kludt: Today on the show, we have Brooklyn Borough President and New York City mayoral candidate, Eric Adams. I wanted to have him on the show because he’s very passionate about rooftop farming, getting healthy food to food deserts, and using food as a weapon against chronic diseases like diabetes, which disproportionately impacts African-American communities. Borough President Adams, welcome to the show.
Eric Adams: Thank you, Amanda and Daniel. It’s great to be here and you started out, you said what I was passionate about, and I am probably one of the few people who have reached this level of government that I’m passionate about our universe. I think far too often when you are a part of the government, you become so scripted and you do not have personal narratives that make you and it forces you to look at life in a different way. I think that the dark moments in my life, I was able to take them from being burials to plantings. It led me to a journey of realizing the universality of our coexistence, not only with our mothers but mother earth.
I view everything through that prism. So sometimes you speak with me and you’ll say, “Okay. He’s an elected official.” Then another time, you say, “Wait a minute, this guy’s a hippie.” Then another time you’ll say, “Hey, this guy is some type of Sage.” I moved through all of these universes and it’s scary at first until people finally say, “Wait a minute, there’s more to life and our purpose than what we were told.”
AK: I love that. To that end, do you want to tell our listeners a little bit about your background, just a quick bio for those who are not familiar with your work and what you do?
EA: I was born in Brooklyn. Brooklyn is the largest borough county in the city of New York out of the five, 2.6 million people, extremely diverse, moved to Queens as a child. I was arrested by police officers who assaulted my brother and I, and that’s why the movement around police reform is so important to me. But instead of saying, “Woe is me.” I say, “Why not me?” I joined the police department. I started an organization for police reform and public safety at the same time. I became a Sergeant, Lieutenant, a Captain, and retired as a Captain. I went on to become a state Senator. Then after serving four terms, I became the first person of color to be the Borough President in Brooklyn. On the way, something called chronic disease hijacked or attempted to hijack my life. I was diagnosed with type two diabetes four years ago.
I woke up one morning and I could not see my alarm clock. I lost sight in my left eye. I was losing it in my right, had constant tingling in my hands and feet. That was permanent neuropathic nerve damage that would eventually lead to amputation, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, the American package. Instead of following the American route of using a prescription, I decided to use plants. In three weeks, after going through a whole full plant-based diet, my vision came back three months later, my diabetes went into remission, the nerve damage went away, and I dropped 35 pounds. I like to tell people I don’t have a six-pack. I have a case now.
AK: That is remarkable. One of the reasons I wanted you on here is because you have ideas around rooftop farming. You’ve talked about how Queens and the Bronx were farmland originally. So can you talk about what you’d like to do there and what kinds of businesses you’d like to build for the city?
EA: I’m in this place where one solution solves a multitude of problems. So we were an agrarian economy at one time. We’re cycling out of COVID. We are going to have a real problem around food. COVID reveals that comorbidities and preexisting conditions led to a higher rate of hospitalizations and deaths. We’re dealing with food deserts throughout our entire city, particularly in economically challenging communities. So look at all of those areas and now say to ourselves, “Our environment is going through a terrible time because there are too many trucks on the road. So why not use our rooftops? Why not look at using vertical farming, using everything from hydroponics, and let’s start with our school system.” We feed 960,000 children a day.
AK: Wow.
EA: Why not say, “Let’s turn to food.” And by growing the food using rooftops, using classrooms, using empty factory spaces, the person who invents and expands this system now will have enough money to leverage long contracts. So if I go to the companies and state that, “Hey, I’m going to give you a five year guarantee contract that you’re going to grow the vegetables and some of the fruits that you’re about to provide to our school system,” you now can leverage that to go into the science and to expand. What do we do in the process? You’re going to teach my young children a nutritionally-based education so they can learn this multibillion-dollar industry of urban farming. They’re going to be skillful in it. And these are the jobs of the future, because 40 percent of the jobs we’re training our children, for now, won’t be available because of computer learning and artificial intelligence. But we’re always going to eat.
Then we take the trucks off the road that are feeding our Department of Education. Then we have the children built into this civic educational plan of identifying food desert, food apartheid, and do nutritionally-based education in their communities so that you can go into the bodegas and local stores and storefronts and start making available fresh fruits and vegetables. Then we go to the Department of Correction and start feeding them healthy meals instead of the meals we’re feeding them. Then we supply them to the hospitals. So this will continue to expand based on the buying power and the leverage we have as a city.
Daniel Geneen: So have you actually been able to incentivize or figure out ways to incentivize or mandate some farms in Brooklyn already, or is this something you’re thinking about for the future?
EA: It’s here. We put a substantial amount of money into our schools, the Department of Education, one of the largest school systems in the country, and we put a substantial amount of money into schools with children, learning how to deal with growing food in the classroom. We partnered with an amazing organization called Farmshelf, and look at what happened with this group that we partnered with. They have this sort of unit that’s the size of a refrigerator with a growth of vegetables inside of the refrigerators in the classroom. The children are connecting with local public housing to give the freshly grown food to. But the children in this school, Democracy Academy, it was an alternative high school where the children were not coming to class. When we bought a couple of units and allowed them to be engaged with this farming inside the classroom, urban farming, the teacher said, “We can’t get them out of the school.”
“When we bought a couple of units and allowed them to be engaged with this farming inside the classroom, urban farming, the teacher said, ‘We can’t get them out of the school.’”
They found a purpose. Education is not feeding the creative energy of children. They’re not into this rote learning. They’re not into not being able to really look at their creative energies and find purpose. So some of the programs we have in the Department of Education, they have been extremely successful. We are trying to turn a public housing development called Marlboro Projects, we want to spend close to $13 million to build a two-story greenhouse that’s going to teach farming, education around farming, and how to deal with food deserts. The bureaucracy that’s in the way is unbelievable. We have been working on this project for about three years and that’s one of the problems we’re having. Too many people in government just don’t get it.
DG: Is it about getting the money together or is it about building it? What signatures do you need that you’re having trouble getting?
EA: Great question. It’s not about the money. I am allocating the money. We already have the money. The money is sitting there waiting to be spent. We have dueling rules and codes in our city and we don’t have a universal plan on, “Okay. We want to do urban farming. We want to do rooftop farms. We want to do vertical farming.” So our city and the city’s zoning and policies are stuck in the 20th century when the entire planet is evolving, technology is evolving. So when you go to people in these various agencies, they are professional naysayers, they say, “Well, we can’t do that.” And you say, “Why?” “Because we’ve never done that.”
DG: Right.
AK: Do you think there are opportunities for private/public partnerships here too, working with a lot of the landlords who might be looking for new opportunities to use their real estate right now?
EA: Yes. I think that is something that we are exploring because when you think about everyone is going to take a financial hit or through COVID, when I save, I diversify my savings. So if one part of my savings, a stock or my CDs go down, at least I’ve diversified it enough, but now landlords must start thinking outside the box. How do you diversify your plan? How do you diversify your buildings? We see that in some of the towers that are placed on buildings for cell phone usage, we can actually diversify the rooftops like some of the establishments in Industry City, The Navy Yard, they have different greenery grown on their rooftop. Our factories have an amazing amount of rooftop space. We’re not going to grow more land, but we have millions of feet of rooftop space that is underutilized and we believe we could use it a better way to grow food in a more healthier way.
DG: Because I assume education is a key component of this, but I imagine in a dream world for you, all of the rooftops would just be growing the food for New York to eat, right? It’s not just government-controlled farms. You’d want a lot of people growing their own stuff as well, right?
EA: Without a doubt. I believe that we... I think that we should return to an agrarian economy. I remember saying this to my team two years ago and they all walked out of the room and said, “He must be smoking that weed that’s illegal.” Now, they started talking to finance experts.
DG: And they’re like, “What if we grow that weed on the rooftops?”
AK: That’s how you make the money.
EA: But we partnered with NYU’s finance team there. They’re looking at it. They’re crunching the numbers and they said, “Wait a minute, this guy is onto something.” We partnered with Cornell University. People are seeing the do-ability of actually doing this, and I feel that all about rooftops can play a role. We can repurpose these rooftops to ensure that we can grow our food. We’re going to take trucks off the road ... There’s a great opportunity to redefine ourselves as a city.
“We can repurpose these rooftops to ensure that we can grow our food. We’re going to take trucks off the road”
DG: What is the red tape like for a private institution to grow on their rooftop? We’re very familiar with trendy restaurants having a farm on their roof and they’re like, “After your aperitif, come check out our farm,” or whatever. But if I have a big apartment complex and I’m like, “I want to turn my roof into a farm,” what kind of legal hurdles are there? Or can I just start doing it?
EA: Two pieces, Daniel. And that’s very important what you just stated and I hope listeners heard you. Racism is built into the structure of our society. We’re comfortable with a trendy restaurant in an affluent community, saying, “When you finish your tea and you finish your Merlot, now, go on up to the rooftop and we’re going to handpick some of your microgreens,” and it’s acceptable. But now, you go out to Brownsville and you have a group of residents that have stated, “We have all of this footage, all of the square feet of rooftop. We want to grow and have our gardens here.” Now, all of a sudden, the rules come out. All of a sudden, it becomes impossible to do.
It’s as though in our mind, people in economically challenged communities are not deserving of some of the finer things that we placed in other communities. So what the Department of Buildings, the Fire Department, the Department of Health, all of these different entities have not come together and started to say, “How do we make this happen?” That’s what we have to go do. I partnered with the former Councilman in Brooklyn, and we came together and said it’s time to get all of our agencies together that are in this space and come up with ways of making this happen. That is one of the goals that we have because they’re all over the place, they’re disjointed and that prevents us from moving forward. So you’ll get an approval in one agency just for another agency to be a complete contradiction of another agency.
DG: Yeah. No, it’s a great point. It’s also the perception of what they’re growing too. The trendy, New York restaurant, the perception of what’s being grown, people would be excited about it like, “Oh, that’s so cool. It’s grown right here,” but if it’s more industrial and it’s grown in a lower income neighborhood, the perception would be that it’s more like crops for feeding and not anything that people should be excited about.
EA: So true. I think that people miss the connection that we long for and we need with nature, not only with the growing of food locally, the plants are not only going to feed your body, but it feeds the anatomy of your spirit. Living in a concrete environment, not seeing the health of the food that you’re growing, not being a part of, not being connected to nature, we don’t realize it, but it plays on us and it takes away from who we are as human beings. That’s why when you go around public housing, you see a high level of violence, high level of chronic diseases, a high level of stress, mental health illnesses. It’s because of the environment people are in. I truly believe that if you turn it into a more green environment, more inclusiveness with nature, you’ll get a different outcome.
AK: I think that’s a great segue back into your personal journey. You actually just wrote a book about this, “Healthy At Last,” where you talk about how you change your diet to fight chronic disease and how in so many communities, there needs to be a push for this. There needs to be a push for eating healthier. Can you talk a little bit about your goals there and how you want to change the way that people eat in certain communities?
EA: Think about this for a moment. Three months of going to a whole food plant based diet, and I went from losing my vision, permanent nerve damage that was reversed, diabetes was also reversed, my ulcers went away, my blood pressure normalized, my cholesterol normalized in three months. Think about that for a moment. The people and I spent the entire ... Has it been nine months now with COVID? Every day of those nine months, I have been in the streets and I’m sure I’ve been around people who have had COVID. I’m pretty sure I was in their presence. I would deliver in masks. I moved into Borough Hall and put a mattress on the floor and I slept here and I used it as mobilization from my office in Borough Hall.
Now, if we would have spent the last three months — we were feeding people in this city for three months — if we would have said, “On our dime, we’re giving you healthy foods. We’re not giving you nacho chips. We’re not giving you processed food. We’re going to give you healthy food like quinoa, which is one of the most nutritional meals people can have. We’re going to introduce you to new food.” We would have number one, we would have fed people, which was important. Number two, we would have started the process of building their immune system so they can have a stronger immune system to fight off COVID-19. Three, we would have started changing the habits that people are so wedded to that believe they could only eat fast food, junk food. So we were missing a golden opportunity.
My goal is, as my program is at Bellevue Hospital, was first of its kind in New York, if not America, where we’re doing lifestyle medicine. 750 people on a waiting list, 230 people are in the program and we are helping people to cycle off their disease and medicine and using this new term called, “reversing chronic diseases.” That is what I believe our hospitals should do and what I want to continue to do to show people how you use food as medicine. That is what’s important. That’s what my book wanted to point out. Many people believe that their culture is tied to the food that’s poisoning them. I wanted to give a very real, honest story of exposing my weakness. “Hey, I’m the Borough President. Yes, I’m a former state Senator, but I’m just an everyday person that I was digging my grave with my knife and fork,” and I want to show people how they can live a healthy life. That’s why my 80-year-old mother was able to reverse her diabetes, also, get off insulin after only two months of going whole food plant-based.
AK: About restaurants in general, do you have a position speaking to your constituents about how they can get out of this crisis? Like many small business owners, they have been so impacted by COVID and I’m wondering if you see a path forward for them.
EA: Yeah, especially with my small restaurants. I hear some people say restaurants are for rich people. They should try the days when I was a kid and I was a dishwasher helping my mother pay the mortgage by washing dishes in a restaurant. Restaurants are for everyday people. Inside a restaurant is a cook, is a dishwasher, waiter, waitress, busboy/girl, low skill, low salary, they’re eking out a living and we have to get our restaurants back open. I believe that a bellwether of a city if you don’t get them up and operating, it’s an indicator of how bad your city’s doing.
I think the city can do a better job. Stop purchasing our food from outside the city and outside the state. Let’s localize the production of food. Let’s allow our local restaurants to use their kitchens to supply the food. We are providing millions of meals. Let’s allow our local restaurants to handle this distribution of food to communities and really engage them to keep them afloat, to keep people hired right here in our city. We spend too much money out of our city and I’m pretty sure other big cities are spending too much money outside of their city limits going to places that it may be cheaper in the short term, but in the long term, keeping your people employed, engaged and your small businesses open is extremely important.
AK: Awesome. I love that. Yeah.
DG: So as you look to a mayoral run, how much of this are you incorporating into your platform? Are these the kinds of things that you will be talking about constantly, or is it just a portion of your plan?
“What good is it to have a fancy hospital when you go in there to have your legs cut off because of diabetes neuropathic nerve damage?”
EA: A substantial portion. Our crisis, our health system, Daniel, is not sustainable. We have 30 million Americans diabetic, 84 million are pre-diabetic. We spend 80 cents on the dollar on chronic diseases. Diabetes is the leading cause of blindness, leading cause of non-trauma limb amputation, leading cause of kidney failure. We can’t continue to go down this road. I am really disappointed. Which presidential candidate talked about food and healthy food? What are candidates running for statewide, citywide offices all across this country, who are engaged in preventive medicine about healthy food? Everyone is talking about access to healthcare. What good is it to have a fancy hospital when you go in there to have your legs cut off because of diabetes neuropathic nerve damage? We have to become proactive and that’s my message. I’m going to use health in hospitals to ensure we have a proactive approach and give people choices, so they don’t have a lifetime of being on prescriptions, but they could have a lifetime that’s healthy on being on plants.
DG: Final thing, you said in the beginning that some people call you a hippie or sometimes you’re a hippie. All right. What does it mean to be a hippie? And are you a hippie?
EA: I think I am. I should’ve been born in the sixties. I just really... Let me tell you. I think that we had a very unique cosmic shift in a universe where people are really looking for their purpose and they’re no longer looking to just go through the motion of being on Valiums and statins and going home every day being unhappy. In Bhutan when I was there, they judged their country not by the gross national product, they judge it by the happiness of their people. We may be financially sound, but we’re emotionally bankrupt and it’s time to really start investing in what’s important and that’s family, friends and happiness.
DG: All right. Let’s grow happiness.
AK: Thank you for your work and thank you. Your book is, “Healthy At Last.” It just came out in October. Everyone should check it out. Thanks so much.
Rooftop Greenhouse Agrotopia Is Taking Shape
Little by little, the roof greenhouse on the crate shed of the REO Auction in Roeselare is taking shape. Compared to the very first visible work, there is already a real greenhouse on the roof, as greenhouse builder Deforche Construct shared recently
Little by little, the roof greenhouse on the crate shed of the REO Auction in Roeselare is taking shape. Compared to the very first visible work, there is already a real greenhouse on the roof, as greenhouse builder Deforche Construct shared recently.
After the Christmas break, the construction team went back to work. The project is scheduled for June 2021, but the official opening is due August this year. After that, the greenhouse will be ready for the 'Festival of the Future' which will be held in Roeselare in September, they shared in a LinkedIn update.
Stijn Cappon (Deforche Construct), Francis Vancraeynest (Deforche Construct), Johan Vermeulen (Maïs Automatisering), and Jago van Bergen (Van Bergen Kolpa Architects) at the laying of the first pile for the project in July 2019. Deforche is constructing the greenhouse, whilst Maïs Automatisering will take care of the technical completion of the greenhouse. Van Bergen Kolpa Architecten has designed the jagged façade and the twelve-meter high greenhouse as a landmark.
Vegetable garden
The REO Auction is located in the heart of West Flanders. "The vegetable garden of Western Europe", the initiators say. The rooftop greenhouse offers space for both leafy and fruiting vegetables. In co-creation projects, suppliers, knowledge institutes, governments, growers, and technology companies are included in crop research. The first processes have already been set up, such as cultivation on water with densely sown crops and vertical farming.
All greenhouse departments will be equipped with LED artificial lighting and a specific climate control system that relies even more on all the knowledge of plant physiology. The greenhouse will be 8000 square meters and will be 8.4 meters separate from the first floor, on the roof of the crate shed.
Vertical cloths are used as shields between the departments, preventing light from radiating into the environment. This is particularly relevant when growing vertically. The rooftop greenhouse does not have its own heating installation: heat is provided by the municipal waste incinerator MIROM and by auction REO.
Festival of the Future
As was recently announced, the Province of West Flanders has chosen the rooftop greenhouse as the location for the 'Festival of the Future'. Three editions will take place between 2021 and 2025. The first edition is planned from 23 September to 3 October 2021.
A document with 'eye-catchers' from the multi-annual budget of the province reads: "At the foot of the rooftop greenhouse there will be built a universe of experience. During two weekends, the general public will be able to discover the agriculture, biodiversity, and food of the future in an exciting journey through an export space. Besides, an attractive and widely accessible evening program will be prepared.
During the week, schools will also be involved, through original workshops. Workshops on computational learning for primary and secondary education, for instance, will be organized. The students will here learn to build a 'Mini-Agrotopia'".
According to the province, the project is characterized by an 'intensive co-creation course of the Province of West Flanders, Inagro, TUA West, POM West Flanders, PTI and the education expertise cell of the Province of West Flanders'. The West Flemish colleges VIVES and HOWEST also 'actively contribute' to the development of the Festival.
Some history
Dominiek Keersebilck of the REO Auction told more about Agrotopia in an interview that appeared earlier in Primeur. The arrival of the rooftop greenhouse is a new step in the history of the auction, he says.
REO Veiling was founded on 20 July 1942 by 27 professional horticulturists from "Roeselare and surroundings" (REO). Due to WW II they had to wait until November 21, 1944, for the first auction day. The story of the REO Auction started in a small shed of a potato trader in the center of Roeselare. After that, the auction moved five times to cope with the increasing supply of horticultural products from West Flanders.
In 1978, REO auction introduced block sales. Also, 1983 was an important year because in that year a simultaneous sale was organized with the Centrale voor Glasgroenten in Sint-Katelijne-Waver for the first time. In 1987 the board of directors decided to build a new and larger auction complex at the current address at the Oostnieuwkerksesteenweg. The new complex was taken into use on 1 April 1991 and officially inaugurated on 24 May.
Rooftop greenhouse
The old auction buildings on the Diksmuidsesteenweg made way for the current packaging department, and a new crate shed was built on the adjoining Vuylsteke site, which was put into use at the end of 2015. A rooftop greenhouse is currently being built on the roof of this packaging shed.
Agrotopia
According to commercial director Dominiek Keersebilck, a lot has changed in recent years. "The REO Auction has seen an increase in turnover and the volume of product sold in recent years. Whereas we have achieved record sales in recent years, this will probably not happen this year due to the corona crisis. This in no way means that there will be no further development on our site. At the moment there is indeed the development of the rooftop greenhouse called "Agrotopia".
The rooftop greenhouse is meant for research and with this technical knowledge, we want to anchor horticulture, here in West Flanders. Also, space can be made for other forms of horticulture, such as vertical farming and urban crop. The rooftop greenhouse allows research into vertical horticulture along a wall of 12 meters high and in the meantime, other innovative cultivation possibilities, such as the cultivation of leafy crops in containers, are also under consideration.”
This article originates from our Dutch magain Primeur - www.agfprimeur.nl.
For more information:
REO Veiling
www.reo-veiling.be
info@reo.be
Publication date: Thu 7 Jan 2021
INDIA: Hydroponics Startups Are Slowly Growing On Indian Consumers
Chennai-based biotechnology graduate Rahul Dhoka’s rooftop looks like a maze. Only, it’s a maze of over 6,000 organically grown leafy vegetables and herbs such as carrom, kale, lettuce, and spinach
Written by Monika Ghosh
29 Dec 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic has dramatically
accelerated the demand for organically grown produce
Chennai-based biotechnology graduate Rahul Dhoka’s rooftop looks like a maze. Only, it’s a maze of over 6,000 organically grown leafy vegetables and herbs such as carrom, kale, lettuce, and spinach.
These vegetables, grown in planters made of PVC pipes that have taken over his 90 square feet rooftop, are grown using hydroponics technique—a method of growing plants in nutrient-rich water instead of soil. Non-commercial hydroponics farming does not require large spaces and can be grown on rooftops like Dhoka’s or even in a smaller set up such as a doorstep. They can also be designed as vertical farms to optimize the land area.
In 2016, Dhoka got into hydroponics as a hobby, and three years later, once he mastered the technique and learned how to create different design structures, he founded Acqua Farms, a consultancy startup that helps people set up their own hydroponics farms.
Dhoka told KrASIA that the consumer interest in hydroponics has increased dramatically due to the COVID-19 pandemic as people have become more conscious of what they eat and want to know where their food comes from.
“My revenue in the first two to three months of COVID-19 was almost the same as the entire previous year’s,” said Dhoka, founder and CEO of Acqua Farms.
Eat healthy, live healthy
Acqua Farms is one of the several organic food companies that have reported a surge in sales during the pandemic while individuals are showing interest in growing their own produce. This trend of owning farms and eating healthy has boosted the demand of hydroponics farms.
The startup, in addition to selling hydroponics starter kits, also runs a subscription service for people with no knowledge of maintaining a hydroponics set up. Under the subscription service, the startup assigns an agronomist who takes care of the plants and monitors them once a week. Till date, Acqua Farms has helped set up over 500 hydroponics farms.
Rahul Dhoka, founder of Acqua Farms posing with the hydroponics set up on his rooftop. Photo credit: Ashwin Prasath
One of the primary benefits of aquaponics farming is that since plants receive nutrition directly from the treated water, they grow around 15-20% faster than traditional soil-based farming, providing higher yields, said Dhoka. This also allows more harvests of the same crop than is possible in traditional farming, giving hydroponics farmers an edge.
“With good management, you can even get 16 harvests in a year [for leafy greens], whereas in soil-based farming only three or four [harvests] are possible,” he said.
Dhoka said, in addition to higher yields, hydroponics is also a sustainable way of farming as it utilizes 90% less water than traditional farming. The benefits of hydroponics don’t stop here: since it can be set up inside buildings and roof-tops, it reduces carbon footprint and food wastage as the produce doesn’t require any storage or long-distance travel, which makes it ideal for farm-to-fork model.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 190.7 million Indians are undernourished. Amidst this dire situation, 16% of India’s agricultural produce is wasted due to the lack of proper storage and transportation.
Hydroponics startups are largely focusing on growing leafy greens due to their shorter crop cycles, easier management, and lesser space requirements. It also caters to the niche market of exotic green produce like kale, lettuce, and herbs.
Commercial-scale set ups
While Acqua Farms works mostly with individuals and families, a few hydroponics startups focus on setting up commercial-scale farms as well. Unlike non-commercial set ups, these require greenhouses or poly houses to provide complete climate control. This allows the production of crops irrespective of the weather conditions.
This is where Mumbai-based startup Barton Breeze comes into the picture. It sets up farms on the rooftops of apartments as well as inside the buildings. To ensure its clients have a steady income, Barton Breeze buys their produce at a price that gives these urban farmers a 30% profit on each harvest. The startup then sells this produce in the market.
The entire process is hassle-free for farmers as Barton Breeze manages their farm, and takes care of marketing, transportation, and sale of the produce.
Large and commercial-scale hydroponics farms require to be equipped with advanced automation systems to ensure the yield is unaffected by weather conditions.
Barton Breeze enables such farms with automation systems to track their farms remotely. The startup’s app iFarm offers a farmer remote access to the farm, “wherein a farmer can not only just monitor but also control the farm remotely which means sitting at home, you press a button and things will happen on the farm,” Shivendra Singh, CEO, Barton Breeze, told KrASIA.
S Sudhanva, COO of Barton Breeze. Photo courtesy of Barton Breeze.
Through the app, the farmer can control the temperature and humidity, and even control the dosing of nutrients in the water. The app also allows users to get updates on their farm data such as energy consumption.
When anything in the farm fails or goes wrong, the farmer gets an alert via email, message, or a buzzer in the app. This not only makes it easier to manage large farms spread across acres but also reduces the need for human labor.
Additionally, Barton Breeze offers farm management software to maintain day-to-day activities. This software can help farmers identify their approximate date of harvest, and expected yield. Moreover, the company installs humidity sensors, sunlight sensors, climate control systems, and thermal sensors in the farm that send alerts when stocks are running low and highlights issues like pest attacks and any increase in the level of plant allergens.
To reduce human contact amid the pandemic, the company has automated customer onboarding through its app. But, most importantly, it has created an artificial intelligence (AI) system that provides crop management guidance to farmers. “For example, if your plant’s leaves are yellow, [the] AI can find out why they are yellow, what are the remedies, and what are the things you can do to cure it,” said Singh.
Singh claimed Barton Breeze grew at a CAGR of 500% year-on-year in 2019 and saw twice more online visitors this year compared to 2019.
Investor interest in hydroponics
According to Singh, hydroponics produce is very well accepted in urban cities like Mumbai, Delhi, and Bengaluru. Spending is not a problem for customers–it’s the unavailability of options near them that keeps people from accepting hydroponics, he said. The products are sold in supermarkets, and unlike a couple of years ago, they have a distinct label that mentions they have been grown using hydroponics.
Most hydroponics startups are still, however, struggling to match their price with the market price of traditional farm produce due to high operational as well as production costs.
However, Singh said Barton Breeze has managed to significantly bring the cost down. “We have brought down the production cost. So, if something is coming from Bengaluru to Mumbai and costs INR 200 (USD 2.70) per kilogram, we offer it at a price of INR 120 (USD 1.62) per kilogram which is lower than the market price,” he said.
With the prices of hydroponics produce being at par with or lower than traditional farm produce, Singh believes the customer base for the former is expanding which is currently limited to upper middle class families. But the demand still remains limited to metros and tier 1 cities.
Read this: Farm to fork: This millennial urban farmer grows vegetables on carpark rooftops in Singapore
Even though the hydroponics startups are experiencing increased demand, investors remain skeptical of the potential of hydroponics produce in the market. For consumers, as long as the produce is organic and the price is at par with other available options, it doesn’t matter whether it is grown in a hydroponics set up or in any other way.
“Hydroponics is more expensive [than greenhouse and net-house farming], and mostly for the production of raw greens, exotic vegetables, and super-premium berries,” said Mark Kahn, Managing Partner at Omnivore, an agritech focused venture capital firm. Earlier this year, Omnivore participated in agritech startup Clover’s USD 5.5 million Series A round. Clover sells hydroponically grown fresh produce.
“We think there is a market for hydroponics produce in India, but it will remain a niche segment within CEA [Controlled Environment Agriculture],” he added.
According to Kahn, there are two major hurdles for the hydroponics segment–lack of consumer demand and high cost of infrastructure.
“…identifying the target segment and building demand will require significant downstream investment and large marketing budgets. As for the latter [hurdle], hopefully, hydroponics startups in India can find ways to lower setup costs and make units more modular,” he said.
However, he adds that Omnivore remains “excited” about hydroponics and will continue to explore investment opportunities in the sector.
Although Omnivore has a cautiously optimistic outlook of the hydroponics market, both Barton Breeze and Acqua Farms reported increased investor interest since the start of the pandemic. “We were definitely in touch with a couple of investors [before] but after COVID, every week there’s a new investor interested in us,” Singh said.
Lead photo: Rahul Dhoka, founder of Acqua Farms posing with the hydroponics set up on his rooftop. Photo credit: Ashwin Prasath
This Belgian Start-Up Allows Anyone To Become An Urban Farmer
A Belgian start-up is helping people in major cities turn their hand to urban farming. Peas&Love is the brainchild of Jean-Patrick Scheepers, co-founder of Belgium’s biggest cooking school. After the failure of a sustainable farming project near Brussels, he moved into the city itself and started farming on rooftops and in gardens
14 Dec 2020
Senior Writer, Formative Content
A new approach pioneered in Belgium allows anyone to become an urban farmer.
Start-up Peas&Love rents out allotments on rooftops and in unused urban spaces.
The company does all the gardening but members get to harvest the fresh produce.
An app alerts them when crops are ready to pick.
Members share produce and garden space with the community.
A Belgian start-up is helping people in major cities turn their hand to urban farming.
Peas&Love is the brainchild of Jean-Patrick Scheepers, co-founder of Belgium’s biggest cooking school. After the failure of a sustainable farming project near Brussels, he moved into the city itself and started farming on rooftops and in gardens.
“For 20 years, I tried to grow fruit and vegetables in my garden or on my terrace and each year I failed,” he told the audience at the Change Now summit in 2017, the year Peas&Love was launched. “I didn’t have the time and I didn’t have the knowledge.
“My idea was that, if I could have my own personal source of vegetables and fruits that are local, that are seasonal, that are good, that are full of quality, that would exactly fit the description of a potager in French, or a kitchen garden in English, and that would be great.”
Garden of plenty: Crops ready to pick at a Peas&Love urban farm near Paris. Image: Peas&Love
Scheepers started Peas&Love after using vertical growing techniques to overcome his earlier gardening setbacks. It now has three urban farms in Brussels and five in Paris where anyone can rent an allotment for about $40 a month.
All of the farming work is taken care of by the company, and members are alerted by an app when it’s time to harvest the produce. Each 4m square vegetable garden is divided into two halves: one for the sole use of the subscriber and the other to grow crops that will be shared by all members.
Made for sharing: half the allotment is private, the other half is shared.
Community based on sharing
“The motivation of the people who are part of the concept is mainly to renew contact with nature but they don't have the time or the knowledge,” Scheepers says. “You come every week to harvest your own allotment but you don't have to do the work to get it.”
It’s all about creating a community of people who help each other and share values as well as food, he says. It’s a “new approach in urban farming” which has 200 active urban farmers at its first location in Woluwe-Saint-Lambert, in Brussels.
Rooftop agriculture: Peas&Love’s first Brussels urban farm. Image: Peas&Love
The company’s “Peas for all” programme makes 5% of the space on its farms available to educational projects and local associations to help more people reconnect to nature.
Scheepers recently set up the European Urban and Vertical Agriculture Federation to promote the concept and provide a forum to represent urban farmers at a European level, and he has launched an Urban Farm Lab in Istanbul.
Lead photo: Urban farms are becoming common all cross the world. REUTERS/Philippe Wojazer
INDIA: This Goa Couple Grow Their Veggies & Fish Without Using Soil or Chemicals!
On 185 square meters of greenhouse and rooftop garden, in their house at Dona Paula, Panaji, they produce 120 kilograms of fish a year and grow 3,000 plants consisting of vegetables and fruits
AUTHOR: GUEST CONTRIBUTOR
December 1, 2020
Goa-based Peter Singh is 74-years-old, and his wife Neeno Kaur is 65. They are a power couple, setting an example of how to be self-reliant with food, and at the same time, converting biodegradable waste into something useful.
On 185 square meters of greenhouse and rooftop garden, in their house at Dona Paula, Panaji, they produce 120 kilograms of fish a year and grow 3,000 plants consisting of vegetables and fruits.
For the last four years, they have been practicing aquaponics at home, a combination of aquaculture (raising fish in tanks), with hydroponics (cultivating plants in water).
However, they do with a twist. “We do aquaponics with permaculture,” says Peter Singh, explaining his system to a bunch of enthusiasts earlier this year.
(L) Peter Singh in his air-conditioned greenhouse that has plants which require a cooler climate. (R) Ornamental fish are grown in a fish tank
He adds, “We compost our kitchen and garden waste and use it in our aquaponics. Plants are potted in a layer of gravel, 1/3rd of coco peat, and 2/3rd of compost. So, our plants get compost plus fish waste, which results in a higher yield. I don’t use any chemicals for this, and I am taking care of my waste and my food.”
One may wonder why they are doing it. For them, the answer is simple–they want to eat organic and be sure of how their food is grown.
Moreover, both have a background in agriculture.
“I was studying Mathematics at the Delhi University; the idea was to stay in Delhi, but then we thought of moving back to our farms in Jalandhar, Punjab. We worked on different forms of agriculture, in which different fruit and timber trees were planted, we did intercropping in the orchard of oilseeds and pulses, produced seeds for the national seed corporation, had a dairy farm, did beekeeping and even exported the honey,” explains Singh.
They moved to Goa seven years ago and found it difficult to source organic vegetables. The majority of the vegetables in the state come from the neighboring city of Belgaum in Karnataka. So, they decided to grow their food in this unique way.
“As we have limited space in Goa, we experimented and discovered aquaponics. We downloaded papers from universities, and read about it. And came up with this model,” says Singh.
They opine that they are still experimenting and bring in changes accordingly. As they have the technical know-how and a background in farming, they are quite confident of their system.
How this system works
Peter Singh explaining the model
This system of aquaponics which involves the fish tank, NFT pipes, (Nutrient Film Technique) which are used to grow vegetables, water-pumps, and artificial grow lights, may look complicated. But Singh makes it easier to understand. He has also made a model of this system that can fit in any balcony or even in any corner of the living room.
“This unit of 2 ft by 6 ft and 6 ft high, with artificial lighting of 200 watts uses 250 litres of water and can grow 180 plants. One can grow lettuce, kale, bok choy or any other vegetable. One fish tank can sustain five kilograms of fish mass so that you can have ten fresh-water fish of ½ kg each,” elaborates Singh.
The system works mainly on electricity, water, and fish waste.
Singh explains, “In a fish tank, the fish waste is mainly ammonia. In this system, aerators circulate the water and create a current. The fish waste settles at the bottom, and the pipes take this waste into the bio-filter, which breaks the ammonia into nitrates and nitrites for plants to use.”
The water gets further filtered and goes back to the fish. It also has aeroponic towers which work as the nursery of plants. It is also a space-saving system as it is vertical.
“Because of heavy nitrogen, green vegetables grow very well. We have lettuce, bok choy, and celery. Also, this system uses 10 percent of the water used in traditional soil-based farming, as water is constantly getting re-used. The only loss is in the evaporation. There’s no need of watering, no weeding, one only has to feed the fish twice a day,” says Neeno Kaur.
The entire system has three fish tanks on the ground floor. One is of 3,000 litres of water; second is 1,500 litres, and the third is 4,000 litres. They raise three types of fresh-water fish—rohu, catla, and chonak or sea bass. If one does not eat fish, Singh suggests using ornamental fish.
The rooftop garden
On their roof, they have a greenhouse of 12ft by 24ft, which has 2,000 plants. The greenhouse in the back garden is 6 ft by 16 ft and has 500 plants. A roof-top garden has 25 fruit trees, 300 onions, and an assortment of chillies, lemons, tomatoes, aloe, chives, creepers like ivy gourd, bottle gourd, cucumber, bitter gourd, ladyfinger, brinjal.
Along a boundary on the ground floor, they have mango, banana, and papaya. They also have an air-conditioned tunnel of 8 ft by 12 ft in their greenhouse, with 1,000 plants of lettuce, kale, bok choy, basil, parsley, cabbage, and broccoli. For the whole system, they spend around Rs 14,000 per month.
The aquaponics system doesn’t require cleaning of water as the water gets filtered in the process. And all the fittings are made by Singh himself. He has also part-time workers for about six hours a day. He adds, “We spend Rs 6,000 on electricity, Rs 4,000 on feeding the fish, and another Rs 4,000 on labour.”
They won the first prize for Most Innovative Stall at the Aqua Goa Mega Fish Festival 2020 held in February.
Agriculture expert from Goa, Miguel Braganza opines, “Peter Singh’s aquaponics is good for those who can afford it as the basic cost of the unit is Rs 30,000. Also, it is ideal for those who eat salads and continental cuisine.”
Regarding the cost, Singh states that it is high “because we pump water from the ground floor to the greenhouse on the roof. If it is on the same floor, this is much lower.”
They also have plans for solar panels and making fish feed at home to be self-sustainable. He adds, “If we automate the system, and put in solar power, then costing will go down substantially. We are also working on growing feed for fish. So our whole system becomes self-dependent.”
However, they are also trying to monetise from this system, by conducting two-day training programmes priced at Rs 5,000. Singh adds, “We also custom design and help set up aquaponics systems, of any scale, from small home systems to commercial systems, charging 10 per cent of the capital cost for the design.”
(L) Bok Choi grown in aeroponic towers. (R) Gourds grown on the roof.
Recently, they started selling these vegetables from their home. A basket contains two bunches of lettuce, a baby bok choy, three sticks of celery, sprigs of parsley, basil, and a small bunch of mint, priced at Rs 100. They will also add kale and Swiss chard to it. From next month, their air-conditioned model will produce about 300 packs of greens a month at Rs 120 each.
Singh and Kaur are hopeful that more people will learn from this system and eat healthy food as it is the need of the hour.
He concludes, “This method is independent of the weather, rain, hail, and sun; it is protected from predators and is the future of agriculture. It doesn’t need land, soil, or chemicals, and produces vegetables and fish wherever you are.”
Also Read: Experts Answer: Can a Hydroponics Farm Be a Good Business? Here’s How!
This shows that aquaponics could be next best thing in agriculture due to urbanisation and loss of agricultural land. It is estimated that the market of aquaponics will grow with the awareness to eat healthy food.
According to a report by Assocham and Ernst & Young, organic products market in India have been growing at a CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) of 25 percent, expected to touch ₹10,000-₹12,000 crore by 2020 from the current market size of ₹ 4,000 crore. As aquaponics is a part of the organic market, the future looks bright for this new-age form of agriculture.
During the current nationwide lockdown to tackle COVID-19, Peter Singh is selling their produce once a week from their home by maintaining social distancing. He says, “We slowed down the sale of our produce in the first week, and worked out a weekly production schedule, which includes a weekly harvest and transplantation. This means we will be able to supply every week all year round.”
Lead photo: Peter Singh is 74, and his wife Neeno Kaur is 65. Together, they grow 3,000 plants on just 185 sqm by a method that’s independent of the rain, hail, and sun!
(Written by Arti Das and Edited by Shruti Singhal)
MONACO: Growing Vegetables On The Rooftops of World’s Most Densely Populated Country
The pandemic has put environmental issues at the forefront, as Jessica Sbaraglia is well aware: “I am convinced that urban agriculture has a great future ahead. More and more businesses are getting involved because the demand is there”
13 November 2020
With over 19,000 people per square kilometer, Monaco has one of the highest population densities in the world, making a less than ideal place for farming. Yet Terre de Monaco has defied the odds. The urban agriculture company currently exploits 1,600 m² of arable land in a country with an area just over two square kilometers.
As Jessica Sbaraglia knows well, to grow fruits and vegetables in Monaco, you need to start from the top. And that is exactly what Terre de Monaco does. Specialized in urban agriculture, the company installs vegetable farms on the roofs of Monaco’s buildings.
Terre de Monaco was founded in 2016. “Six years ago, I shut down my first company and underwent a bit of an existential crisis. What is my purpose in life, what sort of values should I embody?” says Jessica Sbaraglia, who was born in Switzerland.
That taste, I’ve never been able to find anywhere else
Bringing permaculture to Monaco
It was then that she remembered her parents’ vegetable garden, its fruit and vegetables, and their exceptional taste. “That taste, I’ve never been able to find anywhere else,” she says. So, she starts a vegetable garden on her balcony, to “therapeutic, relaxing and rewarding” effects
But soon enough, Jessica Sbaraglia runs out of space. It’s when she starts to “colonize” her neighbors’ balconies that she comes up with the idea for Terres de Monaco. Her new company will farm Monaco’s roofs. “They didn’t know what to do with me. They thought my ambitions a bit ridiculous. They thought it wouldn’t work, that there was no room,” she says.
Zero carbon, zero waste
Today, Terre de Monaco grows fruits and vegetables on five different buildings. There’s a 400 m² vegetable garden on The Monte-Carlo Bay, whose produce goes straight into the kitchens of starred chef Marcel Ravin. A second vegetable garden is on the Tour Odéon, which is now home to 450m² of farmland, as well as 60 hens*, ten beehives, and about thirty fruit trees. Terres de Monaco has also set up vegetable gardens on the 14th floor of the Ruscino residence and on the roof of the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation, as well as a therapeutic garden at the Princess Grace Hospital.
Seasonal fruits and vegetables, as well as the eggs and honey, are sold to people who either live in the building or who work on the farm. “The products we harvest at the Odeon Tower, for example, are sold to the people who live there,” explains Jessica Sbaraglia. Terre de Monaco has now expanded its services to offer individual consultations on how to create and maintain a vegetable garden. They also run numerous educational workshops in schools.
I am convinced that urban agriculture has a great future ahead
Bringing the concept abroad
Terre de Monaco has also been busy exporting their concept abroad: Terre de Monaco is now joined by Terre de Nice.
“We’re working on a fully-fledged farm, that will be built near the Nice stadium. The farm will be spread over seven roofs, which will be connected to each other by footbridges. We’re also introducing a bar and restaurant, which will serve our products”, explains Jessica Sbaraglia. A similar project is planned in Belgium – Terre de Monaco now becomes Terre de Tubize – where 8,000 m² worth of roofs will be turned into vegetable gardens. Other projects in the towns around Monaco, such as Cap d’Ail, as well as in Switzerland are also in the books.
The pandemic has put environmental issues at the forefront, as Jessica Sbaraglia is well aware: “I am convinced that urban agriculture has a great future ahead. More and more businesses are getting involved because the demand is there”.
There’s something almost poetic about Jessica Sbaraglia’s work: In order to go back to earthly roots, Terre de Monaco looked up towards the sky.
* The hens also help recycle a yearly six tonnes of vegetable waste from the Terre de Monaco vegetable gardens and other Monaco establishments, such as the Café de Paris.
© Terre de Monaco
Farming Brought To New Heights
Although still in its early stages of development, urban rooftop farms have already started to attract attention
Forward-Thinking Entrepreneurs, Neighbors, And
Farmers Have Discovered A New Use For Rooftops: Farming.
By Alexandra Neag
November 5, 2020
Who said rooftops should only be used for cocktail bars and beauty spots overlooking the city?
Although still in its early stages of development, urban rooftop farms have already started to attract attention.
Statistics predict that by 2050 the population of the world will reach 9.7 billion. By the same year, the UN predicts that 68% of the world’s population will most likely live in urban areas, up from 55% in 2018. This substantial growth would imply the need for more agricultural land and more fresh products. Yet, if we consider the climate change challenge and the transport pollution that aggravates it, we are in dire need of more local farms.
There is considerable potential for space usage. There are 4.85 trillion sq ft (450 billion m2) of roof space in the US alone, but only 1% is being used. This way, local businesses could supply their greengrocers locally without the added carbon footprint of transportation.
Leveraging rooftop space in metropolitan areas is a great advantage. This would make a significant positive environmental impact. Transport of goods accounts for 12% of all agricultural emissions worldwide.
Reducing transportation costs and pollution is not the only way in which rooftop farms would be more eco-friendly. They would also improve air quality, absorb heat, and cool down the building. They also would add more of a green landscape to the concrete jungle, which is proven to have psychological benefits for people.
Healthy food would be readily available to local businesses, which would reduce the cost of transport and, therefore, the prepared food cost to customers. The urban farmers might even use fewer pesticides as the crop would not be at risk of being eaten by insects and rodents, producing more nutritious and tasty ingredients for people’s diets.
As the advantages of city farming have become more prominent, many places worldwide have started to adopt this initiative. Among them are the City Farm in Tokyo, Dakakker in Rotterdam, and Brooklyn Grange in New York City. In each of these urban farms, people have added new elements and ideas to match the local demand. In Tokyo’s city farm, they adjusted the agricultural conditions to grow soybeans, eggplants, and rice. These are traditionally the most used ingredients in the region. In New York, on the other hand, the extra space has enabled further expansion. They now also raise chicken for eggs as well as bees for honey production.
In Paris’ 15 arrondissement, we can find the biggest rooftop farm. They went a step further and created a soil-free system where fruit and vegetables are grown on vertical columns using coconut fibre. Their model seems to be the most fructiferous, sustainable, and clean so far. As a result, they started offering a consultancy worldwide to help other city farmers start such productive and eco-friendly agriculture systems.
All in all, it is exciting to see such innovative solutions emerging to combat global issues and improve urban efficiency. Although there is still a lot of progress left to be made, ingenious entrepreneurs have shown that farming can be brought to new heights.
RELATED TOPICS : FEATURED, FOOD WASTE, MOBILITY, ORGANIC, PARIS, ROOFTOP FARMING, ROOFTOP GARDENS
Writer and Marketer. After launching new models in the automotive industry, I’ve shifted my focus to writing about sustainable mobility and ground-breaking ideas for a better future.
Four Innovative Design Responses To The Climate Emergency
Design Emergency began as an Instagram Live series during the Covid-19 pandemic and is now becoming a wake-up call to the world, and compelling evidence of the power of design to effect radical and far-reaching change
October 4, 2020
Design Emergency began as an Instagram Live series during the Covid-19 pandemic and is now becoming a wake-up call to the world, and compelling evidence of the power of design to effect radical and far-reaching change. Co-founders Paola Antonelli and Alice Rawsthorn took over the October 2020 issue of Wallpaper* – available to download free here – to present stories of design’s new purpose and promise.
The redesigned System 001/B, The Ocean CleanupTragic, and destructive though the Covid-19 crisis has been, it is one of a tsunami of threats to assail us at the same time. A concise list of current calamities includes the global refugee crisis; spiraling inequality, injustice and poverty; terrifying terrorist attacks and killing sprees; seemingly unstoppable conflicts; and, of course, the climate emergency. Since the start of the pandemic, global outrage against systemic racism following the tragic killing of George Floyd, and the destruction of much of Beirut have joined the list. Design is not a panacea to any of these problems, but it is a powerful tool to help us to tackle them, which is why Paola Antonelli and Alice Rawsthorn are focusing Design Emergency on the most promising global efforts to redesign and reconstruct our lives for the future.
Thankfully, there are plenty of resourceful, ingenious, inspiring, and empathetic design projects to give grounds for optimism. Take the climate emergency, where design innovations on all fronts: from the generation of clean, renewable energy, to new forms of sustainable food growing, and rewilding programs are already making a significant difference to the quality of the environment.
Here Are Four of Paola Antonelli And Alice Rawsthorn’s
Favorite Design Responses To The Ecological Crisis
Urban farm
Photography: © Nature Urbaine
Looming beside the Porte de Versailles subway station in south-west Paris is the colossal exhibition venue Paris Expo Porte de Versailles. By the time it hosts the handball and table tennis events in the Paris 2024 Olympics, Paris Expo will also be the home of Agripolis, the largest urban farm in Europe. Agripolis already operates other urban farms in Paris and occupies 4,000 sq m of Paris Expo’s roof. Over the next two years, it plans to expand across another 10,000 sq m, to produce up to 1,000kg of fresh fruit and vegetables each day using organic methods and a team of 20 farmers. The produce will be sold to shops, cafés, and hotels in the local area, while local residents will also be able to rent wooden crates on the roof to grow their own fruit and vegetables. Once it is completed, Agripolis’ gigantic rooftop farm at Paris Expo should place the Ville de Paris’ program of encouraging urban agriculture at the forefront of global developments in greening our cities.
The Ocean Cleanup
The redesigned System 001/B, The Ocean Cleanup
Scientists claimed that it wouldn’t work. Environmentalists warned that it risked damaging marine life. Few design projects of recent years have been as fiercely criticized as the Ocean Cleanup, the Dutch social enterprise founded in 2013 by Boyan Slat, who quit his degree in design engineering to try to tackle one of the biggest pollution problems of our time by clearing the plastic trash that is poisoning our oceans. Despite its critics and a series of setbacks, notably, when the original rig had to be towed back to San Francisco to resolve technical problems, the Ocean Cleanup has persevered. The redesigned System 001/B (pictured top) successfully completed its trials in the Pacific last year, and System 002 is scheduled for launch next year. The Ocean Cleanup has also developed a parallel project, The Interceptor, a solar-powered catamaran with a trash-collecting system designed specifically for rivers, and which can extract 50,000kg of plastic per day.
The Great Green Wall
Photography: The Great Green Wall of the Sahara and Sahel © UNCCD
Few regions are hotter, drier, and poorer than the Sahel, on the southern edge of the Sahara Desert. The brutal climate has wrought devastating damage in recent decades by causing droughts, famine, conflicts, poverty, and mass migration. The Great Green Wall is an epically ambitious project launched in 2007 by the 21 countries in the Sahel to restore the land by planting an 8,000km strip of trees and plants from the Atlantic coast of Senegal to Djibouti on the Red Sea. The practical work on the Great Green Wall, which is run as an African-led collective supported by the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification, is executed by each of the 21 countries. So far, more than 1,200km of greenery has been planted, although the focus of the project is less on the progress of the wall itself than on its impact in persuading each country in the Sahel region to transform what has become arid desert back into fertile farmland.
Zero-waste village
Photography: © Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP via Getty Images
This was to have been the year when the people of Kamikatsu, a village on the Japanese island of Shikoku, would achieve their goal of becoming a zero-waste community. The 1,500 villagers may struggle to produce no waste at all in 2020 but will come impressively close to doing so in a 20-year experiment that demonstrates the contribution a resourceful group of individuals can make to curb the climate emergency. The initiative began in 2000 when the local government ordered the closure of Kamikatsu’s incinerator. Rather than ship their waste elsewhere, the villagers took a collective decision to reduce and, eventually, eliminate it. They opened a Zero Waste Academy, where waste is sorted into 45 categories for reuse or recycling. Anything sellable is dispatched to a recycling store; fabric is upcycled at the craft center. The villagers have now eliminated over 80 percent of their waste, but are still struggling to recycle leather shoes, nappies, and a few other tricky exceptions.
Raising The Roof: Cultivating Singapore’s Urban Farming Scene
Urban farming has become quite a bit more than a fad or innovation showcase for our garden city. “The practice of urban farming has picked up in scale and sophistication globally in recent years,” said an Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) spokesperson.“
by STACEY RODRIGUES
NOKA by Open Farm Community at Funan Mall is one of the latest urban farms to take root in Singapore. (Photo: NOKA)
Call it a social movement or Singapore’s solution to sustainable self-sufficiency, but urban farming in our garden city is growing to new heights.
Whether you’re wandering through a residential area or exploring the recently re-opened Funan mall, you may have noticed new urban farms sprouting up – flourishing with fruit, herbs, and vegetables, occasionally tilapia inconspicuously swimming in an aquaponics system.
Urban farming has become quite a bit more than a fad or innovation showcase for our garden city. “The practice of urban farming has picked up in scale and sophistication globally in recent years,” said an Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) spokesperson.“
In Singapore, we encourage innovative urban farming approaches such as rooftop farming, which optimizes land, introduces more greenery into the built environment, and potentially enhances our food supply resilience.”Several companies have taken on the gargantuan task of cultivating the urban farming scene here. Rooftop farming pioneer, Comcrop (short for Community Crop), has been hard at work with its latest commercial farm, an 11-month-old greenhouse in Woodlands Loop. Edible Garden City (EGC) has more than 200 farms across the island and works closely with restaurants to ensure sustainable supply and demand.
Indoor micro-greens being grown at NOKA. (Photo: NOKA)
Citiponics has made a name for itself building water-efficient aqua organic “growing towers” that can be used to build anything from butterhead lettuce to sweet basil. In April this year, they opened the first commercial farm on the rooftop of a multi-story car park. The farm produces vegetables sold at the Ang Mo Kio Hub outlet of NTUC FairPrice under the brand, LeafWell.
Sky Greens is arguably the most impressive urban farming venture. It is the world’s first low carbon, hydraulic driven vertical farm, and has been recognized globally for its sustainability innovation.
There are several benefits to having our farms so close to home. Through community gardens or access to commercial-scale farm produce, the public has an opportunity to understand how food is grown.
As urban farmers take great care to ensure produce is pesticide-free, while incorporating sustainable zero-waste and energy-saving practices, there is also comfort in knowing where the food comes from and its impact on the environment.
Mushrooms fruiting in a chamber at NOKA. (Photo: NOKA)
“Having food production within the city or heartland [also] brings food closer to the consumers as it cuts transport costs and carbon emissions, and may improve environmental sustainability,” said a spokesperson from the Singapore Food Agency (SFA), the new statutory board created in April this year to develop the food supply and industry.
However, there are also broader concerns about the impact of climate change and food security in Singapore. It is why much is being done by the likes of the SFA to achieve “30 by 30” – “which is to develop the capability and capacity of our agri-food industry to produce 30 percent of Singapore’s nutritional needs by 2030,” said the SFA. “Local production will help mitigate our reliance on imports and serve as a buffer during supply disruptions to import sources.”
Singapore still has a long way to go as the urban farming scene is still a very young one. But there are opportunities for growth given the continued development here. In the URA’s latest phase of the Landscaping for Urban Spaces and High-Rises (LUSH) 3.0 scheme, “developers of commercial and hotel buildings located in high footfall areas can propose rooftop farms to meet landscape replacement requirements.”
Naturally, developers are taking advantage of this. One of the newest kids on the block is the urban rooftop farm run by EGC for a new Japanese restaurant, Noka by Open Farm Community at Funan. Noka is putting its money on offering Japanese cuisine that infuses local ingredients, from the butterfly blue pea to the ulam raja flower – ingredients are grown and tended to by the farmers at EGC’s 5,000 sq. ft. urban garden just outside Noka’s windows.
WOHA Architects’ edible sky garden, at the firm's office in 29 Hongkong Street, is a testbed for urban farming techniques. (Photo: WOHA Architects)
“The urban farming space is still in the emerging stages of development,” said Bjorn Low, co-founder of EGC. “We are literally scratching the surface of what’s possible. The areas of growth are in the application of urban food production in urban design and city planning, the use of urban farms for deeper community engagement, and the role urban farms plays in creating social and environmental impact in the city.”
While many farmers have found ways to convert existing rooftop spaces into farms or gardens, Jonathan Choe, an associate at WOHA Architects, says that one of the greatest opportunities to advance urban farming in Singapore is to build an entirely integrated system that not only incorporates growing spaces but also how these farms can interact with the entire building infrastructure – from building cooling measures to water recycling and energy management. The firm, which has their own testbed rooftop garden, is currently working on the upcoming Punggol Digital District development.
Dwarf bok choy being grown at WOHA Architects’ edible sky garden. (Photo: WOHA Architects)
But the greatest challenge for urban farmers is truly economies of scale. “Agriculture on its own is already a challenging industry due to industrialization of farming and our food system,” said Low. “Scale is a limiting factor in the city, and urban farming business models need to be able to adapt to both the challenges of a globalized food system and the availability of cheap food, whilst operating in areas of high cost and overheads.”
It begins with cultivating an awareness of and demand for local produce amongst both consumers and businesses alike. For Cynthia Chua, co-founder of Spa Esprit Group – the people behind Noka – taking an interest in agriculture is more than necessary, as it will have long-term benefits in preparing for the future generation of Singaporeans.
A harvest of white radishes from WOHA Architects' edible sky garden. (Photo: WOHA Architects)
Restaurants like Noka, which choose to highlight local produce are an easy way in for consumers to learn about the benefits of supporting local farming businesses. As a business owner, Chua has also noticed that “traveling chefs from different countries are gaining interest in playing with our tropical produce.” In Chua’s opinion, it is the “right timing” to push innovation and continue to turn this “scene” into a fully sustainable industry.
“As a city-state, the general population is disconnected from farming and the way food is being farmed,” said Low. “Urban farms should become touchpoints for us to learn about sustainable agriculture techniques, and encourage consumers in Singapore to eat more responsibly, locally, and ethically.”
Tenders Awarded To Turn 9 HDB Carpark Rooftops Into Urban Farming Sites
With these farming systems, the sites have the potential to collectively produce around 1,600 tonnes of vegetables annually"
September 30, 2020
SINGAPORE - Parked cars will soon make way for growing vegetables as tenders were awarded for urban farming at nine carpark rooftops by the Singapore Food Agency (SFA) on Wednesday (Sept 30).
The sites, which are rooftops of Housing Board multi-storey carparks, comprise five single sites and two clusters of two sites each. They were awarded to six tenderers.
Each site has a term of up to three years.
The highest tender of $90,000 for annual rent was awarded to IT Meng Landscape and Construction for a cluster site in Jurong West, with one site spanning a total area of 3,311 sq m - three-fifths of a football field - and the other at 2,974 sq m.
Other carpark locations include Choa Chu Kang, Tampines, Hougang, Ang Mo Kio, Toa Payoh, and Sembawang.
SFA chief executive Lim Kok Thai said: "The successful tenderers' proposals included hydroponic and vertical farming systems with a variety of innovative features such as IoT (Internet of Things), blockchain technology and automated climate control."
With these farming systems, the sites have the potential to collectively produce around 1,600 tonnes of vegetables annually."
He added: "We look forward to seeing these HDB multi-storey carpark rooftops transform into productive vegetable farms that will contribute to Singapore's '30 by 30' goal, and we will render assistance and guidance to farms where needed."
The 30 by 30 goal refers to Singapore's aim to produce 30 percent of the country's nutritional needs locally by 2030.
Ms. Phoebe Xie, 30, director and co-founder of local urban technology company AbyFarm, was one of the six who successfully tendered for the carpark rooftop spaces. With the 3,171 sq m site at Ang Mo Kio, the company hopes to begin construction of the farm in the next few months, and to have its launch date within the first half of next year. Using a combination of hydroponics and aeroponics vertical farming methods, the farming process is expected to use 90 percent less water, and it is said to be 10 times more productive compared to traditional methods. “The farm will be entirely automated, with real-time technology used to control the environment within the green house, and to consistently monitor the crops and early identify the possibility of bad crops, which will ensure the quality of our crops,” she said. With an expected yield of 200 tonnes of fruits and vegetables each year, the company is looking to harvest local favourites, such as kang kong and kailan as well as other types of produce such as mushrooms, figs, and Japanese melon. Co-founder of SG Veg Farms Eyleen Goh, 46, who secured a cluster site at Sembawang, said the company is expecting around 80 to 100 tonnes of vegetables per site each year. The company will be selling most of its produce to nearby supermarkets, though it hopes to host weekend markets for residents to buy its vegetables.
Minister for Sustainability and the Environment Grace Fu said in a Facebook post on Wednesday that “the challenges of Covid-19 and climate change, together with other trade and environmental pressures, pose a threat to Singapore’s supply of critical resources such as food”.
As land is scarce in Singapore, the SFA has been “unlocking alternative spaces to grow food, such as vacant buildings, like the former Henderson Secondary School and carpark rooftops”.“
Over the next few years, we will be master-planning the larger Lim Chu Kang area and will be engaging the stakeholders and the public in the process,” she said, adding that there are longer-term plans in place to “expand agriculture in the Lim Chu Kang area and aquaculture off (Singapore’s) southern coast”.
Mr. Melvin Chow, senior director of SFA's food supply resilience division, said in May that the launch of the tender for the nine sites came as a result of growing interest from both the industry and the public towards urban farming in community spaces.
Last year, a pilot urban farm - spanning 1,900 sq m - was launched at a multi-storey HDB carpark in Ang Mo Kio. Known as the Citiponics Farm, it aims to grow up to four tonnes of vegetables a month.
The tender for the nine sites, which was launched on May 12, had closed on June 16, and the sites were awarded using the price-quality tender method, where both the bid price and the quality attributes, such as production output, design, and site layout, as well as business and marketing plans, were factored into the tender evaluation.
The SFA said it will be working with HDB to tender out more multi-storey carpark rooftop sites for urban farming in the fourth quarter of the year, as the move is also in line with HDB's Green Towns Programme to cool HDB towns through the use of greenery, such as on carpark rooftops.
More details of these plans for tender will be released at a later date.
Lead Photo: Local agri-tech firm Citiponics' vertical farming plot at the multi-storey carpark rooftop at Block 700 Ang Mo Kio Avenue 6.ST PHOTO: JASON QUAH
Green Shoots: Rooftop Farming Takes Off In Singapore
Urban farms are springing up in crowded cities around the world, but the drive to create rooftop plots has taken on particular urgency in densely populated Singapore, which imports 90 percent of its food
30 September 2020
This photograph taken on September 7, 2020 shows a staff member tending to a rooftop garden used for urban farming to grow edible plants above the Raffles City mall in Singapore. - On the rooftop of a Singapore shopping mall, a sprawling patch of eggplants, rosemary, bananas and papayas stand in colourful contrast to the grey skyscrapers of the city-state's business district. (Photo by Roslan RAHMAN / AFP) /
On the rooftop of a Singapore shopping mall, a sprawling patch of eggplants, rosemary, bananas and papayas stand in colourful contrast to the grey skyscrapers of the city-state's business district.
The 10,000 square-foot (930 square-metre) site is among a growing number of rooftop farms in the space-starved country, part of a drive to produce more food locally and reduce a heavy reliance on imports.
The government has championed the push amid concerns about climate change reducing crop yields worldwide and trade tensions affecting imports, but it has been given extra impetus by the coronavirus pandemic.
This photograph taken on September 7, 2020 shows a casper eggplant growing in a rooftop garden above the Raffles City mall in Singapore. - On the rooftop of a Singapore shopping mall, a sprawling patch of eggplants, rosemary, bananas, and papayas stand in colourful contrast to the grey skyscrapers of the city-state's business district. (Photo by Roslan RAHMAN / AFP) /
"The common misconception is that there's no space for farming in Singapore because we are land-scarce," said Samuell Ang, chief executive of Edible Garden City, which runs the site on the mall.
"We want to change the narrative."
Urban farms are springing up in crowded cities around the world, but the drive to create rooftop plots has taken on particular urgency in densely populated Singapore, which imports 90 percent of its food.
Farming was once common in the country but dwindled dramatically as Singapore developed into a financial hub packed with high-rises. Now less than one percent of its land is devoted to agriculture.
In the past few years, however, the city of 5.7 million has seen food plots sprouting on more and more rooftops.
Authorities last year said they were aiming to source 30 percent of the population's "nutritional needs" locally by 2030, and want to increase production of fish and eggs as well as vegetables.
With coronavirus increasing fears about supply-chain disruption, the government has accelerated its efforts, announcing the rooftops of nine car parks would become urban farms and releasing Sg$30 million ($22 million) to boost local food production.
'Buffer the shock'
Edible Garden City, one of several firms operating urban farms in Singapore, runs about 80 rooftop sites.
But they have also created many food gardens in more unusual places, including a former prison, in shipping containers, and on high-rise apartment balconies.
Their farms use only natural pesticides such as neem oil to repel pests.
"What we really want to do is to spread the message of growing our own food. We want to advocate that you really do not need large parcels of land," said the firm's chief executive Ang.
The company grows more than 50 varieties of food, ranging from eggplants, red okra, and wild passion fruit to leafy vegetables, edible flowers, and so-called "microgreens" -- vegetables harvested when they are still young.
It is also using high-tech methods.
At one site inside a shipping container, they are testing a specialised system of hydroponics -- growing plants without soil -- developed by a Japanese company.
This photograph taken on September 7, 2020, shows a staff member tending to a rooftop garden used for urban farming to grow edible plants above the Raffles City mall in Singapore. - On the rooftop of a Singapore shopping mall, a sprawling patch of eggplants, rosemary, bananas, and papayas stand in colourful contrast to the grey skyscrapers of the city-state's business district.
(Photo by Roslan RAHMAN / AFP) /
The system features sensors that monitor conditions, and strict hygiene rules mean crops can be grown without pesticides.
Edible Garden City's produce is harvested, packed, and delivered on the same day -- mainly to restaurants -- but online customers can also subscribe to a regular delivery box of fruit and vegetables.
Sales to restaurants slowed when Singapore shut down businesses to contain the coronavirus from April to June, but Ang said household clients grew three-fold in the same period.
William Chen, director of the food, science, and technology programme at Singapore's Nanyang Technological University, said developing city farms was a "way to buffer the shock of supply chain breakdowns".
"Skyscraper farming in Singapore is certainly a bright option," he added.
Still, there are limits to what a country half the size of Los Angeles can achieve, and Chen stressed the city would still have to rely on imports of other staples, such as meat.
"We don't have animal farms, and for rice we don't have the luxury of land," he said. "Growing rice and wheat in indoor conditions will be very costly, if not impossible."
In addition, a lack of skilled farmers in modern-day Singapore presents a challenge.
"While we are able to recruit people with an interest in farming, they do not have the relevant experience," Ang said.
Singapore, Singapore | AFP