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All-in-One, Plug-and-Play Indoor Hydroponic Greenhouse ‘GroBox’ Launches on Kickstarter
All-in-One, Plug-and-Play Indoor Hydroponic Greenhouse ‘GroBox’ Launches on Kickstarter
Created to make it easy for anyone to grow their own food in the convenience of their own home, self-watering GroBox grows plants faster with two-thirds less water
Offering an extremely efficient and sustainable way to grow plants through hydroponics, GroBox controls the watering schedules and air flow to grow plants faster than other methods while using two-thirds less water than traditional systems.
SAN FRANCISCO (PRWEB) JANUARY 09, 2018
GroBox, an all-in-one, plug-and-play indoor hydroponic greenhouse that offers anyone the ability to grow their own plants conveniently in their own home, is now available for the first time on Kickstarter.
Offering an extremely efficient and sustainable way to grow plants through hydroponics, GroBox controls the watering schedules and air flow to grow plants faster than other methods while using two-thirds less water than traditional systems.
By using hydroponics technology that makes GroBox self-watering, sets watering cycles and manipulates the LED grow lights, users only have to change the water in GroBox a few times a month – skipping the guesswork for how often they should be watering their plants.
GroBox has also formulated a fertilizer solution so plants get the exact nutrients they need, providing clay pellets that replace messy soil and allow for even water distribution. The LED grow lights in GroBox also provide the lighting the plants need no matter the season or outside weather, and are also customizable for the specific growth phase for specific plants.
GroBox is easy to set up, as well. Users only need to:
Add filtered water to fill line, then add in fertilizer
Add clay pebble growing medium
Add plant mediums and insert seeds (or clones)
Set growing settings based on plants they are growing
From there, GroBox owners only sit back and watch their plants grow, changing the water inside only a few times a month. Plants can either be grown from seeds or clones.
GroBox was designed to make it easy for everyone, everywhere to grow their own plants in the convenience of their home, on their own time, and during any season. By growing their own plants, users also know exactly where they come from – assuring users that they are eliminating pesticides and other harmful chemicals from entering their bodies.
For more information about GroBox or to purchase the indoor hydroponic greenhouse at an early-bird discount during crowdfunding, visit the GroBox Campaign Page on Kickstarter.
About GroBox
GroBox is a part of the sustainable gardening movement. We started with FogBox and have been innovating with incorporating sustainable agriculture methods into technology for years.
We want to help change how people think about their food -- where it comes from and what’s going into it. No toxins or pesticides, ever. Just plants.
Our mission is to become a part of the sustainable gardening movement and make it easier for people to grow their own plants, on their own time, anywhere, during any season.
Farming Without Soil
Farming Without Soil
Meena R. Prashant
January 11, 2018
Vijay Yelmalle teaches agriculturists – both urban and rural – how to apply technology to practice eco-friendly farming and increase yield
Mumbai: Vijay Yelmalle had a steady career spanning 14 years in the chemical industry in Singapore. But there was something that kept tugging at him back home. “Whenever I read about farmer suicides, it depressed me. I wanted to do something for them, especially farmers from my home State, Maharashtra,” says Mr. Yelmalle.
In 2012, he ended his lucrative career and returned to India to establish the Center for Research in Alternative Farming Technologies (CRAFT). Mr. Yelmalle spent the first two years doing extensive research in technologies like hydroponics and aquaponics, which involve farming without soil. “These technologies make farming sustainable. The main reason for farmer suicide is unsustainable conventional farming,” says Mr. Yelmalle.
He began by growing vegetables on his terrace in Mumbai and giving them to his family and friends. After the success of this initiative, he began CRAFT in 2014 with four employees and a personal investment of ₹30 lakh.
Breaking through
The beginning was challenging. “I began CRAFT to become a leading service provider in alternative farming technologies. Despite being one of the leading companies in the field, business was not good, as not many people knew about these methods,” he says.
Mr. Yelmalle had to devote a good deal of time educating people and destroying misconceptions: most of their knowledge came from YouTube videos, and they would come to him asking how to produce 200-400 tonnes of vegetables in one acre, with no idea of the cost it entailed. Many others were not aware of the volatility of the agricultural produce market, while some thought hydroponics or aquaponics were forms of magic, and required no technical skills.
Today, CRAFT has a pan-India customer base. “We have sent supplies and do-it-yourself kits to hundreds of people which cost anywhere between 2,000 and 40,000. Till date, we have trained almost 1,500 people in hydroponics, aquaponics, urban farming, commercial aspects of the technologies etc,” says Mr. Yelmalle.
CRAFT helps its customers set up farms and provides consultation and training at Kharghar, Navi Mumbai. Mr. Yelmalle stays in touch with his clients on WhatsApp to help with problems they face.
In addition, CRAFT has developed two sustainable business models. One is focused on the health of urban dwellers. This model is about growing vegetables in urban spaces and supplying fresh, nutritious produce to subscribers from nearby areas at market prices. The other model, called ‘Rural Integrated and Digitalised Economical Aquaponics’ relates to the economic sustainability of marginal farmers using aquaponics. Mr. Yelmalle is also looking at establishing an institute to bring in
more educated people into this sector. The government, he says, needs to subsidise protected cultivation to allow more farmers to adopt this technology. He plans to collaborate with National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development to impart these skills to farmers.
Sustainable farming
Traditional soil-based farming has many problems. Farmland is getting increasingly fragmented [as families expand, successive generations own less land per person]. Land is also getting infertile due to the heavy use of fertilizers, and climate change is having its own adverse effets. Soilless farming, on the other hand, uses just 10% of water as compared to the traditional method, says Mr. Yelmalle. There is no drainage of water or fertilizers into the ground, and all the nutrients are re-circulated within the system. Mr. Yelmalle says soilless farming gives a higher yield as all the parameters such as pH nutrient concentration and water temperature are controlled within the required levels. The produce in soilless farming is also more uniform.
As for the costs involved, he says, “Hydroponics [providing crops synthetic nutrients in the right quantity and combination for the highest yield] is very technical and scientific and requires a very high investment. It is more suitable for urban areas and rich farmers who can afford to employ skilled manpower. Aquaponics, where fish and vegetables are grown together, is a more organic method; after the initial training, a farmer can work it out on his own. The cost of inputs could be reduced drastically with innovation.” A kitchen garden made with recycled material works out to a few thousand rupees, while the cost of a commercial farm runs into a few lakhs.
Further, these technologies require minimal use of nutrients and no pesticides, thereby reducing input costs and giving pesticide-free produce, which has a premium in the market in terms of pricing as well as demand. The technologies also reduce the incidence of crop failures due to drought, thanks to the minimal use of water and inspect or pest attack due to the use of protected growing environment such as shade net, greenhouse, etc.
The greatest advantage of hydroponics or aquaponics is vertical farming — utilising scarce land in cities to get a greater higher yield per square feet. Although the cost of setting up a vertical farm is high, the selling of vegetables in retail makes the venture attractive. Urban farms also have a smaller carbon footprint as produce is grown locally, avoiding transportation.
Manas Kulkarni, a farmer from Vivare village in Jalgaon district said, “We are into traditional farming and grow bananas, cotton, onion, maze, gram, and wheat. Using hydrophonics, we can now grow all types of vegetables, like coloured peppers, tomatoes, exotic leafy vegetables, broccoli and Chinese cabbage.”
Mr. Kulkarni said he attended the CRAFT workshops with the understanding that with the growing population, availability of land for farming will be a challenge in the near future. He has opened a small hydroponics setup in his village and will soon start growing leafy vegetables.
Pravin Tulpule, an entrepreneur said, “I was looking to improve my kitchen gardening skills; something I love doing at home. The use of cocopeat [a natural fibre made of coconut husks] and clay pops, not soil, made it easy to manage.” The technology, he said, is “not rocket science”, and the advantage is that one can practise it at home or on a commercial scale. “The results of micronutrients were phenomenal. The best part was getting fresh vegetables to eat. It helped me understand the optimum use of resources, including space.”
The concept
In hydroponic farming, crops are given synthetic nutrients calculated to meet their requirement.
In aquaponics, fish, and plants are grown together with the single input of fish feed. Fish are reared in tanks and the water is circulated to vegetable roots. All other nutrients required for plant growth are provided by the fish excreta
The advantages
Vertical farming: utilizing scarce land in cities to get a greater higher yield per sq ft
Eco-friendly: Urban farms have a smaller carbon footprint as produce is grown locally.
Snapshot:
Center for Research in Alternative Farming Technologies
Founder: Vijay Yelmalle
Employees: 6
Funding: Bootstrapped
Web: www.craftagro.com
Three Videos From "Urban Produce" Explaining Indoor Vertical Farming
Three Videos From "Urban Produce" Explaining Indoor Vertical Farming
FarmBot Wants to Cultivate An Open-Source Future For Remote Farming
FarmBot Wants to Cultivate An Open-Source Future For Remote Farming
January 3, 2018
“Farm from anywhere” is a phrase we’re likely to hear more and more of as technology enables easier access to fresh, locally grown food. We just wrote about Babylon Micro-Farms, a remote, hydroponic farm you can keep inside your living room. There’s also a healthy urban farming market: thanks to companies like Farmshelf and Smallhold, restaurants, schools, and the average consumer get better access to fresh food and more involved in the food production itself.
But no one’s tackled the reinvention of farming quite like the folks at FarmBot.
FarmBot is basically precision agriculture for the people. When he launched the FarmBot project in 2011, founder Rory Aronson wanted to find a way to bring the benefits of remote farming to the everyman without the hefty price tag.
Precision agriculture normally involves technology like self-steering tractors and aerial drones that can make better use of resources. Because the method uses real-time data to understand weather, air quality, labor costs, and other factors, growers can make smarter decisions about how much and how often to employ resources. As its name suggests, precision agriculture provides meticulous records of every single step of the growing process.
Historically, it’s been the territory of industrial farmers. But thanks to Aronson, anyone with a little space and (considerably less) cash can get involved in food production.
Both FarmBot products, made up of cartesean coordinate robots along with software and documentation, can work on rooftops, in backyards, and can accommodate both small- and large-scale farming operations. It’s unclear whether the company means “farm from anywhere” literally, as it says on its website. But considering the highly customizable nature of the product, anyone with some tech know-how could theoretically hack the bot and make it work in any given climate.
A visual interface lets you “plan your garden like a videogame,” according to the company’s website. So the fact that the interface looks a bit like FarmVille is no coincidence. You can drag and drop plants into the virtual plot of land (below), build care regiments, and even scare away birds.
After the garden is planned, the machine plants seeds, measures soil moisture content and water, and can detect and destroy weeds. Email alerts tell a user when the crops are ready for harvest.
It’s also open source, including the hardware, software, and documentation. That means all design files, source code, and hardware specs are available for free on the company’s website, so anyone can customize their farm without having to fork over a bunch of extra money.
Right now, the FarmBot Genesis goes for $2,595 via the company’s website. The FarmBot Genesis XL, which is available for preorder, costs $3,295 and covers “421 percent the area of for just 38% more cost.” Shipments of both machines are expected to go out in May of this year.
Aronson would eventually like to get the price point down to $1,000. It’s unclear whether that will happen soon or if it’s some ways off. Meanwhile, FarmBot is making its way into universities and non-profits, and the company is working with NASA to develop open-source food production on Mars, the Moon, and deep space. Remote farming indeed.
All images courtesy of FarmBot.
Automation Is Coming…And 9 Other Things You Need to Know About Indoor Farming
This year, our report provides not only an outlook of the industry, but also an updated analysis of the industry following our 2016 report. We received over 150 responses from 8 countries, with 81% coming from the United States, 12% coming from Canada, and the remainder coming from other countries.
Agrilyst
The intelligence platform for indoor farms
January 8, 2018
Automation Is Coming…And 9 Other Things You Need to Know About Indoor Farming
Curious about indoor farming? You’ve come to the right place.
Last year, we set out to provide detailed insight about the state of the indoor farming industry today — what growers are doing, their challenges, and how they see their field changing over the next few years. With that, the State of Indoor Farming was created.
This year, our report provides not only an outlook of the industry but also an updated analysis of the industry following our 2016 report. We received over 150 responses from 8 countries, with 81% coming from the United States, 12% coming from Canada, and the remainder coming from other countries.
You can check out the full State of Indoor Farming report here.
If you don’t have time to dig deep, don’t worry. Here are the 10 things you need to know:
1. Automation is exciting.
Labor makes up a huge portion of an indoor farmer’s budget (49% of a hydroponic operation), so finding ways to cut down on those cost is important. As a result, automation topped the list of technologies farmers are most excited about.
2. On the flip side, farmers think container farms are overhyped.
Regardless of its recent growth in the last few years, container farms came in at number one on the list of technologies responding farmers thought were overhyped. LEDs came in both second on the list of things growers think are overhyped as well as tied for third on the list of technologies farmers were most excited about.
3. Indoor agriculture isn’t the same as urban farming.
This is a big misconception. Indoor farms typically locate close to the point of sale or where efficiency can be maximized, which is not just in urban areas. This is one of the major benefits of indoor farming. Because the farmer has more control over climate, they can choose to locate a farm wherever it makes the most sense.
4. Most indoor farms are producing 2 or more crops in their space.
80% of respondents to our latest SOIF survey grow at least two crops. Because growers have the ability to create microclimates within the growing area, they can optimize for more than one type of crop. Below are the five most common crops grown by the responding farmers.
5. Indoor agriculture produces higher yields compared to conventional farming.
Enclosing facilities gives farmers the ability to create ideal growing environments. As a result, farmers can grow a crop from seed to harvest in less time and produce higher yields.
6. Leafy greens and microgreens have the highest profit margin.
On average, leafy greens and microgreens had the highest profit margin for responding farmers in 2017, at 40% across various facility and system types.
7. Vertical farms use a lot of energy.
Artificial lighting is a key component to vertical farming operations. Growers run their lights approximately 16 hours per day, every day, all year round. As a result, expect energy to account for a large percentage of your operating costs. Greenhouses use energy too. Most of the energy consumption in a greenhouse comes from heating and cooling costs.
8. Growers are innovative.
We asked growers if they would buy technology from a startup and 78% indicated they would. Most growers specified they don’t want to be “beta testers” but they recognize the need to innovate. The key for farmers is trusting technology and not buying new technologies that don’t directly benefit their farm.
9. 2018 will be the year of data and analytics.
When asked about the technologies growers are looking to invest in this year, most farmers selected data and analytics; climate control systems ranked second. If you are going to run a profitable farm in 2018, investing in a technology stack is a must.
10. Profitability is the number one goal for growers in 2018.
When asked about their number one goal for 2018, 46% of farmers indicated either increasing profitability or revenue. For an additional 7%, the primary goal is decreasing costs, which takes financial-related goals to 53%.
Special thanks to our survey partners: Urban Ag News, State of the Soil, and Cornell University.
Want more? Check out the full State of Indoor Farming report here.
How To Grow Microgreens From Seed
How To Grow Microgreens From Seed
January 9, 2018
Want to grow your own microgreens at home? Here are 12 procedures that are sure to help.
Introductions
What are microgreens, exactly? Many people think they are sprouts, but that is a different product. Others think they are baby lettuce, but that's because they haven't tried microgreens. So what are microgreens and what makes them distinctive from sprouts and baby lettuce? Microgreens are tiny seedling plants of many varieties of vegetables, herbs, lettuces, greens, and flowers, grown 7-21 days from start. These tiny young plants have flavors that range from very mild to totally intense, and people are often surprised by heavenly flavor that they can add to any dish. Specific varieties that can be grown as microgreens are large, and include mustard varieties like ruby streaks, mizuna and tatsoi, herbs like parsley and fennel, vegetables like radish, carrot and celery, even flowers like nasturtiums and marigolds.
Growing Methods
Microgreens are grown on a pad made from 100% sustainable plant fibers to hold the seeds in place and keep them from rolling around before they sprout. If you lay the pad in the 10x20 tray dry, they would not lay flat, and the seeds would go rolling off the high spots and end up crowding up the low spots. The pads would also have a hard time becoming evenly moist to begin with. Before placing the pads in the tray PRE-SOAK THEM in a bucket of vegan boost water. This helps them lay flat in trays, which makes planting a lot easier and helps give the seeds a germination boost. Plan to put the pads in a couple hours before you plant.
Planting and Growing Procedures
1. Pre-soak microgreens pad in vegan boost water
2. Weigh out the correct amount of seeds to be planted
3. Place seeds into a season shaker
4. Place the wet pads into the tray
5. Smooth out the pad until completely flat
6. Evenly shake the seeds in each tray, one tray at a time, using a gentle shaking motion
7. Spray each tray, one at a time, spray generously.
8. Spray humidity dome and place dome on the trays
9. Place the trays in a dark area for a couple of days
10. Day 3 take off the humidity dome and place the tray under a grow light
11. Look for the first set of "true leaves" as a sign of readiness.
12. Grab scissors and cut the microgreens just above the pad line
Product Uses
Microgreens are quite versatile and can be used in a numbers of ways. Put them on tacos, pizza, soups, in salads, on sandwiches, anywhere you'd put baby greens or lettuce or cook them in stir-fry. Use them as an amazing garnish or ingredient on any dish. They can also be eaten as a salad and added to sushi and wraps.
If you enjoyed this, you might also enjoy these posts about growing:
"Microgreens - It starts with a seed"
"How to grow micro basil in six easy steps"
Tags: microgreens growing microgreens growingtips nick greens grow team
Kimbal Musk Doubles Down On School Garden Effort
Learning gardens provide access to nutritious food and serve as educational tools at underserved schools. Photo courtesy of the Kitchen
Kimbal Musk Doubles Down On School Garden Effort
The Colorado 100 Fund is a $2.5 million effort toward creating 100 learning gardens in Colorado by 2020.
BY DALIAH SINGER | JANUARY 3, 2018
In 2011, Kimbal Musk, co-founder of the Kitchen (and brother of tech giant Elon Musk), decided it wasn’t enough serving real, local food at his family of restaurants. So he launched the Kitchen Community nonprofit with the goal of “empower[ing] kids and their families to build real food communities from the ground up.”
In practice, what that means is creating learning gardens—a garden as an outdoor classroom—in underserved, low-income schools across the country. Since the first opened in Denver in 2011, 450 learning gardens have been built across the country. Colorado, though, has begun lagging behind. The state currently has 55 learning gardens; Chicago has 150. But that will soon change: Musk recently announced theColorado 100 Fund, a $2.5 million initiative to increase the number of Centennial State learning gardens to 100 (in other words, adding 45 more) by the end of 2020. “We built our first [learning garden] in Denver,” says Courtney Walsh, Musk’s communications director. “We need to look at our own backyard…to really impact change.”
Kimbal Musk (right) and a student at a Kitchen Community learning garden in Los Angeles in 2015. Photo by Patrick T. Fallon for the Kitchen Community
According to the 2017 Kids Count report from the Colorado Children’s Campaign (CCC), 16 percent of Colorado children experienced food insecurity—“their access to adequate food was limited by lack of money and other resources”—between 2013 and 2015. In addition, many high-poverty neighborhoods are located in food deserts, meaning they have limited access to affordable and nutritious foods. That’s one of the reasons the CCC says, “…children growing up in low-income or food-insecure families are likely to…have challenges getting the nutrients they need for proper growth and development.”
School gardens can help reverse those concerns by exposing children to fruits and vegetables, teaching them where their food comes from, and encouraging healthy lifelong eating habits. At an elementary school, students might count the plants and learn their names. In middle and high school, the gardens become the foundation for a science class or a lesson in entrepreneurship (how to run a farm stand, for instance).
To accomplish the 100-garden goal, Musk formed a Leadership Circle comprised of prominent Coloradans who support his efforts to improve children’s health. Among them is Robin Luff, who also serves on the board of the Kitchen Community. “We’re there to talk about the importance of real food, of changing behaviors. We all believe that can happen when we have a really strong effort in a city,” Luff says. “It’s useful, and it’s lasting.”
Schools submit applications for learning gardens, and the district has to approve the Kitchen Community’s efforts. The nonprofit has already worked with the Denver Public Schools and the Poudre School District and will continue to do so; it expects to add some gardens in Jefferson County as part of the Colorado 100.
“One of the challenges in Colorado versus some of the other inner cities we’re working with is that we have this gorgeous landscape we look at every day,” Luff says, “and it’s really hard to imagine that some kids have never played in a stream or with sticks. [Determining how to] make a lasting impression in Denver is really important.”
One hundred learning gardens is a big enough number to convince people (the legislature, school boards) to pay more attention to the issue. “It becomes an ecosystem about learning about food,” Walsh says. “If you have 100, then you’re able to truly impact the community…and reach kids at all age levels.”
But don’t expect this work to stop once Musk and team reach 100. ”Kimbal’s overarching national goal is to build 1,000 learning gardens to ostensibly impact a million children,“ Walsh says. We have no doubt he’ll get there.
DALIAH SINGER, 5280 CONTRIBUTOR
Daliah Singer is an award-winning writer and editor based in Denver. You can find more of her work at daliahsinger.com.
US-Based AeroFarms To Introduce Vertical Farming in Collaboration With Local Businessmen
US-Based AeroFarms To Introduce Vertical Farming in Collaboration With Local Businessmen
January 10, 2018 | DOHA NEWS
Qatar has realised about its high dependency on its neighbouring countries for essential products such as food items due to blockade. Since then it has been using the opportunity devised by crisis to become self-sufficient with the major focus on food security.
Qatar looks highly motivated to achieve aim of self-sufficiency and its confidence has even been a major factor in attracting a lot of Global firms to join its ambitious Self-sufficiency Exhibition scheduled in April, 2018, which is certainly a great prospect.
Recently, in an exclusive interview with Qatar Tribune, AeroFarms Co-Founder and CEO David Rosenberg, stated that his company has presented their technology of indoor farming to Qatar and local businessmen have expressed interest in associating.
The technology of indoor farming to grow vegetables without sun or soil, in a fully-controlled indoor environment can prove very beneficial to Qatar given its geographical conditions. The company’s patented aeroponic growing system, he explained, has very fast harvest cycles, predictable results, superior food safety and less environmental impact.
Though such association will ensure self-sufficiency and food security and boost much needed confidence in local producers and manufacturers to contribute in economic growth, it may lead to increase in prices of indoor produced farm products. The technology as claimed by Rosenberg, ensures that all their produce is available year-round, consistent price, longer shelf life, less shrink, safely grown, wide variety, customizable mixes and no weather issues.
Till now Qatar has met its demand by exports but on a much higher prices and compromised quality, however, such a technology can have immediate effect on achieving food security but only if we do not have to compromise on quality and reasonability of the prices. Hence, we need to move up on lines of ‘produce in Qatar’ and this may prove to be a good addition, without compromising on the basics, as we are not looking for a short-term solution but a long term plan.
Automated Hydroponic Gardens Help You Grow Fresh Produce Indoor Year-Round
Automated Hydroponic Gardens Help You Grow Fresh Produce Indoor Year-Round
Derek Markham (@derekmarkham)
Living / Lawn & Garden
January 4, 2018
Grow some of your own greens, veggies, and herbs indoors with one of these automated hydroponic growing systems.
When you combine an automated low-water growing system with efficient LED lighting, you get a space-saving - and time-saving - solution for growing veggies indoors. Thanks to advances in both automation and lighting, as well as dropping prices for those technologies, the number of countertop and kitchen gardens on the market is rapidly growing.
The latest entry to the indoor gardening scene comes from OPCOM, which is offering a wide range of hydroponic growing systems ranging from a small countertop garden to vertical wall gardens to modular stackable units, as well as 40' shipping container farms, all of which feature "energy-efficient Auto-Cycle" systems that control the lights and watering.
OPCOM, a 23-year old global digital imaging and lighting company, has been branching out into the manufacture of indoor grow units as well because its founder and CEO Jack Ting "passionately believes in the power of hydroponic farming to produce healthier plants while reducing costs and conserving land, energy and water." The company's OPCOM Farm products are intended for everyone from the beginning gardener to those looking to set up a restaurant garden or indoor urban farm, and all of which rely on hydroponics and LED lighting said to simulate the "precise sunlight spectrum" for optimal growth.
The smallest of the units is the O2-Light, a tabletop garden that runs about $180, includes a built-in fan ("a Bio-Air Refresher") and a light that has two lighting modes and can be swiveled over your reading material or work area, with the intent of enabling "a healthy reading environment." The GrowFrame, which costs about $280, can be mounted on a wall as a vertical garden or used on a tabletop, fits up to 20 plants, and also includes a fan (I mean a Bio-Air Refresher). The GrowBox (~$600) is a tabletop unit that can grow up to 50 plants, and its open-frame design and height- and angle-adjustable LED lights are meant to be able to let it handle plants up to 3 feet tall. The $800 GrowWall is a vertical growing system that can accommodate up to 75 plants across 5 tiers, and has a minimal physical footprint (~9" deep x 53" wide).
The company also has a number of other bigger units that could be a great complement to a school, business, or restaurant, as well as large "Interactive Cloud Farms" in a 40' shipping container for those looking to grow mass quantities of greens, veggies, or herbs for sale.
Urban/Indoor Farming Accelerator in Brooklyn Feeds New Yorkers Year-Round
Urban/Indoor Farming Accelerator in Brooklyn Feeds New Yorkers Year-Round
Square Roots is a high-tech indoor farming accelerator in the heart of Brooklyn, New York, working to ensure that city residents can source fresh, sustainable produce twelve months a year. In a major urban center like New York City, where fresh produce can be tough to find even in seasons of peak agricultural output, Square Roots is proving the potential of indoor, climate-controlled agriculture.
The company was co-founded by entrepreneurs Tobias Peggs and Kimbal Musk, who also runs two restaurant chains, with the dual goals of satisfying a demand for produce and training a new generation of entrepreneurial leaders who understand urban agriculture, local food systems, and the transparency and trust that personal relationships bring to food
Over the course of a 13-month program, Square Roots’ ten Resident Entrepreneurs run businesses at the accelerator’s physical home while taking part in a curriculum of skill-based training, professional development, and experiential business learning. They work with hydroponic growing systems housed in old, repurposed shipping containers calledLeafy Green Machines, sold by Freight Farms. Depending on crops and conditions, each container can yield up to 50 pounds of leafy greens per week while using only eight gallons of water a day, according to Freight Farms.
The entrepreneurs deliver fresh greens to consumers at 80 office locations in the city, sell specialty items through a number of retail channels, and work in direct partnership with restaurants. Square Roots shares 30 percent of the total revenue with the farmers, amounting to between US$30,000 and US$40,000 annually, according to co-founder and CEO Tobias Peggs.
“The idea is: with the skills they acquire at Square Roots, and the experience they gain running a business, they can graduate confidently with the knowledge to set up all kinds of companies,” says Peggs. “They might create hardware companies designing more efficient lights for urban farmers. Or software companies to better connect local farmers to consumers. Or value-add companies using locally grown basil to make pesto.”
Peggs attributes the company’s recent success to two primary factors: the high efficiency of the production modules and the trust that the company has built with its customer base.
“Because you are growing in three dimensions instead of two, you can get a lot of food from a tiny footprint,” he says. “And it’s always in season indoors! Even if there’s two feet of snow on the ground outside, we can create the perfect growing conditions inside.”
The company’s proximity to customers is an important element in building trust. “At Square Roots, we’re literally in the same neighborhood as our customers,” says Peggs. He also suggests that building trust requires intentional transparency. To that end, Square Roots elected to install big windows on the modules so that passersby could see how the food was being grown and hosts open house community events on the farm once a monthfor city residents to tour the farms, meet the farmers, taste the food, and engage in a question-and-answer session.
“These notions of trust and transparency are baked into our values and into our product,” says Peggs. “It’s what people expect from modern food companies.”
At the end of one year with the company, trainees pass off their fully-running farming businesses to the next season’s entrepreneurs.
Because the farmer-entrepreneurs are only with the company for a year, the production modules are designed to be easy to understand and use, a significant difference from the knowledge intensity of traditional farming. Peggs doesn’t go so far as to describe the modules as “plug-and-play,” though, explaining that the training program receives substantial support from Square Roots’ head farmer Phil Cuddeback and from farming mentors who have worked at companies like Small Hold, Eden Works, Farm.One, and Gotham Greens
Their first cohort of ten entrepreneurs, which the company refers to as “Season 1,” graduated at the end of October 2017. Four of them are in the process of starting their own businesses, two moved into roles at companies working in the urban agriculture space, two have been rehired by Square Roots to work on research and development efforts, and one is staying on for a second season of production at Square Roots’ facility.
Square Roots raised US$5.4 million in funding in 2017 and aims to expand towards 20 cities by the year 2020.
Pieter De Smedt Comments on 2017 Investments On Vertical Farming
Pieter De Smedt Comments on 2017 Investments On Vertical Farming
Are you a grower or a technology company? You will have to make up your mind someday!
2017 marked another year where several of vertical farming's big names raised millions of dollars for their future development. Aerofarms closed on its 40 million USD series D, Bowery Farming secured 27.5 million USD for its series A, and of course Plenty locked in a whopping 200 million USD as well. What have these companies done with these type of funds in the past and what are they planning on doing with them now? Pieter De Smedt, US country manager for Urban Crop Solutions explains it to HortiDaily.com
"The answer is twofold. First, they plan to allocate the funds into substantial engineering and biological R&D to come up with an indoor growing system and operational playbook to grow crops efficiently (or improve their current set up). Second, they will use the other part of the funding to build and operate said system to expand a brand, grow produce and sell it into the market. But does that make sense?"
A young industry required companies to do the work on technology themselves
"Let us begin by saying that we understand why this approach arose. The industry is young. Companies that wanted to get into vertical farming until recently had almost no integrated technologies available. They were for that reason forced to invest in doing all of that themselves. This meant that all these different companies had to reinvent the wheel as well as make the same mistakes as had been made previously by someone else - just to get started farming indoor. As a result, each time millions were raised and spent on R&D just to arrive at that first operational vertical farm. As technology progressed, these companies were forced to again raise and invest millions into the continued improvement of their R&D, then to build, and lastly to grow and sell.
So now the question arises whether they should continue this loop or at least for how long they should. This is really a matter of what they believe the future will look like."
A future with defined roles for growers and technology providers
"If they continue, then in their vision of the future competition in the industry will comprise of brands of indoor produce growers competing against each other based on (among other things) who has developed the best technology and horticultural know-how in-house. This obviously puts a huge strain on any ambition of profitability as the company must earn back not only the cap-ex of the construction of the system but also of the immense (and continued) R&D investments that preceded it. With limited margins, we argue that that is not a realistic expectation.
If we compare with the more mature greenhouse growing industry, the future is likely to have technology providers on the one hand and growers on the other. Let us take the example of a greenhouse tomato grower. Each time this grower will want to open a new farm or update an old one, he looks at what is available in the market and asks the e.g. 10 leading technology providers (the greenhouse project developers) to present an offer that meets his needs. After careful consideration, he will proceed with the partner he feels most comfortable with. If two years later he wants to open another farm, the process is reiterated and perhaps a different technology provider wins that time. In this model, R&D capital investment on engineering and horticulture remain with the technology supply companies - as we argue they rationally should.
Maturing vertical farming industry
Translate this to the maturing vertical farming industry. What will the companies mentioned above do when they see their technology surpassed by that of a third party technology provider or when a technology provider starts offering new crops? Will they then continue to put venture capital funds into R&D to keep their own system competitive in the (unrealistic) hopes of earning those ever-increasing investments back by selling produce? No. They will have to become technology agnostics and purchase whichever technology on the market best fits their growing needs for a given project at a given time.
In this more mature market new types of entrants will change the playing field too. Whereas now we see primarily investor backed entrepreneurs entering the vertical farming industry, it is likely to assume that the existing incumbent growers, produce processors, as well as produce sellers will at one point also make their move. We predict that they will do so relying on technology providers – as they are doing now as well for their current precision ag and/or greenhouse production.
For the sake of completeness, let me emphasize that we are not saying that the grower will not be doing any R&D - of course they will. Every grower will have specific projects aimed at diversifying its portfolio of produce, improving process flow, cutting energy requirements, increasing yields, etc. and they should do this.
What we are saying though – and this can be construed as the conclusion of this text – Is that in a gradually maturing industry, companies will necessarily need to focus on the primary scope of their business if they want to be successful. That means growers will grow and sell produce while their suppliers will develop and provide the required technology. This will be key to ensure that the future of vertical farming is one of efficient, profitable, diverse, and global operations.
Pieter De Smedt is the US country manager for Urban Crop Solutions, a global indoor farming group building fully robotized vertical plant factories and containers with projects in Europe, North America, and South East Asia.
For more information:
Urban Crop Solutions
Grote Heerweg 67, 8791 Beveren-Leie (Waregem), Belgium
800 Brickell Avenue 1100 Suite, Miami (FL 33131), USA
+32 56 96 03 06
info@urbancropsolutions.com
sales@urbancropsolutions.com
urbancropsolutions.com
Indoor Farmers Report Access to Capital Is Biggest Challenge, Agrilyst Survey Says
While last year, indoor farmers reported the cost of operations as their biggest challenge, this year growers say that access to capital is their biggest hurdle, according to a new report from indoor farming software company Agrilyst.
Indoor Farmers Report Access to Capital Is Biggest Challenge, Agrilyst Survey Says
While last year, indoor farmers reported the cost of operations as their biggest challenge, this year growers say that access to capital is their biggest hurdle, according to a new report from indoor farming software company Agrilyst. It may seem impossible, with indoor farms like AeroFarms, Bowery Farming, and Plenty announcing large early rounds of venture funding, but indoor farming contains much more variety than these high tech coastal operations, as the annual Agrilyst report seeks to demonstrate.
Indoor Farming, on the whole, is maturing, according to the report and Agrilyst CEO Allison Kopf, with greenhouse operations making the most progress to date.
“I’m seeing the most maturation in the high-tech, smart greenhouse industry. Growers in greenhouse operations who have been operating for a number of years are perfecting growing methods and reinvesting profits into new technologies, instead of inventing systems and methods from scratch. Profit margins are pretty stable for these operations and both revenue and costs are incredibly stable across all facility sizes, whereas other facility types (like vertical farming) showed large spreads across different size and age facilities,” Kopf told AgFunderNews.
The report is the result of a survey of 150 indoor farms in eight countries and paints a picture of the financial health and hurdles of various kinds of indoor farming operations. A clear majority (81%) of respondents were US-based with 12% from Canada and 7% from other countries. Nearly half of respondents represent hydroponic farms, while 24% run soil-based operations, 15% aquaponics, 6% aeroponics, and 6% use a mixture of growing technologies.
The most dominant type of facility was glass or poly greenhouses (47%) followed by indoor vertical farms (30%), which generally convert existing industrial buildings. Plastics hoop houses, container farms and other types of structure make up the remaining 23% of respondents.
Costs Rise As Farms Grow Up
In terms of challenges, access to capital is followed by what the report calls “building-related” challenges such as pests and maintaining optimal growing environments followed by labor, and financial sustainability.
Indoor growers continue to focus on specialty crops to take advantage of high margins since operation expenses remain high, with labor at the top of the list.
While labor is a major cost center for all types of indoor farming, vertical farms require the most employees per square foot. “This makes automation technologies incredibly important as the industry matures,” concludes the report.
In terms of inputs, costs are generally split evenly between seeds, nutrients and grow media, except for vertical farms, where grow media represents half of input costs. The report explains that even in profitable vertical farming operations, the cost per square foot is $37.10 while the cost of a hydroponic operation is $13.86. While growing in stacked layers may mean that this difference isn’t as dramatic as it appears.
Profitability Depends on Farm Type and Crop, Not Tech
Profitability remains a challenge for indoor growers with only 51% of reporting farms operating profitably.
The type of farming operation most likely to be profitable according to the report, are indoor deep water culture operations followed by glass or poly greenhouses with 75% and 67% of respondents reporting profitability, respectively. The third most profitable growing method in the survey is container farms (50%) followed by indoor vertical farms (27%) and low-tech plastic “hoop houses” (25%).
The report notes however that “vertical farms reporting limited profitability is most likely because it is a new industry that is just beginning to mature.” Indeed even funding record-breaking vertical farm Plenty is less than five years old. The average age of the unprofitable farms was five years, while the average age of the profitable farms was seven years.
Flower-growing operations are by far most likely to profitable with 100% of farms in the survey reporting operating in the black. Flowers are followed by tomatoes with 67% profitability and micro greens with 60% profitability. Kopf said that this year’s survey did not receive responses from enough cannabis growers to include in the report, but cannabis likely remains the most profitable crop grown indoors.
The type of growing technology seems less correlated to profitability as most technology types range from 50-60% of farms reporting profitability with one exception. Only 25% of farms reporting using a mix of growing technologies operate profitably.
Common Misconceptions
The survey seeks to underline that indoor farming is not only an urban phenomenon, though urban operations generally receive more media attention and seem to draw more venture funding. What might come as a surprise to those who follow the big names in indoor farming is that the majority of respondents were in rural locations (47%) while urban farms made up 43% of respondents and the rest suburban.
“Indoor agriculture isn’t equivalent to urban farming. This is a big misconception. As evidenced by the data, indoor farms typically locate close to the point of sale or where efficiency can be maximized. For a tomato grower, this may mean locating a greenhouse in a rural area where energy is cheaper and closer to a distribution center,” reads the report.
It is also a common misconception that indoor farms can only grow tomatoes, greens, and cannabis. Though these are definitely staples of indoor farms, the crop assortment among the 150 operations surveyed is much more varied and includes: leafy greens, tomatoes, cannabis, flowers, microgreens, strawberries, herbs, cucumbers, peppers, mushrooms, onions, leeks, hops, figs, sweet corn, eggplant, fish, insects, carrots, and shrimp but the main crops are leafy greens, microgreens, herbs, flowers, and tomatoes.
To find out more about the costs associated with each farm type and growing method, and the state of indoor farming generally, download the full report.
NATUFIA Indoor Kitchen Garden For The First Time Unveiled at KBIS, Orlando
The Natufia Kitchen Garden is Natufia Labs’ technological response to today's’ overwhelming issues of food traceability, pesticide, GMOs, poor taste and unnecessary waste that have plagued the food industry and our plates all the way to the greatest chefs.
NATUFIA Indoor Kitchen Garden For The First Time Unveiled at KBIS, Orlando
The fully automated Natufia Kitchen Garden, the one that CNN, ABC, Der Spiegel, Vogue Paris, USA Today, Fox News, WIRED, PC World spoke so much about after its stint at Las Vegas CES last year and the one that has been adopted by some of the best chefs in Europe and now selling by Bulthaup Paris will be presented for the first time to the US professional Kitchen and Bath Industry at KBIS in Orlando Jan 9-11.
- Booth: S5456 at South Hall's ASID Design Pavilion
- Co-founder and team available for meetings at KBIS
The NATUFIA® Kitchen Garden, the leader in high end automated hydroponic solutions, on exceptional display at the Kitchen & Bath Industry Show in Orlando, Jan 9-11 2018.
ORLANDO, USA, 4 JANUARY 2018 – After its widely acclaimed first introduction in the US last year during Las Vegas CES 2017 show, and after one year of successful introduction in the European market, Natufia Labs will be presenting its latest Natufia Kitchen Garden model at the Orlando 2018 Kitchen & Bath Industry Show (KBIS) at ASID Design Pavilion, South Hall, Booth S5456. The latest model of the Natufia Kitchen Garden will be on display and presented by Natufia Labs CEO Gregory Lu and his team.
The Natufia Kitchen Garden is Natufia Labs’ technological response to today's’ overwhelming issues of food traceability, pesticide, GMOs, poor taste and unnecessary waste that have plagued the food industry and our plates all the way to the greatest chefs.
The Kitchen Garden is the product of four years of intensive engineering, software, hydroponic and botanic research to provide leading chefs across the world with a solution to organically grow plants right in their kitchen, all year round, and to finally recover the true taste of things.
Recent independent lab tests revealed vitamins level over 400 % higher when grown inside the Natufia KG. "Consumers are progressively seeking out organic and healthy food options. We provide a sustainable technical solution that connects people back with nature, without efforts and without compromising on quality and nutritional values" says Gregory Lu.
“This is the future: This is for all Chefs to support technological progress and the preservation of nature,” says Emmanuel Renaut, three Michelin starred Chef in Megève, an early adopter of the Natufia Kitchen Garden, who was recently ranked 6th top chef worldwide. Among other early adopters, we count ***** Four Season George V Hotel Chef Simone Zanoni, or ***** London Sofitel St James Chef Hameed Farook.
After having the Natufia Kitchen Garden being tested in the hands of the greatest, Natufia Labs decided to start making the Natufia Kitchen Gardens available to private users; the one that also wants health, taste and convenience to reach their plate. Bulthaup Paris (3 stores), Modulonova, Varenna and others have started to sell Natufia KG to Paris and London private customers.
Now that the Natufia Kitchen Garden is developing at great speed its presence on the UK, French and Italian professional and private markets, and a very conclusive first introductory at Las Vegas CES last January, the presence at KBIS Orlando 2018 shows a more determined move by Natufia Labs to start to commercialize in the US and in Canada.
Natufia® Labs, established in 2014 is the manufacturer of Natufia Kitchen Garden. Natufia Labs has become one of the leading research labs and a specialized manufacturer of high technology content hydroponic equipment designed for people who admire original taste, traceability of food and GMO-free nutrition. Less waste, more taste, better health.
www.natufia.com Facebook.com/Natufia
Download press pictures from here.
Media contact:
marketing@natufia.com
Direct: +1 646 919 7020
Aggressively Organic To Send Hydroponic Systems to Puerto Rico
Aggressively Organic To Send Hydroponic Systems to Puerto Rico
HYDROPONICS STARTUP RAISES FUNDS TO SEND FARMING TECHNOLOGY TO PUERTO RICO
Aggressively Organic aims to send 50,000 Micro Growth Systems™ to the U.S. Territory
Earlier this week we announced via social media that we’re raising funds via a rewards crowdfunding campaign on Humanity Project to ship 50,000 Aggressively Organic Micro Growth Systems™ to Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria.
We’re setting out to raise $500,000 on Humanity Project to manufacture, create, and deliver our patent pending Aggressively Organic Micro Growth Systems™ to Puerto Rico so that individuals, agencies, and relief groups can use these self-contained personal hydroponic systems to start growing phytonutrient rich food immediately upon arrival. Vegetables and herbs grown in Aggressively Organic Micro Growth Systems™ would be available for harvest as soon as 30-60 days without building out any additional electrical, water, or other resources.
There’s an incentive for those who donate, too. When a donor purchases some systems for a family in Puerto Rico, we at Aggressively Organic will send the same amount of systems to the donor so they can grow their own food at home as well.
As soon as we receive $500,000 for 50,000 systems, we will will allocate all of our efforts, energy and capacity to fulfill on the promise of providing short, mid and long-term relief to Puerto Rico and the citizens there. We cannot currently fund this production, but can provide our revolutionary farming technology at $10.00 a system rather than their retail pricing of $20.00. All the end user would need to provide would be enough water (24- 32 oz) every 30-90 days and sunshine or lighting.
To learn more and support our mission to send our Micro Growth Systems™ to Puerto Rico visit: https://humanityproject.com/projects/aggressively-organic-relief-for-puerto-rico/
By Bridget O'Reilly | December 8th, 2017 | Food Insecurity
Letcetra Agritech – A High-Tech Hydroponic Farm
Letcetra Agritech – A High-Tech Hydroponic Farm
December 26, 2017 Start Up Valli Sarvani
Letcetra Agritech was founded in 2016 by three engineers of different backgrounds.
The main motive which united them to establish this startup was to provide quality food with the help of hydroponics.
Letcetra Agritech is a Goa based startup. The company provides various services to their users. These include establishing customized hydroponic systems, training, research and development, sales etc.
Lettuce, tomatoes, bell peppers, basil etc. are their main products.
The company helps in establishing Turnkey setups which are useful for those who have land and want to use it in a productive way.
As the population of the country has been growing, the produced food is not meeting the needs. In order to solve this problem effectively, the hydroponic system is recognized as one of the best ways.
The company has a comprehensive commercial hydroponic system in which they design the ways, an operation to run it successfully and solutions to maintain it properly.
Furthermore, everyone can have their customized hydroponic system which is suitable to their needs.
According to the demographic areas, and the respective demand and supply, the company suggests the types of vegetables to be grown. If the clients need, the company even offers a buy-back guarantee.
The hydroponic system is gaining wide popularity in recent days due to its advantages. Unlike traditional agriculture, there is no need to depend on the nature for sunlight, water, and other things.
LED lights are used to compensate the sunlight, and air conditioning systems control the temperature and humidity.
Even the land required for this system is lesser compared to traditional agriculture. 85 percent less water is required as the system uses recycled water. Nutrition requirements are also less. The harvest is pesticide free. Growth cycle is shorter and year-long growth is assured.
Letcetra Agritech also provides training to grow the crops in the hydroponics system.
You can contact them on all days except Sunday from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Image Reference: Letcetraagritech
Hydroponic Farm, Housing Project Planned Near Pablo, Montana
Hydroponic Farm, Housing Project Planned Near Pablo, Montana
January 07, 2018 at 11:27 am | By PEREGRINE FRISSELL Daily Inter Lake
A developer planning an ambitious housing project and hydroponic farm near Pablo believes his company is on the brink of realizing its goal after years of wrangling grants, permits and community support.
Previously the farm and residential development were going to be adjacent to each other, but the developer has switched course and is putting each on separate lots a little under 3 miles away.
The firm, Hawaii-based Aloha Noblehouse Inc., which has an executive director and president based in Marion, plans to construct a commercial farm on a 31-acre site on Minesinger Trail, just off U.S. 93 south of Polson toward Pablo.
Just less than 3 miles away, closer to Pablo, will be an 80-unit single-family housing development that will offer low-priced mortgages. Both properties are on the Flathead Indian Reservation.
The idea is that people who choose to live in the housing should be able to support themselves and their family by working a job at the nearby agricultural production facility, said Gerald Greenstein, president of Aloha Noblehouse. He intends the project to enhance food security and affordable-housing options and promote economic development in the area between Polson and Pablo.
“Our area is desperately in need of affordable housing,” said Jodie Paxton, executive director of the Ronan Housing Authority.
Paxton said she supported the project and was in talks with the developers early on to manage the housing when it was going to contain rental units.
They have since switched to plans to sell the units so the housing authority is no longer involved, but Paxton said the proximity to Salish Kootenai College would make the development an important addition to the area.
“Unfortunately it’s tough to live here, it’s tough to find a job that can pay for what it costs to own a home,” Paxton said. “I think it would go a long way toward assisting those who are in a lower income bracket to buy a home.”
The developer, in an application for a New Markets Tax Credit, states the housing portion of the development will include an electric vehicle charging station, a daycare for children between 2 and 5 years of age, community center and a triage nurse station. A triage nurse is generally referred to as the first nurse to evaluate a patient, determine the severity of the maladies and decide where to refer them for more comprehensive care.
The organization has yet to file for any permits with Lake County that would be needed before construction were to begin, said Jacob Feistner, director of the Lake County Planning Department.
They have received letters of support from several organizations, including the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes and the Ronan School District. The project has also been endorsed by the Lake County commissioners and the Salish Kootenai Housing Authority.
Greenstein and his colleagues at Aloha Noblehouse are still working to pull together the funding they need to begin construction. He hopes the project will provide a sustainable business model that could act as a catalyst for similar developments to go up throughout the nation. Aloha Noblehouse also holds property in Idaho and Hawaii.
The proposed sites will operate with a mixture of renewable energy resources, and the developer hopes to get them as close to carbon-neutral as they can, according to an executive summary of the project.
While the farm would be small in size compared to most commercial farms, the developer hopes to have a large output by producing year-round in a large greenhouse-like setting using hydroponic farming techniques. Aloha Noblehouse predicts the project could create between 25 and 40 jobs, according to a copy of its business plan.
The developer plans to grow organic lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, yellow squash, zucchini and peppers, as well as basil and thyme. The business plan states the company will seek USDA organic certification and seek production contracts with the food supplier giant Sysco.
They estimate their total annual sales to be in the range of 1,600 tons of food, totaling about $4.4 million the first year, according to the executive summary. They expect it to grow closer to $5 million in following years.
The developers say they would like to partner with Salish Kootenai College, the Montana University System and nearby Kicking Horse Job Corps for educational opportunities and to help find people to staff the facility.
The application also states they will seek to install a restaurant attached to the agricultural production facility. It would be operated as a privately held, for-profit limited liability company.
The project has gained the approval of the Lake County Community Development Corporation.
“As an agency that works on economic development, we absolutely support developments that add new housing, create jobs and add value to agriculture in the area,” said Gypsy Ray, executive director of the Lake County Community Development Corp. “From what I’m aware of, all of those things would be part of the program if successful.”
Ray noted that while she had spoken with the developers and supported the project, she had not worked closely with them in recent weeks or months. She said they were still seeking funding and investors, and that had been the major hurdle for a while.
The single-family residences are expected to begin in the $140,000 range, and Aloha Noblehouse has arranged options with financiers to make competitive mortgages attainable for those with good credit. The default design will be three bedrooms and one bath, Greenstein said, but could be altered for an additional fee if enough prospective residents express interest.
The developer also has been angling for a New Markets Tax Credit, a federal tax credit available for ventures that include real-estate investment in low-income areas of the United States. The credits would go toward the housing project only, not the agricultural center.
The tax-credit program was nearly eliminated in the negotiation process for the new federal tax plan that passed through Congress just before Christmas. Aloha Noblehouse contacted Montana’s U.S. senators and representative to enlist their help in preserving the credit, and the final passed version does not eliminate the program.
Reporter Peregrine Frissell can be reached at 758-4438 or pfrissell@dailyinterlake.com.
City Farming: If Your Yard Looks Like This You Could Make USD$950/wk
City Farming: If Your Yard Looks Like This You Could Make USD$950/wk
By Ben Brown on January 3, 2018
Making money out of your own parcel of land, whether it be five square meters, or 10, is easier than you imagine and as we push towards a more sustainable future, more homes are taking up their own versions of city farming with budding green entrepreneurs making more than $1000/week out of micro-farming.
There’s a philosophy I believe in called ‘just start’. Simply put, it’s removing the excessive planning and thoughts that people use to delay ideas, and instead, just start. And that saying is especially evident in the city farming world, with the method of putting a seed in the ground and watching it grow.
After that first seedling sprouts a shoot, you will come to learn new methods and innovate the ways you conduct your own city farming to start producing high turnover regular crops in your tiny space and onsell that produce to farmers markets, cafes, and restaurants.
City farming is just that. It’s a way of keeping up with the commercial consumption of fresh foods in cafes, markets, and restaurants as businesses take a turn towards providing more organic foods. And it’s how regular household owners are making an income comparable to a full-time white-collar job, just by working the greens in their backyard.
What on Earth is City Farming And Why is it Here?
If you haven’t heard of it already, it’s no surprise. The city farming movement is very new, but the concept of growing your own foods definitely isn’t.
By 2050 our global population is expected to hit 9.7 billion, according to the UN. That’s 33% more than what we have on this planet right now. And what’s more shocking is that two-thirds of those people will be living in city areas which means there are a lot of mouths to feed in urban areas.
The interesting part of that is that even though most of the population is in cities, their foods originates far from those areas, often in regional farms hundreds or thousands of miles away. This removes the self-sufficiency of a lot of cities which are instead reliant upon the transport of foods which can easily be affected by disasters and other issues.
City farming introduces the idea of cities and urban areas to develop their own organic fresh foods to feed a local area or community, rather than relying on those far-flung farming areas.
Whether it be in front yards, backyards, abandoned lots, balconies, rooftops or just indoors, new methods of produce gardening have been utilized by various entrepreneurs seeking to make a change to the way we feed our cities.
By definition, according to Maximum Yield, city farming (also known as urban farming or urban agriculture) is:
A combination of different efforts aimed at growing fruits and vegetables in an urban area and then distributing them within that specific area.
So let’s take a closer look at how this might be achieved, and how some green-thumbed entrepreneurs are earning more than USD$1000 each week by farming in their own urban yards and how you can too.
How is This Backyard Money-Making Scheme Possible?
It’s simple, people pay a premium for fresh, organic goods, even more so if they are in season produce and are varieties that are hard to find in stores.
This can be done on any time commitment, with small-time portions creating a small income, while the full-time farmers are able to rake in a very sizeable income. This is all measured on the type of production you want to run, whether it just be a small greens or mushroom patch, right up to a microfarm, which requires investment and work and has the most rewarding aspect of a homegrown business.
While there are a number of ‘how to’ guide’s out there available to you, in a general manner, the following is a step-by-step basic guide on how you would manage to get started. I would advise you to research each area a lot more to know the specifics about what might grow the best in your environment, soil and conditions, what time availability you have, and the area you live in with surrounding businesses and markets.
1. Empty The Yard
The first and most important thing you can do if you have a grass lawn like most do is to reduce it. Grass does nothing except consume water, aside from of course if you have a dog, where it can use the grass as a toilet, it is effectively useless.
In most areas, your lawn in your backyard or front yard will consume the same amount of water as most greens and vegetables would, so it is a much better way to utilize resources as you can generate food rather than just green grass.
When you are removing the grass, think about the quality of the soil you are going to be using to produce your mini-crops. Does your soil have a high nutrient count? Does it need to be fertilized? There are in fact starter crops that farmers use to replenish the nutrients of the soil to keep the ground fertile, so you may have to look into biohacking your soil for optimal results. A great source for this comes from Mother Earth News.
When it comes to soil maintenance, a quote I read on Reddit stands out very well, which says: “good gardeners grow plants, whereas great gardeners grow soil“.
2. High Yield Edible Plants For City Farming
Just looking at the nutrients of the soil above, it is important to remember that some plants will suck the nutrients out of your soil and leave your next crop with nothing in the ground whatsoever. Sure, if you want to grow something once this might work. But if you are looking at having regular seasonal harvests you are going to need to keep that bed full of nutrients.
The second part of that is ensuring that you are able to regularly harvest and sell your crops (that is, if you want to make a business out of it), so you need to select plants and vegetables that have the following traits:
- Are an in-demand product in your area
- Where the fresher the produce is the more value it has (coming from you rather than a farm hundreds of miles away)
- Has a quick turnover, so doesn’t take too long to grow
- Is not too reflective of the season, so that you can grow it all year round
There are various foods that have high turnarounds that are highly popular with urban farmers and backyard organic entrepreneurs. Six easy urban farming foods to grow are:
- Beans
- Potatoes
- Carrots
- Squash and zucchini
- Tomatoes
- Radish
These are aside from the leafy in-demand plate greens such as baby spinach and microgreens which are heavily used in organic cafes and restaurants as well as a high commodity in farmers markets.
3. Grow According To Your Available Space
Just because you have a small backyard or even an apartment, it doesn’t mean you can’t produce good amounts of fresh foods. In fact, with the right design of growing methods, you can triple the effective space of your area through looking at planting crops vertically.
Growing vine plants such as beans, tomatoes, peas and cucumbers are a great way to utilize that space. You can do this with PVC piping, wires, netting and trellises to support the vines and their heavy fruit as they grow up to six foot and produce great crops. In doing this, you need to make sure the vine plants have plenty of space in between each other and have plenty of soil to grow into, as vine-based plants often develop large root systems and draw lots of water out of the ground.
The other method is to built a plant system over another producer. This is quite common ingreenhouses, where a vegetable or plant that doesn’t need as much light can grow on the ground, while microgreens are grown on a tray at waist-height above them. This allows you to grow multiple crops at the same time with different harvest times.
No matter what type of weather zone you are in, growing all year round can be difficult to achieve just because of seasonal weather pattern changes. To combat this, many urban farmers are usinggreenhouses, customised to the length of their backyard, in order to maintain perfect growing conditions all year round.
A great source for looking at new methods of vertical growing and what to use isPinterest, which provides a great array of guides on how to grow in confined spaces, vertical farming, city farming and permaculture.
4. Make Your Profit
You might be reading this because you enjoy gardening or the idea of being a little bit more self-sufficient in life. Or, you might be reading this because you are also entrepreneurially-minded and like the idea of being able to make money by spending the time in the backyard, and on the computer researching innovations in gardening.
When it comes to generating profit, there are three methods you can achieve this by. They are:
- Selling directly to businesses such as cafes and restaurants
- Selling through farmers markets
- Selling by yourself (community shares)
For large farms, retailers buy a share of what is grown on those farms at the start of the growing season and onsell it to the customer when it is harvested. This works in the same manner when you sell yourself to your neighbors and other people in your nearby community. It takes a bit of work to set up, but essentially you need to find out what it is people want in your area and grow it for them. You are now acting as an on-demand farmer for those people and are able to deliver a freshly harvested good rather than harvesting and then selling, which comes with the risk of not being able to sell your produce.
A home like this could easily produce USD$900-$1000/wk
This same method works for the first money-making method and is the ideal scenario that will see you being able to expand your farm. If a cafe or restaurant is reliant upon you being able to produce fresh goods each month, then you have a consistent business with that buyer and are able to continually farm from your backyard and deliver to them for a great profit. This is, of course, once you are able to effectively run your own farm to constantly provide a commercial business with fresh goods every week or month.
Selling through farmers markets is simple and much easier but comes with significant risk. The risk for selling your produce at markets is that you might not be able to sell all of your product at the market, so you might have to face waste of your fresh goods. The other issue is that it depends on the foot traffic and interest of the market balanced with the stall fee you have to pay. Can you be certain you will be able to cover the stall fee, the expense of your mini farm, and the bills you need to pay to keep up the next month’s crops?
While the markets may seem like a risky option, they can also pay off quite well as you are not dealing with a demanding client, they are easy to get involved in, and generally, at a farmers market, greens and vegetables are a very in-demand product.
What are you waiting for? Pull up the grass and get the crops in.
Remember about that philosophy I mentioned at the beginning of this post on ‘just start’, if you are even slightly interested in the idea of city farming, and enjoy working outdoors, mixing science, statistics, nature and business together, then just start by getting that soil fertile and planting your first seedlings.
Farmers that only use urban properties to farm greens and vegetables are making well over USD$1000 each week by working on the exact same principles as I have written about in this post. For instance, Curtis Stone, The Urban Farmer makes $75,000 annually using the same formula, as well as various other entrepreneurs who are making similar full-time incomes running their own greens businesses.
So get started with city farming.
Hydroponics Startup Looking To Decentralize The Food Supply Chain
Hydroponics Startup Looking To Decentralize The Food Supply Chain
doitvoluntarily (75) in news • January 5, 2018
In 2016, it's estimated that the global hydroponic market was worth more than $230 million.
It's anticipated that the global market will surpass $395 million by 2020. Though there are some estimates that place the market value much higher, suggesting that it could reach more than $13 billion by 2025.
The hydroponics approach is expected to keep on growing because it provides farmers with more control over the growing process.
Not only that, but it also provides a host of benefits such as using less water, taking up less space, and helping to protect against pests, producing higher yields than traditional methods, and so on. However, some critics of the method suggest that the produce is inferior to traditional methods as far as quality and nutrients because of the way that it's grown.
The global hydroponics market is expected to grow over 6.4 percent over the next decade.
A number of different crops are able to be grown with hydroponic growing methods and they are things like cucumbers, peppers, lettuce, strawberries, and more.
Right now, Europe is said to have the largest hydroponics market, making up roughly 36.44 percent.
They are followed by the Asia Pacific region that makes the 2nd largest market in terms of revenue. Following in 3rd place is the North American market and although they might be 3rd right now, they've got the fastest growing market.
There are a variety of companies already in this space and a great deal of different hydroponic growing projects that are taking place around the world. You've got dozens of crops being grown with this method in greenhouses, in shipping containers, in backyards, and a variety of different growing spaces.
One entrepreneur who is interested in this growing method, Jonathan Partlow, spent about 5 years working on his design for a hydroponic growing system that would help to decentralize the food supply chain. He wanted to provide people with a growing medium and something that could easily work in a variety of different spaces both big and small.
Eventually, he came up with Aggressively Organic.
This company offers pint-sized hydroponics that makes it easy for people to have fresh and quality produce available right in the convenience of their own home. Partlow came up with the micro growth system you can see below.
The growing system consists of a glueless corrugated box that has a plastic liner, coco coir disc, and comes with some nutrient solution mix.
They've already shipped these mini growing systems to some farmers in a beta group and they are also looking to use the product to provide humanitarian relief to areas that are struggling with food insecurity.
One of their recent humanitarian efforts included working to get the Aggressively Organic mini growing systems to Puerto Rico. For that effort, they've set up a crowdfunding page to try and raise funds (trying to raise about $500k) to bring about 50,000 systems to the island.
With their mini design, the plan is for you to cut and take the produce when you need it.
You harvest whenever you are hungry, and when you've got dozens of different ones growing at one time it makes preparing a decent snack or meal fairly easy. Vegetables and herbs grown could be harvested within 21- 60 days; depending on what you're growing.
Partlow says that this growing method can produce lettuce using only an eighth to a quarter-gallon of water, compared to traditional growing methods which might use 3 gallons or more when trying to grow a head of lettuce. And the Micro Growth Systems are expected to retail for around $20 US and the only thing the user needs to provide is light and water.
At the moment their patent is still pending and the product is still in manufacturing, those interested can sign up on their site to try and become a beta grower.
Their system claims to be able to grow more lettuce in a 10 x 10 room than a traditional organic farm might be able to grow with a half acre of land.
Aggressively Organic is based in Indiana and they hope with their business that they'll be able to bring more than 200 jobs to the area by 2021.
Pics:
Pixabay
via GreenandVibrant.com
Twitter/Aggressively Organic
Sources:
https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20171206006224/en/Global-Hydroponics-Market-Report-2017-2023-Market-expected
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/hydroponics-market-2020-forecasts-168-cagr-with-hvac-holding-largest-share-569069051.html
http://www.freshplaza.com/article/186162/Aggressively-Organic-relief-packages-helping-Puerto-Rico-regrow-after-Hurricane-Maria
https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160811005565/en/Global-Hydroponics-Market-2015-2020---Market-anticipated
https://aggressivelyorganic.com/
http://www.gardencentermag.com/article/pint-size-hydroponics/
https://www.scalarmarketresearch.com/market-reports/hydroponics-market
http://www.freshplaza.com/article/186162/Aggressively-Organic-relief-packages-helping-Puerto-Rico-regrow-after-Hurricane-Maria
https://humanityproject.com/projects/aggressively-organic-relief-for-puerto-rico/
http://www.insideindianabusiness.com/story/37020852/fishers-ag-startup-launches-campaign-for-puerto-rico
Understanding Organic Hydroponics
Understanding Organic Hydroponics
January 2, 2018
Do you feel afraid, hesitant and indecisive about organic hydroponics?
Introduction
There are two types of hydroponic nutrients, synthetic or organic based. A synthetic is in the form of water soluble salts developed by humans for plant intake. Comparable to the way table salt separates in water to form Na+ (cation) and Ci- (anion), the pre-formulated fertilizer salts separates into the correct spectrum concentrations of needed ions components needed for plant success. Organic fertilizer components are dependent upon organism in the water to convert the organic materials into an inorganic usable form for plants. Because of the non soluble of many nature sources of nutrition, organic based hydroponic have 20 - 30% fertilizer salts with the rest being soluble organic components, such as guano, plant extracts, worm castings, potash and kelp. Because all of the components are not identical in structure and properties they separate at different rates in the solvent creating a minor pH fluctuation. This is the major difference between synthetic and organic based nutrients, but is easily conquered with patience and practice.
Reservoir Stability
Organic hydroponic reservoir tanks gain from stability because they attract and develop some level of microbial activity. In nature, the soil is regularly a stable place when it comes to temperature and to extent moisture content, pH, and fertility levels.
Good Habits
Keep hydroponic reservoir tank levels topped up to the full line with fresh nutrient water daily or automatic with a float valve.
Maintain hydroponic reservoir tank cover, heavy light can destroy the organic hydroponic nutrient solution.
Add only filtered or RO water to the organic hydroponic reservoir, tap water will contaminant the solution.
Premix your organic nutrient concentrates with a small amount of filtered water before adding to the reservoir.
Add calcium first to the hydroponic reservoir tank, to neutralize filtered water.
Monitor the pH, EC and temperature of your organic nutrient solution daily.
Bad Habits
Add a big volume of filtered water directly to a running reservoir tank that has been depleted without having any organic nutrients in it, avoid huge swings in EC, TDS, and pH.
Depend on chemical pH adjusters. Use filtered out rainwater, and if your system is running correctly, the pH will swing itself where it needs to be within a few days of mixing fresh for the first time. (pH 5.8 - 6.5)
Allow reservoir tank temperatures to fluctuate widely.
Monitoring Organic Solution
Organic hydroponic is a living and monitoring key parameters can tell you a lot about the health of your organic hydroponic systems and the needs of your plants.
Key parameters are EC, pH and nutrient water temperature
For most growers, EC is a measure of how many nutrients are in a given reservoir tank. Synthetic nutrient and mineral salts give off higher readings. Maintain a lower EC with organic solutions than you would with conventional hydroponic solutions.
pH in organic hydroponics will often start out less than optimal when first adding your nutrients to the fresh filtered water, over the course of a few days, you should see the pH finally stabilize into a fair range of 5.8 to 6.5. Once stabilized, your reservoir tank should be maintenance free expect from top-ups with filtered water and diluted nutrient concentrates.
Temperature is big. An organic hydroponics reservoir that experiences big swings in temperature is at risk of developing issues. Keep a stable 65 to 75 degree F reservoir tank temperature.
If you loved this, you might also love these posts about nutrients:
"How to mix nutrient in a hydroponic system"
Local Roots: Farm-In-A-Box Coming To A Distribution Center Near You
Local Roots: Farm-In-A-Box Coming To A Distribution Center Near You
Ars checks out shipping-container farming that’s said to have price parity with farms.
Diana Gitig - 12/16/2017, 11:00 AM
The interior of a TerraFarm | Local Roots
Eric and Matt could not be more earnest in their quest to feed the world.
These two fresh-faced LA boys founded Local Roots four years ago. Their first purchases were broken-down, 40-foot shipping containers—this is apparently easy to do, since it is cheaper for shipping companies to just churn out new ones rather than fix broken ones. Local Roots then upcycles them into modular, shippable, customizable farms, each of which can grow as much produce as five acres of farmland. The idea is to supplement, not supplant, outdoor agriculture. And Ars got a look at one of these "farms" when it was set up in New York City recently.
Every aspect of the TerraFarm, as the repurposed shipping containers have been dubbed, has been designed and optimized. The gently pulsing LED lights are purplish—apparently, that’s what lettuce likes—and the solution in which the plants are grown is clean and clear. The "farm" is bright and vibrant, and it smells great in there.
This environment came about because Local Roots consulted a lot of experts. It employs horticulturalists, mechanical, electrical, and environmental engineers, software and AI developers, and data and nutrition scientists. The company does this to ensure that the growing conditions and produce are always optimal—both for the plants' growth and their nutritional content.
TerraFarms use no pesticides, herbicides, or fertilizers—they don’t have to. This means they generate no toxic runoff, and the produce fits most definitions of organic food. They use 99-percent less water and obviously much less land than outdoor farms. Since the farms are indoors, they are not subject to the vagaries of weather, be it the extreme temperatures, storms, and droughts brought on by climate change or the more mundane conditions of heat, cold, or dryness that exist outside of LA.
They can be moved anywhere—desert, tundra, underground, and even Mars, as both Eric and Matt pointed out independently of each other. Wherever the TerraFarms are, their conditions will be constantly monitored by the experts back at HQ in Vernon, California, just outside of downtown LA, where Local Roots recently built a huge new facility.
The difference two weeks makes
Most of the crops that we grow today have been bred for the stability of the final product, whether a fruit or leaf or root. This way, the produce can last for the two weeks it takes to truck it from where it's grown (California, for example, which produces more food than any other state) to wherever it's headed. But TerraFarms is intended to reside and be staffed near distribution centers for major retailers, never further than 50 miles from the consumers eating the produce. So most of that same two-week period will elapse while the produce is in your fridge.
Regardless of their location, TerraFarms will provide people with fresh, local, organic produce all year long. Local Roots thus seems to have managed to attain both the benefits of small organic farms—i.e., fresh, local produce—while keeping the benefits of large, industrialized agriculture, like technical expertise and centralized distribution.
Local Roots already provides food to SpaceX, Tender Greens, and Mendocino Farms, and the United Nations World Food Programme has just purchased TerraFarms to provide produce to developing areas of the world; although the Food Programme supplies essentials like rice and beans, about two million people still suffer from micronutrient deficiencies which other produce can alleviate.
A solution like this in a developing economy doesn't seem to make much sense on the surface. But the company is now claiming that it has achieved cost parity with traditional, outdoor farming. It's the first in the indoor/urban/vertical farming model to have done so, possibly because the shipping containers allow them to generate more farmland more quickly and more cheaply than can be done in a warehouse or other indoor systems.
Thus far, Local Roots has concentrated on growing greens—lettuces and some herbs. Since these are highly perishable, they benefit the most from being grown locally and getting to consumers quickly. But in principle, each TerraFarm can be customized to grown anything, anywhere. Which might be a very good thing, as climate change is not going to be good for the coffee crop.