Welcome to iGrow News, Your Source for the World of Indoor Vertical Farming
Agrify (AGFY) Enters Into Binding Letter of Intent For An Additional $3M Contract With Hannah Industries For Facility Build-Out And Installation of 179 Vertical Farming Units
Agrify Corporation (NasdaqCM: AGFY) (“Agrify” or the “Company”), a developer of highly advanced and proprietary precision hardware and software grow solutions for the indoor agriculture marketplace
February 19, 2021
Agrify Corporation (NasdaqCM: AGFY) (“Agrify” or the “Company”), a developer of highly advanced and proprietary precision hardware and software grow solutions for the indoor agriculture marketplace, today announced it has entered into a binding letter of intent, which sets forth the principal terms of a contract currently being negotiated with Hannah Industries (“Hannah”), a leading Tier 2 producer and distributor of cannabis in Washington State, for the design and build-out of an approximately 30,000 square foot facility. The contract will include facility build-out services in total of $3 million and annual SaaS revenue of approximately $285,000. Such payments will be financed by Agrify, are to be made monthly over a two-year period commencing upon the first successful harvest, and will reflect an APR of 25%. The agreement for this design and build-out will be in addition to the previously purchased 179 Vertical Farming Units (“VFUs”) and is part of Agrify’s turnkey solution to its customers. The work is expected to be completed by early Q4 2021, subject to entry into a definitive agreement.
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“We are especially proud to be selected by Hannah Industries, a leading producer and distributor in the State of Washington. Their decision to upgrade from the traditional grow methodology to Agrify’s integrated vertical farming solution is the strongest testimony of our joint belief that Agrify’s solution will help Hannah Industries to produce the highest quality cannabis flowers consistently. We’re thrilled to have been chosen again by Hannah for the facility design, construction, and installation of our proprietary and advanced grow solutions,” said Raymond Chang, Chief Executive Officer of Agrify. “Agrify VFUs and Agrify Insights software should also help Hannah realize increased levels of automation, control, transparency, and repeatability. We expect this will be a great win for our team, and we look forward to working with Hannah to successfully implement it.”
“The current market is very competitive, and consumers have lots of options. One of the most important things to our business is being able to deliver a consistent, high-quality supply of cannabis to our retail partners,” said Jason Whitney, Chief Executive Officer of Hannah. “The Agrify grow system and software allow us to have an extremely high level of control over the grow, helping us meet our customers’ needs. In addition, the information Agrify Insights software provides will allow our team to make real-time decisions on supply chain management based on feedback from our customers. This evolution in the industry is one of the reasons we are extremely pleased to be implementing the Agrify solution for our cultivation facility.”
Vertical Barrels Components "Ready For Vertical Farming Integration"
The aponix vertical barrel system is an alternative vertical NFT solution from Germany that can be used instead of rack systems to use vertical space more efficiently in hydroponic setups and at the same time use natural sunlight better
The aponix vertical barrel system is an alternative vertical NFT solution from Germany that can be used instead of rack systems to use vertical space more efficiently in hydroponic setups and at the same time use natural sunlight better. The system aims to maximize the number of possible grow spaces per level arranged in a given 3D room by increasing the diameter from a ‘Tower’ to a ‘Barrel’.
The whole system is based on lego-like ring segment pieces that serve either as spacers or provide differently organized inserts for standard 2-inch netpots. Assembling multiple of these ring segment pieces will result in stackable ring segments or barrel levels to assemble one or multiple such vertical cylinders. With more ring segments stacked, the height and the number of grow spaces are increased.
By the end of 2020 aponix will have developed the new ‘Version 3’ that will incorporate all collected improvements from the existing global user base from the last 3 years and adding a few more features:
Liquid will be guided more precisely inside. It will also have a new more robust and tight connection mechanism and air traps to keep liquid inside also on high flow rates.
There will be a backwards-compatible and reusable grow plug insert, that is supposed to replace 2-inch one-time use plastic netpots also in other systems. It will also have an optional plant trellis insert to grow larger flowers and fruiting dwarf varieties.
There will be a new lid-base that speeds up setup of lines of vertical barrels and enable rotation of the units if needed.
There will also be a dedicated sprinkler dome lid enabling different sprinkler options including own solutions and also the own existing pressure-less irrigation option using the waterbuffer.
Vertical barrels will be more stable and can be built higher unsing the new V3 part.
There will only be a single ring segment piece in ‘Version 3’ with 2 grow pod inserts that only allow 2 stacking positions instead of 4 in V2. If spaces are unused they can be capped with a nice green cover plug.
As of 2020 aponix also changed their market strategy from looking for distributors to starting to work only with product partners who bring in own engineering and create more specific and distinguishable solutions based on aponix components. Aponix parts are now defined as being mere infrastructure parts that always need to be integrated into a greater individual context involving more or less horticulture engineering depending on the application. Which means product partners create their own unique solutions based on aponix components adding other external even competitive pieces, logic and/or service and market them independently under their own brand and own product name.
For more information:
Aponix
hello@aponix.eu
www.aponix.eu
18 Feb 2021
Little Leaf Farms Raises $90M to Grow Its Greenhouse Network
Massachusetts-based Little Leaf Farms has raised $90 million in a debt and equity financing round to expand its network of hydroponic greenhouses on the East Coast. The round was led by Equilibrium Capital as well as founding investors Bill Helman and Pilot House Associates. Bank of America also participated.
by Jennifer Marston
Image from: Little Leaf Farms
Massachusetts-based Little Leaf Farms has raised $90 million in a debt and equity financing round to expand its network of hydroponic greenhouses on the East Coast. The round was led by Equilibrium Capital as well as founding investors Bill Helman and Pilot House Associates. Bank of America also participated.
Little Leaf Farms says the capital is “earmarked” to build new greenhouse sites along the East Coast, where its lettuce is currently available in about 2,500 stores.
The company already operates one 10-acre greenhouse in Devins, Massachusetts. Its facility grows leafy greens using hydroponics and a mixture of sunlight supplemented by LED-powered grow lights. Rainwater captured from the facility’s roof provides most of the water used on the farm.
According to a press release, Little Leaf Farms has doubled its retail sales to $38 million since 2019. And last year, the company bought180 acres of land in Pennsylvania on which to build an additional facility. Still another greenhouse, slated for North Carolina, will serve the Southeast region of the U.S.
Little Leaf Farms joins the likes of Revol Greens, Gotham Greens, AppHarvest, and others in bringing local(ish) greens to a greater percentage of the population. These facilities generally pack and ship their greens on the day of or day after harvesting, and only supply retailers within a certain radius. Little Leaf Farms, for example, currently servers only parts of Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New York, and New Jersey.
The list of regions the company serves will no doubt lengthen as the company builds up its greenhouse network in the coming months.
VIDEO: How This Vertical Farm Grows 80,000 Pounds of Produce Per Week
Bowery Farming is a network of vertical farms working to reengineer the growing process
Bowery Farming Uses Technology To Prioritize
Accessibility And Sustainability In Their Produce
Growing Operations
by Terri Ciccone and Eater Video Feb 20, 2021
To some, the pristine growing conditions and perceived mechanical interference of a vertical farm can seem unnatural, but at Bowery Farming “interference” is actually not the goal at all. “We don’t really think about how people are involved in the growing process, but how to take people out of the growing process,” says chief science officer Henry Sztul. “Our goal is actually to have as few people walking around our plants as possible.”
Bowery Farming is a network of vertical farms working to reengineer the growing process. Using a system of light and watering technology, Bowery is able to use 95 percent less water than a traditional outdoor farm, zero pesticides, and chemicals, and grow food that tastes as good as anyone else’s.
Bowery Farming uses vertical farm-specific seeds that are optimized for flavor instead of insect resistance and durability. Seeds are mechanically pressed into trays of soil and sent out into growing positions, or racks within the building that have their own lighting and watering systems. Each tray gets its own QR code so that they can be monitored and assigned a customized plan for water and light until they’re ready to be harvested.
Irving Fain, Bowery Farming’s founder, and CEO contemplates the prediction from the United Nations that 70 to 80 percent of the world’s population will be living in and around cities in the next 30 years. “Figuring out” how do you feed and how do you provide fresh food to urban environments both more efficiently as well as more sustainably?’ is a very important question today, and an even more important question in the years to come.”
Indoor Farming Gains Ground Amid Pandemic, Climate Challenges
Investors used to brush off Amin Jadavji’s pitch to buy Elevate Farms’ vertical growing technology and produce stacks of leafy greens indoors with artificial light. Now, indoor farms are positioning themselves as one of the solutions to coronavirus pandemic-induced disruptions to the harvesting, shipping, and sale of food
Investors say urban farming can boost food security despite rising inflation, trade tensions and global food shortages.
Image from: Reuters via AppHarvest
Investors used to brush off Amin Jadavji’s pitch to buy Elevate Farms’ vertical growing technology and produce stacks of leafy greens indoors with artificial light.
“They would say, ‘This is great, but it sounds like a science experiment,'” said Jadavji, CEO of Toronto, Canada-based Elevate.
Now, indoor farms are positioning themselves as one of the solutions to coronavirus pandemic-induced disruptions to the harvesting, shipping, and sale of food.
“It’s helped us change the narrative,” said Jadavji, whose company runs a vertical farm in Ontario, and is building others in New York and New Zealand.
Proponents, including the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), say urban farming increases food security at a time of rising inflation and limited global supplies. North American produce output is concentrated in Mexico and the US southwest, including California, which is prone to wildfires and other severe weather.
Climate-change concerns are also accelerating investments, including by agribusiness giant Bayer AG, into multi-storey vertical farms or greenhouses the size of 50 football fields.
They are enabling small North American companies like Elevate to bolster indoor production and compete with established players BrightFarms, AeroFarms and Plenty, backed by Amazon.com Inc founder Jeff Bezos.
But critics question the environmental cost of indoor farms’ high power requirements.
Vertical farms grow leafy greens indoors in stacked layers or on walls of foliage inside of warehouses or shipping containers. They rely on artificial light, temperature control and growing systems with minimal soil that involve water or mist, instead of the vast tracts of land in traditional agriculture.
Image from: Reuters via AppHarvest
Greenhouses can harness the sun’s rays and have lower power requirements. Well-established in Asia and Europe, greenhouses are expanding in North America, using greater automation.
Investments in global indoor farms totalled a record-high $500m in 2020, AgFunder research head Louisa Burwood-Taylor said.
The average investment last year rose sharply, as large players including BrightFarms and Plenty raised fresh capital, she said.
A big funding acceleration lies ahead, after pandemic food disruptions – such as infections among migrant workers that harvest North American produce – raised concerns about supply disruptions, said Joe Crotty, director of corporate finance at accounting firm KPMG, which advises vertical farms and provides investment banking services.
“The real ramp-up is the next three to five years,” Crotty said.
Vegetables grown in vertical farms or greenhouses are still just a fraction of overall production. US sales of food crops grown under cover, including tomatoes, cucumbers and lettuce, amounted to 358 million kilogrammes (790 million pounds) in 2019, up 50 percent from 2014, according to the USDA.
California’s outdoor head lettuce production alone was nearly four times larger, at 1.3 billion kg (2.9 billion pounds).
Image from: Reuters via AppHarvest
The USDA is seeking members for a new urban agriculture advisory committee to encourage indoor and other emerging farm practices.
Plant Breeding Moves Indoors
Bayer, one of the world’s biggest seed developers, aims to provide the plant technology to expand vertical agriculture. In August, it teamed with Singapore sovereign fund Temasek to create Unfold, a California-based company, with $30m in seed money.
Unfold says it is the first company focused on designing seeds for indoor lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, spinach and cucumbers, using Bayer germplasm, a plant’s genetic material, said Chief Executive John Purcell.
Their advances may include, for example, more compact plants and an increased breeding focus on quality, Purcell said.
Unfold hopes to make its first sales by early 2022, targeting existing farms, and startups in Singapore and the United Kingdom.
Greenhouses are also expanding, touting higher yields than open-field farming.
AppHarvest, which grows tomatoes in a 60-acre greenhouse in Morehead, Kentucky, broke ground on two more in the state last year. The company aims to operate 12 facilities by 2025.
Its greenhouses are positioned to reach 70 percent of the US population within a day’s drive, giving them a transportation edge over the southwest produce industry, said Chief Executive Jonathan Webb.
“We’re looking to rip the produce industry out of California and Mexico and bring it over here,” Webb said.
Projected global population growth will require a large increase in food production, a tough proposition outdoors given frequent disasters and severe weather, he said.
Image from: Reuters via AppHarvest
New York-based BrightFarms, which runs four greenhouses, positions them near major US cities, said Chief Executive Steve Platt. The company, whose customers include grocers Kroger and Walmart, plans to open its two largest farms this year, in North Carolina and Massachusetts.
Platt expects that within a decade, half of all leafy greens in the US will come from indoor farms, up from less than 10 percent currently.
“It’s a whole wave moving in this direction because the system we have today isn’t set up to feed people across the country,” he said.
‘Crazy, Crazy Things’
But Stan Cox, research scholar for non-profit The Land Institute, is sceptical of vertical farms. They depend on grocery store premiums to offset higher electricity costs for lighting and temperature control, he said.
“The whole reason we have agriculture is to harvest sunlight that’s hitting the earth every day,” he said. “We can get it for free.”
Bruce Bugbee, a professor of environmental plant physiology at Utah State University, has studied space farming for NASA. But he finds power-intensive vertical farming on Earth far-fetched.
“Venture capital goes into all kinds of crazy, crazy things and this is another thing on the list.”
Bugbee estimates that vertical farms use 10 times the energy to produce food as outdoor farms, even factoring in the fuel to truck conventional produce across the country from California.
AeroFarms, operator of one of the world’s largest vertical farms, based in a former New Jersey steel mill, says comparing energy use with outdoor agriculture is not straightforward. Produce that ships long distances has a higher spoilage rate and many outdoor produce farms use irrigated water and pesticides, said Chief Executive Officer David Rosenberg.
Vertical farmers tout other environmental benefits.
Elevate uses a closed-loop system to water plants automatically, collect moisture that plants emit and then re-water them with it. Such a system requires two percent of the water used on an outdoor romaine lettuce operation, Jadavji said. The company uses no pesticides.
“I think we’re solving a problem,” he said.
Agritech: Precision Farming With AI, IoT and 5G
For a company that grows and delivers vegetables, Boomgrow Productions Sdn Bhd’s office is nothing like a farm, or even a vertical farm. Where farms are bedecked with wheelbarrows, spades and hoes, Boomgrow’s floor plan is akin to a co-working space with a communal island table, several cubicles, comfortable armchairs, a cosy hanging rattan chair and a glass-walled conference room in the middle
Image from: Photo by Mohd Izwan Mohd Nazam/The Edge
For a company that grows and delivers vegetables, Boomgrow Productions Sdn Bhd’s office is nothing like a farm, or even a vertical farm.
Where farms are bedecked with wheelbarrows, spades and hoes, Boomgrow’s floor plan is akin to a co-working space with a communal island table, several cubicles, comfortable armchairs, a cosy hanging rattan chair and a glass-walled conference room in the middle.
At a corner, propped up along a walkway leading to a rectangular chamber fitted with grow lights, are rows of support stilts with hydroponic planters developed in-house and an agricultural technologist perched on a chair, perusing data. “This is where some of the R&D work happens,” says Jay Dasen, co-founder of the agritech start-up.
But there is a larger farm where most of the work behind this high-tech initiative is executed. Located a stone’s throw from the city centre in Ampang is a 40ft repurposed shipping container outfitted with perception technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities that mimic the ideal environment to produce more than 50,000kg of vegetables a year.
Stacked in vertical layers, Boomgrow’s vegetables are grown under artificial lights with Internet of Things (IoT) sensors to detect everything from leaf discolouration to nitrate composition. This is coupled with AI and machine learning algorithms.
Boomgrow is the country’s first 5G-connected vertical farm. With the low latency and larger bandwidth technology, the start-up is able to monitor production in real time as well as maintain key parameters, such as temperature and humidity, to ensure optimal growth conditions.
When Jay and her co-founders, K Muralidesan and Shan Palani, embarked on this initiative six years ago, Boomgrow was nowhere near what it is today.
The three founders got together hoping to do their part in building a more sustainable future. “I’ve spent years advising small and large companies on sustainability, environmental and social governance disclosures. I even embarked on a doctorate in sustainability disclosure and governance,” says Jay.
“But I felt a deep sense of disconnect because while I saw companies evolving in terms of policies, processes and procedures towards sustainability, the people in those organisations were not transforming. Sustainability is almost like this white noise in the background. We know it’s important and we know it needs to be done, but we don’t really know how to integrate it into our lives.
“That disconnect really troubled me. When we started Boomgrow, it wasn’t a linear journey. Boomgrow is something that came out of meaningful conversations and many years of research.”
Shan, on the other hand, was an architect who developed a taste for sustainable designs when he was designing modular structures with minimal impact on their surroundings between regular projects. “It was great doing that kind of work. But I was getting very dissatisfied because the projects were customer-driven, which meant I would end up having debates about trivial stuff such as the colour of wall tiles,” he says.
As for Murali, the impetus to start Boomgrow came from having lived overseas — while working in capital markets and financial services — where quality and nutritious produce was easily available.
Ultimately, they concluded that the best way to work towards their shared sustainability goals was to address the imminent problem of food shortage.
“By 2050, the world’s population is expected to grow to 9.7 billion people, two-thirds of whom will be in Asia-Pacific. Feeding all those people will definitely be a huge challenge,” says Jay.
“The current agricultural practice is not built for resilience, but efficiency. So, when you think of farming, you think of vast tracts of land located far away from where you live or shop.
“The only way we could reimagine or rethink that was to make sure the food is located closer to consumers, with a hyperlocal strategy that is traceable and transparent, and also free of pesticides.”
Having little experience in growing anything, it took them a while to figure out the best mechanism to achieve their goal. “After we started working on prototypes, we realised that the tropics are not designed for certain types of farming,” says Jay.
“And then, there is the problem of harmful chemicals and pesticides everywhere, which has become a necessity for farmers to protect their crops because of the unpredictable climate. We went through many iterations … when we started, we used to farm in little boxes, but that didn’t quite work out.”
They explored different methodologies, from hydroponics to aquaponics, and even started growing outdoors. But they lost a lot of crops when a heat wave struck.
That was when they started exploring more effective ways to farm. “How can we protect the farm from terrible torrential rains, plant 365 days a year and keep prices affordable? It took us five years to answer these questions,” says Jay.
Even though farmers all over the world currently produce more than enough food to feed everyone, 820 million people — roughly 11% of the global population — did not have enough to eat in 2018, according to the World Health Organization. Concurrently, food safety and quality concerns are rising, with more consumers opting for organically produced food as well as safe foods, out of fear of harmful synthetic fertilisers, pesticides, herbicides and fungicides.
According to ResearchAndMarkets.com, consumer demand for global organic fruit and vegetables was valued at US$19.16 billion in 2019 and is anticipated to expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6.5% by 2026.
Meanwhile, the precision farming market was estimated to be US$7 billion in 2020 and is projected to reach US$12.8 billion by 2025, at a CAGR of 12.7% between 2020 and 2025, states MarketsandMarkets Research Pte Ltd.
Malaysia currently imports RM1 billion worth of leafy vegetables from countries such as Australia, China and Japan. Sourcing good and safe food from local suppliers not only benefits the country from a food security standpoint but also improves Malaysia’s competitive advantage, says Jay.
Unlike organic farming — which is still a soil-based method — tech-enabled precision farming has the advantage of catering for increasing demand and optimum crop production with the limited resources available. Moreover, changing weather patterns due to global warming encourage the adoption of advanced farming technologies to enhance farm productivity and crop yield.
Boomgrow’s model does not require the acres of land that traditional farms need, Jay emphasises. With indoor farms, the company promises a year-round harvest, undisturbed by climate and which uses 95% less water, land and fuel to operate.
Traditional farming is back-breaking labour. But with precision technology, farmers can spend less time on the farm and more on doing other things to develop their business, she says.
Boomgrow has secured more than RM300,000 in funding via technology and innovation grants from SME Corporation Malaysia, PlaTCOM Ventures and Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation, and is on track to build the country’s largest indoor farms.
Image from: Boomgrow
The company got its chance to showcase the strength of its smart technology when Telekom Malaysia Bhd (TM) approached it to be a part of the telco’s Smart Agriculture cluster in Langkawi last October.
“5G makes it faster for us to process the multiple data streams that we need because we collect data for machine learning, and then AI helps us to make decisions faster,” Jay explains.
“We manage the farm using machines to study inputs like water and electricity and even measure humidity. All the farm’s produce is lab-tested and we can keep our promise that there are no pesticides, herbicides or any preserving chemicals. We follow the food safety standards set by the EU, where nitrate accumulation in plant tissues is a big issue.”
With TM’s 5G technology and Boomgrow’s patent-pending technology, the latter is able to grow vegetables like the staple Asian greens and highland crops such as butterhead and romaine lettuce as well as kale and mint. While the company is able to grow more than 30 varieties of leafy greens, it has decided to stick to a selection of crops that is most in demand to reduce waste, says Jay.
As it stands, shipping containers are the best fit for the company’s current endeavour as containerised modular farms are the simplest means of bringing better food to local communities. However, it is also developing a blueprint to house farms in buildings, she says.
Since the showcase, Boomgrow has started to supply its crops to various hotels in Langkawi. It rolled out its e-commerce platform last year after the Movement Control Order was imposed.
“On our website, we promise to deliver the greens within six hours of harvest. But actually, you could get them way earlier. We harvest the morning after the orders come in and the vegetables are delivered on the same day,” says Jay.
Being mindful of Boomgrow’s carbon footprint, orders are organised and scheduled according to consumers’ localities, she points out. “We don’t want our delivery partners zipping everywhere, so we stagger the orders based on where consumers live.
“For example, all deliveries to Petaling Jaya happen on Thursdays, but the vegetables are harvested that morning. They are not harvested a week before, three days before or the night before. This is what it means to be hyperlocal. We want to deliver produce at its freshest and most nutritious state.”
Plans to expand regionally are also underway, once Boomgrow’s fundraising exercise is complete, says Jay. “Most probably, this will only happen when the Covid-19 pandemic ends.”
To gain the knowledge they have today, the team had to “unlearn” everything they knew and take up new skills to figure what would work best for their business, says Jay. “All this wouldn’t have been possible if we had not experimented with smart cameras to monitor the condition of our produce,” she laughs.
New Freight Farms CMO Shares 4 Reasons Why He Moved From Sportswear To AgTech
After an amazing experience and professional success, James felt that he needed a change: a new challenge, a new industry, a new way to make an impact
Former Senior Director Global Marketing at Reebok shares his reasons for joining Freight Farms C-Suite
James Woolard spent the last 14 years at Reebok, heading up everything from regional Sports Marketing and Brand to Global Marketing for the brand’s Running and Style units. After an amazing experience and professional success, James felt that he needed a change: a new challenge, a new industry, a new way to make an impact. His search brought him to the world of AgTech and Freight Farms, where he saw the huge potential of both the company and the industry and knew it was just what he had been looking for. Today, James shares the four big reasons why he was so drawn to the AgTech industry, and how he believes his previous experience will help propel Freight Farms forward.
In the past, I have always resisted “building a social presence” as a result of a (very British) suspicion of people’s real motives and my own laziness in maintaining it. In truth, the former reason is an easy cover story for the latter. However, in this case, my aversion to online social platforms has been overruled by a greater feeling that I want to share: Gratitude.
I am grateful for the experiences I have had, the people I have been fortunate enough to meet, and excited by all the opportunities in the future. However, most recently I am grateful for the opportunity to become the Chief Marketing Officer of Freight Farms. There were several small reasons to make the switch–but they all scaffold up to four somewhat big reasons:
Creating a Simple Solution for a Complex Problem
A pioneer of indoor agriculture and a leader in hydroponic container farming, Freight Farms has a suite of products and technology that can revolutionize access to hyper-local fresh grown produce. Our products reflect a level of complex design and engineering on which far cleverer people than me tirelessly work; yet the solution we are creating is incredibly simple — A 2.5-acre smart farm in a 40ft freight container that can go anywhere in the world to provide food security. With already over 300 of our farms around the world, we are building a tech-connected network of farmers who are simultaneously solving food access issues in their own communities and building a new global food system–all powered by Freight Farms technology.
1 in 6 people in the world relies on food imports to feed them daily. This number is set to reach 3 in 6 by 2050.
9 counties–mostly in California–are responsible for most of the food supply within the U.S. Any disruption (fires, drought, etc) can be catastrophic to the whole system.
In the U.S., 19 million people currently live in food deserts with limited access to healthy and nutritious fresh foods.
2. Leveraging Cross-Category Experience
In addition, I am incredibly grateful to my former colleagues at Reebok and Adidas. I was lucky enough to have a robust education in the UK Sports industry and be part of and learn from an amazing Adidas leadership team. I was fortunate enough to come to the US, understand firsthand the dynamics of a global business, and meet a diverse range of interesting people. And I got to set up my family in Boston.
Now it is time to apply this experience to Freight Farms. Why the move from sports to Agtech you might ask? Yes, I needed the change and new challenge. And yes I would be lying if I said I targeted Agtech but sometimes you find what you need without realizing it. I am still a sports fan at heart — and when I first walked into the offices I walked into a locker room full of energy and talent. I was intrigued and hooked early on. I met Jon — who a decade earlier had looked at a Freight container and thought “why can’t I put a farm in there and build a business helping people anywhere in the world access fresh, hyper-local food”; I met a team of people (young, purposeful, talented ones) like Caroline, our Director of Marketing and Community Relations, with huge potential and authenticity who wanted to learn and grow; I met a new CEO in Rick and CTO in Jake with pedigree and passion; I saw a set of investors led by Ospraie Management and Spark Capital backing this all with capital.
3. Driving Profits for Company & Customers
At Freight Farms, I saw the impact I personally could have on the business. We have a thriving community of customers who have been essential in building Freight Farms’ success. The stories are inspiring, and I am eager to apply my experience to help Freight Farmers achieve their own individual success with the best possible support from our company. At the end of the day, we can’t be shy about saying “people need to make money”, because that’s the only way our mission to build a global infrastructure of local farms can succeed. I am here to embrace this and say ‘how can we create a return on investment for every stakeholder’? This is how we will grow.
4. Saying ‘No’ to Greenwashing and ‘Yes’ to Tech for Good
I am conscious of the perceived need to be on trend with “sustainability”, of the danger of falling into buzzwords and jargon that are of the moment. There is a business model and story myriad people are chasing. This is all happening parallel to a degradation of our trust in technology; as a society, we recognize it’s time to direct it towards something good. With three girls under 12 (all over using screens in Covid times), I see the benefits and dangers. We all see the power of the big brands and how algorithms are driving division. I believe people want to see positive expressions of technology beyond driving up their 401k. Combined, these two factors unlock our greatest brand strength in 2021: we already do leverage technology and data to create a truly sustainable product. There’s no need to spin, exaggerate, or greenwash. We can carry on doing exactly what we are doing with confidence that we’re creating the kind of positive impact the world needs.
That’s what is most exciting about entering the ‘Agtech’ industry: the moniker actually means something — the former (Agriculture) consistently driving change throughout history, and the latter (tech) acting as the most rapid accelerator of that change in my lifetime. It’s exhilarating, and I can’t wait to see how far we can take it.
Learn more about Freight Farms.
Freight Farms
Empowering anyone to grow food anywhere. Freight Farms makes local food accessible in any climate with the Greenery™ container farm.
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3
These Buildings Combine Affordable Housing And Vertical Farming
Inside each building, the ground level will offer community access, while the greenhouse fills the second, third, and fourth floors, covering 70,000 square feet and growing around a million pounds of produce a year
A Million Pounds of Produce A Year, Along With Housing And Jobs.
[Image: Harriman/Gyde/courtesy Vertical Harvest]
02-18-21
Some vertical farms grow greens in old warehouses, former steel mills, or other sites set apart from the heart of cities. But a new series of projects will build multistory greenhouses directly inside affordable housing developments.
“Bringing the farm back to the city center can have a lot of benefits,” says Nona Yehia, CEO of Vertical Harvest, a company that will soon break ground on a new building in Westbrook, Maine, that combines a vertical farm with affordable housing. Similar developments will follow in Chicago and in Philadelphia, where a farm-plus-housing will be built in the Tioga District, an opportunity zone.
[Image: Harriman/Gyde/courtesy Vertical Harvest]
“I think what we’ve truly understood in the past year and a half—although we’ve been rooted in it all along—is that we have in this country converging economic, climate, and health crises that are rooted in people’s access to healthy food, resilient, nourishing jobs, and fair housing,” Yehia says. “And we saw this as an urban redevelopment tool that has the potential to address all three.”
Nona Yehia [Image: Harriman/Gyde/courtesy Vertical Harvest]
The company launched in 2015 on a vacant lot in Jackson, Wyoming, aiming in part to create jobs for people with physical and developmental disabilities in the area. In 2019, it got a contract from Fannie Mae to explore how its greenhouses could help with the challenge of food security and nutrition, studying how a farm could be integrated into an existing affordable housing development in Chicago as a model for new projects.
Now, as it moves forward with the Chicago project and expands to other cities, it will also create new jobs for people who might have otherwise had difficulty finding work, working with local stakeholders to identify underserved populations. “Part of this is providing healthy, nutritious food,” Yehia says, “but also jobs at livable wages. We’re positioning all of our firms to address the new minimum wage level of $15 an hour with a path towards career development.”
[Image: Harriman/Gyde/courtesy Vertical Harvest]
Inside each building, the ground level will offer community access, while the greenhouse fills the second, third, and fourth floors, covering 70,000 square feet and growing around a million pounds of produce a year. (The amount of housing varies by site; in Maine, the plan includes 50 unites of housing, and the project will also create 50 new jobs.) In Chicago, there may be a community kitchen on the first level. In each location, residents will be able to buy fresh produce on-site; Vertical Harvest also plans to let others in the neighborhood buy greens directly from the farm. While it will sell to supermarkets, restaurants, hospitals, and other large customers, it also plans to subsidize 10-15% of its harvest for local food pantries and other community organizations. “By creating a large-scale farm in a food desert we are creating a large source of healthy, locally grown food 365 days a year,” she says.
Correction: We’ve updated this article to note that the project in Maine has 50 units of housing, not 15, and the company received a contract—not a grant—from Fannie Mae.
ADELE PETERS
ADELE PETERS IS A STAFF WRITER AT FAST COMPANY WHO FOCUSES ON SOLUTIONS TO SOME OF THE WORLD'S LARGEST PROBLEMS, FROM CLIMATE CHANGE TO HOMELESSNESS. PREVIOUSLY, SHE WORKED WITH GOOD, BIOLITE, AND THE SUSTAINABLE PRODUCTS AND SOLUTIONS PROGRAM AT UC BERKELEY, AND CONTRIBUTED TO THE SECOND EDITION OF THE BESTSELLING BOOK "WORLDCHANGING: A USER'S GUIDE FOR THE 21ST CENTURY."
WEBINAR: Learning Transfer From The Cannabis Industry To The Vertical Farming Industry
We are thrilled to organize a Webinar focusing on the technical aspects and experience of these experts
MARCH 3, 2021
AT 16:00 Central European Time
ONLINE
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Critical Lessons: Learning Transfer from the Cannabis Industry to the Vertical Farming Industry
We are thrilled to organize a Webinar focusing on the technical aspects and experience of these experts:
Our speaker Emil Breza is Co-Founder, President, and CEO of AgricUltra™ Advancements Inc. Bringing together his interdisciplinary technical expertise and many years of product development and innovation he introduced to AgricUltra a PlantFirst™ design approach to create one of the industries most advanced Turn-Key Vertical solutions for Controlled Environment Agriculture applications.
Prior to founding AgricUltra, Emil had years of experience in Process Engineering, the Automotive Industry, Professional consulting, and the Military where he honed his ability to identify the root cause of problems and develop solutions that are outside the box.
Our speaker Buck Young is co-founder and Executive Director at CannTx Life Sciences Inc, a Canadian LP focused on leveraging innovation and science to produce exceptional cannabis products and provide solutions to the industry. He is also the CEO of Saed Technologies Ltd, which develops and licenses technologies related to plant propagation, a Board member of Mary Agrotechnologies, and sits on the management committee for a cannabis botanical drug strategic alliance with Devonian Health Group. He is passionate about translating research findings into commercial outcomes, advancing the adoption of precision agriculture, and understanding nature’s pharmacopeia.
Emil Breza
Buck Young
Dr. Joel Cuello
Please register here, there is only a limited number of tickets available.
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CANADA - CALGARY: Local Produce Options Expand With Vertically Farmed Greens
The newest local player is Allpa Vertical Farms. The company is headed by three young entrepreneurs who used their shared interest in food, sustainability, and engineering to build a vertical farming operation
Elizabeth Chorney-Booth
Feb 20, 2021
Pictured is a package of sunflower microgreens produced by ALLPA in Calgary on Thursday, February 11, 2021. Azin Ghaffari/Postmedia PHOTO BY AZIN GHAFFARI /Azin Ghaffari/Postmedia
Over the years, the local food movement has grown from a handful of agriculture advocates touting the importance of supporting local farmers to a large-scale demand for everything from meat to chocolate that’s been produced and, when possible, grown here in Alberta. With Canada’s Agriculture Day being this Tuesday, it’s as good a time as any to celebrate homegrown products, be it artisanal honey or good ol’ Alberta beef.
Yet, as we look outside at our February weather, it’s obvious that some of our favourite foods simply can’t grow in abundance here. Greenhouse technology allows farmers to grow local cucumbers and tomatoes alongside wheat and canola fields, but greenhouses take up a lot of real estate. A new breed of urban farmer is using vertical farming techniques to grow crops like microgreens and baby kale on a much smaller footprint, right inside the city limits.
Pictured are some of the microgreens produced by Allpa in Calgary. Azin Ghaffari/Postmedia PHOTO BY AZIN GHAFFARI /Azin Ghaffari/Postmedia
The newest local player is Allpa Vertical Farms. The company is headed by three young entrepreneurs who used their shared interest in food, sustainability, and engineering to build a vertical farming operation. It involves vertically stacked levels of plants, grown indoors, usually in a warehouse or shipping container. The lighting, irrigation, and soil are carefully controlled so that crop yields aren’t reliant on exterior factors like weather and sunlight.
Allpa specializes in microgreens, growing radish, broccoli, sunflower, and arugula sprouts that can be bought by the tub at the Italian Centre Shop and all Sunterra locations. Since microgreens only take about 11 days to go from seed to harvest, the Allpa crew can grow their greens to order, making for less food waste.
From left: Andrey Salazar and Guillermo Borges, Allpa co-founders, with Zakk Tambasco, head of production, with their products. Azin Ghaffari/Postmedia PHOTO BY AZIN GHAFFARI /Azin Ghaffari/Postmedia
“The company (began) with an internal conflict I had between climate change and farming,” says founder Andrey Salazar, who grew up on a coffee farm in Columbia and has studied physics and electrical engineering in Calgary. “I wanted to combine my background as a farmer and my practical skills as an engineer, so I went to my garage and started building the equipment.”
Allpa is far from the first vertical farming outfit in Calgary. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, Deepwater Farms had developed a huge following among restaurant chefs with its greens grown via a vertical hydroponics system. The company was originally conceived as a closed-loop aquaponics operation, raising fish and using the fish waste to fertilize plants. Food safety regulations have prompted the company to decouple the two systems, but it continues to sell both indoor-grown baby kale, arugula and beet greens as well as barramundi and tilapia.
It’s been a successful model. Before COVID-19, the majority of Deepwater’s business was with restaurants seeking products previously unavailable from local producers (you don’t see a lot of barramundi swimming around Calgary), all of which came to a screeching halt last spring. The company was able to pivot and is now doing a booming retail business, with their products available in 80 retailers, including all Calgary Co-Op stores, select Safeway and Sobeys locations, Blush Lane and Community Natural Foods, among many others.
“We work with some of the best restaurants in the area and that’s how we started,” says Paul Shumlich, Deepwater’s founder and CEO. “Now we’re 99 percent selling to retail, which we’re very grateful for.”
Reid Henuset and Paul Shumlich of Deepwater Farms pose for a photo in the city’s first commercial aquaponics farm on Tuesday, November 20, 2018. Al Charest/Postmedia Al Charest/Postmedia
Vertical farming methods are hardly dominating in Alberta – with so much farmland we obviously have other options to grow food, along with a reliable flow of food grown in warmer climes. But it is taking hold in other parts of the world and Calgary has the potential to be a leader in vertical farming technology. The Harvest Hub is a local tech start-up developing soil-based indoor farms, with a focus on green energy and diversification of crops, which will allow urban farmers to go beyond microgreens and leafy greens. Founder Alina Martin says Harvest Hub has had success growing crops like saffron, zucchini, carrots, and bell peppers in its Calgary test farm. Once they hit the market, technological innovations should make vertical farming more feasible for urban growers.
“Vertical farming is one of the fastest-growing industries in the world, but most people in Canada don’t understand it,” Martin says. “As much as we romanticize the idea of having your food growing just down the street, the challenge here is the cost. You can’t be in downtown Calgary growing basil and make money. The infrastructure costs will kill you.”
While Martin suspects that Harvest Hub’s business will largely come from outside of Calgary (the company is working on addressing food insecurity in communities in Canada’s North), she does believe vertical farming is the way of the future on a global scale. While we may not have locally grown saffron in our cupboards in the immediate future, it is nice to have access to that Calgary-bred barramundi and handfuls of affordable microgreens for now.
Elizabeth Chorney-Booth can be reached at elizabooth@gmail.com. Follow her on Twitter at @elizaboothy or Instagram at @elizabooth.
USA - LOS ANGELES: Indoor Urban Farm Planned For Century City
Planet to Plate’s proposal at Century City could bring renewed momentum to the business park after Strauss Brands’ proposal for a $60 million facility became mired in controversy in 2019
Feb 19, 2021
New York-based Planet to Plate Inc. wants to operate an urban farm within an industrial building in Milwaukee’s Century City business park.
The company’s plans consist of spending $150,000 to renovate a portion of the industrial building at 3945 N. 31st St. for an indoor growing operation, according to a permit recently filed with the city.
The industrial building is owned by an affiliate of Good City Brewing, which has offices and distribution operations in the space. Planet to Plate operations would be confined to an approximately 8,900-square-foot space within the building, said Christopher Corkery, Planet to Plate chief executive officer.
Planet to Plate aims to bring hyper-local fresh greens to the Milwaukee market, allowing food businesses to reinvest in “food deserts” and improve the socio-economic conditions of these areas,” according to a building code variance and commercial alterations permit filed with the city.
“Really the goal is to create supply chain resilience in food systems and create new jobs in food tech,” Corkery said, adding that because of the coronavirus pandemic, food security has never been more relevant.
Planet to Plate at Century City would be operational by this spring pending city approval, Corkery said.
Planet to Plate’s proposal at Century City could bring renewed momentum to the business park after Strauss Brands’ proposal for a $60 million facility became mired in controversy in 2019. Strauss Brands withdrew its proposal days after Ald. Khalif Rainey, whose district includes Century City, pulled his support for the project due to public pressure.
The Century City Business Park is located at the former site of the A.O. Smith and Tower Automotive manufacturing complex, which once employed thousands of workers. After Tower Automotive shut down the operation in 2006, the site was acquired by the city, which has spent years converting it into a business park.
While Spanish train maker Talgo Inc. and Good City Brewing have established operations in Century City, efforts to attract more companies to the area have been slow in-part because of location challenges including crime, facility security, employee safety, and its distance from the freeway.
Last year, Planet to Plate received special use permits from the city to operate an urban farm at the Cecilia Annex building and an adjacent vacant parking lot near the northwest corner of West Wells Street and North 27th Street on Milwaukee’s west side.
However, due to the scale of the project and coronavirus-related challenges, Planet to Plate has shifted its focus to the smaller Century City proposal, which Corkery said will be a more immediate response to local food systems disrupted by the pandemic.
“It’s something we (still) hope to do but obviously that’s a grander project and COVID certainly disrupted much of the business community,” Corkery said. “We hope to continue on (the Cecilia Annex building) project in the future.”
Brandon covers startups, technology, banking, and finance. He previously worked as a general assignment and court reporter for The Freeman in Waukesha. Brandon graduated from UW-Milwaukee’s journalism, advertising and media studies program with an emphasis in journalism. He enjoys live music, playing guitar, and loves to hacky sack.
USA - MICHIGAN: Indoor Agriculture Receives $100,000 Grant From MDARD
The indoor agriculture program is a new major brought to NMU which focuses on hands-on learning of indoor agriculture, sustainable farming practices, urban farming models, environmental infrastructure systems, helping solve the global food crisis, and more
NMU’s new indoor agriculture program recently received a $100,000 grant on Feb. 12 from Michigan’s Department of Agriculture and Rural Development to help offset the costs for a self-contained growing center.
According to MDARD’s page, the grants are to help “promote the sustainability of land-based industries and support infrastructure that benefits rural communities”.
MDARD received over 139 proposals, totaling over $11 million. The program only accepted 20 proposals, which totaled to roughly $1.7 million. This included NMU’s proposal for a self-contained growing center.
The indoor agriculture program is a new major brought to NMU which focuses on hands-on learning of indoor agriculture, sustainable farming practices, urban farming models, environmental infrastructure systems, helping solve the global food crisis, and more.
Last fall was the first semester that the program took off.
“One of the biggest challenges of growing a program is finding space, and even though there is some available around campus, and in the Jacobetti Center in particular, it still costs a lot of money to retrofit that space and make it usable for the intended purpose.” Evan Lucas, assistant professor of technology and occupational sciences, said. “We targeted this grant specifically to help alleviate the cost impact of adding space for our labs.”
Lucas went on by saying that the program submitted the idea of purchasing one to two shipping containers to enhance the curriculum. The shipping containers, depending on size and capability would be used to add growing space and diversity the type of growing space.
The program hopes that with the grant money they will be able to grow, and in turn create more space for students to work. Sarah Cormier, a junior in the indoor agriculture program, has exciting hopes for the grant money.
“I’d hope it’d encourage others to look into the program and think about food production differently,” said Cormier. “We are limited in our labs with the number of seedlings we can tend to, but with more systems we would be able to monitor more plants simultaneously.”
In turn, having more space means having room for more students. After quick shutdowns and pack-up times, last semester was hard for the program. However, Cormier felt that the experience this semester has been more straightforward.
With the COVID-19 pandemic, the program had to cut back on the amount of students able to register. This left many students on waiting lists, unable to participate in the brand new program.
“We were unfortunately not able to open up more than we did without sacrificing the hands-on aspect of growing, which we weren’t really willing to do as that kind of defeats the main purpose,” Lucas stated.
However, Lucas was quick to say how integral Kim Smith Kolosa, another assistant professor of technology and occupational sciences, was to the program.
“She has done an amazing job taking this program from literally non-existent to exceptional in no time, and we couldn’t ask for anything better at this time,” Lucas said.
TAGS: grant, indoor agriculture, news
Expansion Update: Introducing Vertical Harvest Philadelphia
Along with the farm already under development in Westbrook Maine, this Philadelphia greenhouse is part of our initiative to co-locate vertical farms with affordable housing in underserved communities across the nation
We Are Thrilled To Announce The Third Farm
Location For Vertical Harvest — Philadelphia, Pennsylvania!
The farm, scheduled to break ground later this year, will be part of the new Tioga District™ development — a federally qualified opportunity zone located in a food, health, and wellness desert in the upper north area of the city.
Stationed adjacent to the Temple University Health Sciences Campus and Temple University Hospital, the 70,000 square foot Vertical Harvest greenhouse will be part of the development’s Preventative Health Hub™ a 168,000-sq-foot, state-of-the-art national model for healthcare, health, and wellness with social impact.
Along with the farm already under development in Westbrook Maine, this Philadelphia greenhouse is part of our initiative to co-locate vertical farms with affordable housing in underserved communities across the nation. Specifically, this Philadelphia project will include an accompanying 50 affordable housing units for farmworkers.
Exciting New Development Partners
Our partners in the project are Greg Day, principal and manager of TDB, LLC based in Westbrook, Maine. and TPP Capital Holdings (TPP), a Philadelphia-based, Black-led social impact private equity fund manager and healthcare real estate development firm. TPP is on a mission to change the face of Black health by investing in and transforming blighted and underserved black neighborhoods into integrated and scalable wellness-centric districts over the next 10 years. TPP’s principals Anthony B. Miles and Clinton Bush are co-architects of the Tioga District Preventative Health Hub™.
Within a five-city square block area, the full Tioga District™ development will create 1,407 residential units for rent or sale, the preventative health hub, 172,870 square feet of commercial/office space, 107,000 square feet of retail space, and 92,392 square feet of pedestrian, streetscape and stormwater improvements.
The goal is to uplift Philadelphia’s distressed neighborhood of Tioga with an 85.5% black population, 45% high blood pressure rate, 43.3% obesity rate, 19.3% diabetes rate, 42% of people in poverty, $17,052 median household income, and an unemployment rate of 18%.
We are very proud that Vertical Harvest will be part of this incredible and forward-thinking development, says Nona Yehia, Vertical Harvest CEO. “Partnering with the visionaries at TPP, we hope to help address systemic inequities and facilitate change in underserved neighborhoods. Vertical Harvest’s reimagined food systems and the jobs they create can help these communities be more nourishing, resilient, and sustainable.”
FEBRUARY 15, 2021/BY DAWN HAGIN
10 Ways To Grow The Indoor Farming Market
The Center of Excellence for Indoor Agriculture has identified ten strategic areas for accelerating the global transition to indoor farming
by Dr. Eric Stein
The number of indoor farming companies seems to grow almost daily, each claiming to be more innovative than the last. And yet, there is a lack of data pertaining to the profitability, yields, and sustainability of the indoor farming industry. The Center for Excellence for Indoor Agriculture (COE) was established for this very reason. The COE aims to accelerate the development of the indoor farming market by fostering collaboration and knowledge sharing, conducting third-party research, and recognizing excellence in the indoor farming industry.
The Center of Excellence for Indoor Agriculture has identified ten strategic areas for accelerating the global transition to indoor farming: recognition of excellence, development of metrics, realistic investment expectations, job creation vs. automation, greenhouse vs. vertical farm models, crop diversity, sustainability, training, research into the business aspects of vertical farms, and the development of innovative economic ecosystems.
With respect to recognition, the COE has developed its “Best in Class” awards for growers and manufacturers to recognize excellence, encourage knowledge sharing and hold companies accountable.
Eric W. Stein, Ph.D.
“We really think that recognition of excellence is important to the industry, especially if it comes from an independent body. A lot of people make claims about being the best at everything and are promising things they can’t deliver. We really think that it’s important to separate those people from those who are really doing a good job in the industry. We also hope that it will motivate companies to continue to improve,” says Dr. Eric Stein, founder and executive director of the COE.
Eric also highlighted the ambiguities related to automation and job creation in indoor agriculture, which ultimately comes down to the company’s goals. With labor accounting for roughly 25-30% of an indoor farm’s total operating costs, automation can greatly increase profitability by reducing labor costs. However, social enterprises and triple-bottom-line companies may sooner focus on local job creation and use different targets for profitability in the context of their mission.
The cornerstone of the COE and its ten strategic areas is knowledge sharing, which many experts have cited as necessary for the industry’s continued growth.
“I think that one of the biggest needs in the industry is knowledge sharing. Everybody is approaching this from a proprietary perspective, which is typical of emerging industries. But if this industry is going to mature, we need to make sure that we have benchmarks. At the COE, we look at it from an industry level of analysis as opposed to an individual firm level of analysis.”
BrightBox-Venlo
While research and development currently focus mostly on production, the COE considers the entire system from the supply chain to the point of sale. According to Eric, the focus on plant production has effectively over-shadowed equally important factors such as the logistics of the supply chain, packaging, distribution, channels, and marketing.
“There has been a lot of focus on the growing process, which is very important, but in the end, to get products from a seed supplier to the company growing it to a supermarket, lots of things need to take place. It’s not just about having the best growing system. How you get it to consumers is equally important, if not more so.”
With the pandemic limiting face-to-face interactions within the industry, the COE has focused on building its member website, expanding social media channels, and building relationships with growers, manufacturers, and partners such as Indoor Ag-Con. Most recently, the organization has forged a relationship with Sage Publications, a major publisher of academic books, journals, and other scientific resources to feature research related to indoor farming and sustainability.
For more information:
Center of Excellence for Indoor Agriculture (COE)
Eric W. Stein, Ph.D., Executive Director
eric@indooragcenter.org
www.indooragcenter.org
Publication date: Mon 15 Feb 2021
Author: Rebekka Boekhout
© VerticalFarmDaily.com
For Vertical Farms To Succeed, Sensors Must Take Center Stage
Vertical farming—the process of cultivating produce in stacked, indoor shelves, rather than side-by-side in fields—is a fast-growing industry (pardon the pun)
February 19, 2021
Vertical farming—the process of cultivating produce in stacked, indoor shelves, rather than side-by-side in fields—is a fast-growing industry (pardon the pun). Since it was conjured (or revived, depending who you ask) in a 1999 Columbia University lecture, the technology has grown into a global industry set to be worth $13.5 billion by 2030.
Companies like Plenty, Bowery Farms, and Infarm have innovated vertical farming with a dazzling array of modular, IoT-connected smart devices, which can improve plant “recipes” (the insider term for creating better, more nutritious food) and ramp efficiency alongside vast improvements on water and land usage.
Berlin’s Infarm, for example, claims to have saved over 10m gallons of water and 500,000 square feet of land across its 1,200 farming units, installed in supermarkets in restaurants).
But it is scale and efficiency that proves vertical farming’s bete noir. Leafy greens—low on energy demands and relatively high in price—constitute the lion’s share of output. High-energy food like cereals and potatoes, essential to human survival, remain firmly within the wheelhouse of traditional farms, which already occupy 40% of livable land on Earth, and one of our biggest environmental threats.
“What’s really needed, and that will come with time, is a humanitarian aspect to (vertical farming), which addresses food crises and starvation issues in, say, sub-Saharan Africa where farmers have to put up with horrible things like invasion of locusts,” says Dickson Despommier, the professor who popularized the medium 22 years ago. “Locusts would have a very difficult time invading a vertical farm.”
To feed the world, however, vertical farms need better lights. LED technology has already skyrocketed since its mainstream rollout in the 1960s. “Haitz’s Law” dictates that LED light increases by a factor of 20 and cost drops by a factor of ten every decade.
“The direction is clear: the prices have gone down, the efficiencies have gone up, and I see that continuing,” says Lars Aikala, CEO of Valoya, a leading supplier of LED lights to the vertical farming industry.
But things are getting more complex. Nowadays companies like Valoya can tinker with light spectra to increase growth rates in certain plants while reducing energy costs. “When we started in 2009 this field was pretty much untouched,” says Aikala.
Experts expect Haitz’s Law to tail off in the coming years, as technology becomes smaller, compacter and tougher to scale up. Rather, the next big leaps in LED technology will come via smart sensors, which will help lights replicate night and day, isolate spectra and better tailor themselves to plants’ preferred sunlight.
“If growers want to replicate seasons all year round they have to replicate and control all these parameters in a very narrow window, so plants can survive and grow in a healthy state all year round,” says Fei Jia, technical solutions manager at Heliospectra. “LED lighting allows this because of a high photon efficiency.
“Smart farming is the trend in lighting.”
An added bonus is that around 95% of an LED light is recyclable, helping vertical farmers persuade the public they’re not just a flash in the pan. When sensor technology can lower costs enough to produce carbs and other vital produce, their companies can finally claim to be solving a part of a food crisis that is leaving almost a billion people without adequate access to nutrition each year.
“We’re just at the starting point of (LED) technology, so the price will go down but conversion is going to go up to create more power with less energy,” says Infarm co-founder Erez Galonska. “Now we’re standing on 50-60%, and with the next generation of technology, we easily improve the LEDs. It’s already improved so we’re more energy-efficient already.”
FILED UNDER: CLEAN TECH, CONSUMER, FEATURES, SOFTWARE, STARTUPS, TOP STORY
These Stacked Shipping Containers Are Actually High-Tech Farms
A major perk of the Planty Cube system is that it can be set up in multiple environments, such as restaurants, hotels and apartments
FEB 2, 2020
Credit: n.thing
For green thumb owners looking to take their plant parenting skills to the next level, allow us to introduce you to the Planty Cube, a smart vertical farming system developed by Seoul-based agricultural startup n.thing.
The hydroponic setup is based on “internet of things” technology and is comprised of a network of capsules that enables farmers to cultivate “high quality vegetables in a fully controlled environment, ensuring production over tens of times higher than ordinary farmland per unit area, CES explains. The higher crop yields are directly linked to Planty Cube’s ability to support year-round growing.
Credit: n.thing
In pursuit of n.thing’s mission to turn everyone into a farmer, Planty Cube is off to a running start as the winner of CES 2020 Best of Innovation Awards. The intricate system resembles a shipping container but upon closer inspection is actually multiple shelves of planters, or pickcells, that house seeds.
Each pickcell is connected to the modular system, which is comprised of sensors that track each plant’s health and progress, adjusts humidity and temperatures in response to unexpected environmental changes, and also allows farmers to tend to their crops remotely via a smartphone. In the place of soil, the produce is grown via a nutrient that the system delivers to each plant. The system’s enclosed design prevents pests from infiltrating the crops. Not ready for an entire farm? Planty Cube has a solution for such an agricultural conundrum: It allows growers to choose how many units they start with, leaving them with the option of adding additional units as they see fit.
Credit: n.thing
A major perk of the Planty Cube system is that it can be set up in multiple environments, such as restaurants, hotels and apartments. Its sustainable build helps to decrease environmental impact, further eliminating even more of the obstacles presented by traditional farming methods.
Kenya Foy
CONTRIBUTOR
Kenya is a Dallas-based freelance entertainment and lifestyle writer who devotes most of her free time to traveling, gardening, playing piano, and reading way too many advice columns.
Creating A Whole New Fresh Food Experience Category | Q & A With Fifth Season CEO Austin Webb
In this Q & A Austin shares more about the company's mission, unique approach, and plans for the future
Fifth Season has been making headlines in recent weeks. In addition to a feature story in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, other outlets have covered the vertical-and-robotic-farming pioneer's expanded distribution partnership with food retailer Giant Eagle Inc, and its designation as "Official Greens" provider for the NHL 2020-2021 season of the Pittsburgh Penguins.
These stories follow many others that have tracked the company'simpressive innovations and accomplishments over the last year. Indoor Ag-Con had a chance to catch up with Fifth Season CEO Austin Webb, who co-founded the Pittsburgh-based company with brother Brac Webb (one of this week's Indoor Ag-Conversations panelists!) and Austin Lawrence. In this Q & A Austin shares more about the company's mission, unique approach, and plans for the future.
READ Q & A WITH AUSTIN WEBB
Where Vertical Farming and Affordable Housing Can Grow Together
Some vertical farms grow greens in old warehouses, former steel mills, or other sites set apart from the heart of cities. But a new series of projects will build multistory greenhouses directly inside affordable housing developments
Some vertical farms grow greens in old warehouses, former steel mills, or other sites set apart from the heart of cities. But a new series of projects will build multistory greenhouses directly inside affordable housing developments.
“Bringing the farm back to the city center can have a lot of benefits,” says Nona Yehia, CEO of Vertical Harvest, a company that will soon break ground on a new building in Westbrook, ME, that combines a vertical farm with affordable housing. Similar developments will follow in Chicago and in Philadelphia, where a farm-plus-housing will be built in the Tioga District, an opportunity zone.
Inside each building, the ground level will offer community access, while the greenhouse fills the second, third, and fourth floors, covering 70,000 square feet and growing around a million pounds of produce a year. (The amount of housing varies by site; in Maine, there will be only 15 units of housing, though the project will create 50 new jobs.)
In Chicago, there may be a community kitchen on the first level. In each location, residents will be able to buy fresh produce on-site; Vertical Harvest also plans to let others in the neighborhood buy greens directly from the farm. While it will sell to supermarkets, restaurants, hospitals, and other large customers, it also plans to subsidize 10% to 15% of its harvest for local food pantries and other community organizations.
“By creating a large-scale farm in a food desert, we are creating a large source of healthy, locally grown food 365 days a year,” Yehia says.
Agritecture Partners With Mainvest To Democratize Urban Agriculture Financing
The two companies will work together to accelerate the urban farming and controlled environment agriculture (CEA) industry across the country by offering new entrepreneurs a more accessible way to raise capital for small-scale or pilot facilities
Boston, Massachusetts, February 16, 2021 - Agritecture, LLC, an urban farming consulting and digital services firm, announced it has partnered with Mainvest, a small business investment platform that connects local entrepreneurs with investors who care.
The two companies will work together to accelerate the urban farming and controlled environment agriculture (CEA) industry across the country by offering new entrepreneurs a more accessible way to raise capital for small-scale or pilot facilities. Research has shown that urban agriculture provides a range of crucial ecosystem services valued at $33+ billion.
“We’ve seen a great deal of success in the F&B industry fueled by a need for alternative sources of capital and demand from community members for tangible ways to support local brands,” stated Nicholas Mathews, Mainvest CEO and Co-Founder. “As sustainable investment becomes mainstream and urban farming projects increase, we see a niche for our services further up in the local food supply chain. We’re excited to connect innovative entrepreneurs in the urban agriculture sector with retail investors across experience and income levels looking to get involved in a growing industry. We’re excited to partner with Agritecture on empowering the industry to raise capital on more favorable terms with the support of active and engaged communities.”
In 2020, the USDA offered the availability of only $3M in grants for urban agriculture and innovative production to just 10 projects - despite receiving 578 applicants. While the CapEx, or startup cost, can vary widely for these projects, Agritecture notes that nearly 30% of controlled environment farms modeled via their Agritecture Designer digital platform have a CapEx of less than $250,000 - likely a pilot facility for an entrepreneur who wants to start small and learn before scaling up.
“Since our founding in 2014, we’ve seen sustained, year-over-year growth in interest toward urban agriculture, especially amongst industry newcomers,” said Henry Gordon-Smith, Founder and CEO of Agritecture.
This growth has only accelerated since the onset of the pandemic, according to the team at Agritecture, which reported nearly a 2x increase in website traffic since Q1 of 2020.
But despite increasing interest in urban agriculture, and record levels of funding for a handful of indoor mega-farms, financing continues to be a major pain point for small and medium-scale CEA businesses. “Through hundreds of consultations and economic models developed over the
past seven years, we know that these farms can achieve profitability with competitive payback periods, while still serving their local markets and communities,” noted Gordon-Smith.
Gordon-Smith cites Agritecture’s 2019 and 2020 Global CEA Census Reports, produced alongside agtech solutions provider Autogrow, which show that nearly half of all CEA facilities are being started by those with no previous farming experience. Furthermore, per their recent census, 78 percent of CEA business founders who attempted to raise money were unsuccessful in doing so through traditional financing sources, such as banks.
“By teaming up with Mainvest and their innovative financing platform, we can now deliver a direct link from our planning services and digital platform, Agritecture Designer, to critical funding opportunities for these pilot and small-scale facilities,” added Gordon-Smith.
About Agritecture
Agritecture, LLC is the global leader in urban agriculture advisory services, having worked on over 120 projects in more than 25 countries. Based out of New York, Agritecture is on a mission to empower key stakeholders and accelerate the agriculture industry with climate-smart strategies through a proven methodology, real-world data, and an expansive network.
For more information, please visit agritecture.com.
About Mainvest
Mainvest is an online investment platform for building communities and the American Dream. At Mainvest, people can directly invest in businesses they want to see in their own neighborhoods, generating both potential ROI (return on investment) and ROC (return on community). Visit mainvest.com to see the potential impact you can have on a community you care about.
For more information, please visit mainvest.com/for-businesses/urban-ag.
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For more information about Mainvest, please contact Domenick Bauer at domenick@mainvest.com.
For more information about Agritecture, please contact Briana Zagami via email at briana@agritecture.com.
Space: A Hi-Tech Vegetable Garden To Grow On The Moon And At The Poles
The future is already here! This is demonstrated by Enea, which is working on a hi-tech garden to grow micro-vegetables on the moon and in extreme terrestrial environments, such as polar ones
ENEA: The Experimental Campaign Between Real And Virtual Begins
The future is already here! This is demonstrated by Enea, which is working on a hi-tech garden to grow micro-vegetables on the moon and in extreme terrestrial environments, such as polar ones. The cultivation is set up inside a special igloo greenhouse designed to withstand very low temperatures.
Luca Nardi
Simulated space missions are also contemplated, thanks to advanced immersive virtual reality techniques. These are the challenges of V-GELM (Virtual Greenhouse Experimental Lunar Module), the experimental project that kicks off in the Casaccia Research Center with the aim of developing a lunar cultivation module by combining innovative hydroponic cultivation techniques with virtual experiments to support the life of astronauts in future long-term missions. The project will be carried out by a team of Enea researchers and by students from CITERA (Centro Interdipartimentale Territorio Edilizia Restauro Ambiente) and from the Tuscia University and Sapienza University of Rome.
A virtual reconstruction of some activities
V-GELM has been selected among the best projects conducted by university teams from all over the world in the context of the IGLUNA 2020 mission of the European Space Agency (ESA), presented yesterday 09/07/2020 by the coordinator Swiss Space Center.
The project is divided into two phases: the first involved students and researchers, in collaboration with Mars Planet Society, in the architectural and functional design of the spaces simulated through immersive virtual reality technologies. The second phase will involve Hort3, the innovative Enea garden where the hydroponic cultivation of two particular varieties of radish, Daikon and Rioja, will be tested, inside a particular tent called "EGG" for its particular egg shape, designed by the University of Milan.
The EGG tent
"The virtual experiment - stresses Luca Nardi of the Enea Biotechnology Laboratory - allows you to offer to the public a realistic interactive perspective suitable for simulating the environments and the operations to be performed and also carrying out ergonomic analyzes. In this way, it is possible to identify from the beginning any critical issues and reduce the costs of developing space modules and of astronaut training times".
The module developed by Enea as part of the Hortspace project, funded by the Italian Space Agency, consists of a closed-cycle hydroponic multi-level cultivation system of one cubic meter with LED lighting where different species of micro-vegetables are grown, purposefully selected to reach the ideal growth stage for consumption within 10-15 days.
The laboratory
"It is a soilless cultivation system - explains Nardi - with the recycling of water, without the use of agrochemicals, able to guarantee the members of the crew engaged in space missions high-quality fresh food and correct nutritional intake, without forgetting the psychological benefit given by the growth of plants in confined environments - such as those of future extraterrestrial bases or in extreme environments, such as hot and cold deserts".