The demand for locally-grown produce has skyrocketed in recent years, including in Pittsburgh, where farmers’ markets can be found in neighborhoods across the city from May through October. But as the demand for local produce rises, the limited growing season — most farmers’ markets are winding down for the year, or have already — coupled with a lack of space to grow have led to some creative solutions. Pittsburgh-based SEED Aquaponics is part of a movement to make community agriculture even more eco-friendly.
Colleen Beck started the company two years ago after spending time in Thailand researching sustainability and aquaponics systems.
Aquaponics, she says, is “a new technology that grows vegetables using fish manure in a closed loop system. In aquaponics you use aquaculture, which is growing fish, and hydroponics, which is growing plants in water, and you combine the two so that the water never leaves the system.”