With 2020 upon us, innovations in food are changing what we eat, how food is produced, and even how we think about food. Evolve.ag gathered six of the top trends in food and food tech in 2020.
One of the trends they note is that more food will be grown vertically & in controlled environments. Vertical farming is on the rise with new locations of established vertical farms, like Gotham Greens and Bowery Farming coming to Baltimore and Plenty expanding to Los Angeles. These moves positively signal that business is viable enough to allow for scaling up--which has been a significant concern of and a hindrance to the controlled environment agriculture industry.
They expect we'll see more specialty food products coming out of controlled environments too. For example, Oishii, a Japanese vertical farm in New Jersey, grows delicate strawberries originating from the foothills of the Japanese Alps. The farm perfectly replicates the specific climate where these beauties would grow naturally in Japan and picks them at the height of ripeness (verified by measuring sugar count once they glean a glossy appearance). The strawberries are then hand-delivered day-of to happy chefs and happy omakase eaters. This specialty market is just the beginning as vertical farms fine-tune critical environmental elements and explore the use of heirloom seeds.