Vertical farming

US (MN): Students grow their own veggies at home

University of Minnesota students are encouraging one another to grow their own vegetables — not in a greenhouse or on a plot of land, but in their own apartments and dorms. The University’s Minnesota…

Greek students design autonomous aquaponics system

Two Greek teams that participated in the Robotics Olympiad 2018, held in Thailand, have taken home a fourth place in the world, as they competed against 63 countries, including robotics’ giants’ Russia, China and Japan. The Greek junior high school team was from Panorama, Galatsi while the senior students came from…

Ship to Plate, food grown onboard cruise condo ships

What else can you add to the cruise ship to make it more like home? A fresh produce farm. Storylines will have ship-to-plate food using some of the latest technologies in hydroponic food production. This will enable portions of the menu and indeed whole dishes to be grown right onboard the cruise condo…

US (CT): Recap of 2018 Hartford Aquaponic Tours

Every year, aquaponic tours are a highlight of the Aquaponics Association Conference. This year’s Putting Up Shoots Conference in Hartford, CT included tours of three very different aquaponic systems: one hobby-homestead system growing into a commercial-scale farm, one community center with…

Saba to set up hydroponic farm

The Public Entity Saba is facilitating the setting up of an agricultural, hydroponic farm to give local-grown vegetables another push. On Monday, Commissioner of Agriculture Rolando Wilson signed the deed for the purchase of 6,000m2 of land at Rendez-Vous, Windwardside. The financing to set up the agricultural/hydroponic farm came from the Regional Envelope…

146 million USD invested in indoor ag this year

Agtech venture pioneer Finistere Ventures released its “ 2018 Agtech Investment Review ,” providing in-depth insight on global financing activity, industry trends, regional variations, and a comprehensive exploration of challenges and opportunities in Latin America. Developed in collaboration with PitchBook, with additional…

Belgian supermarket to introduce in-store vertical farms

Colruyt Group is testing a system developed in-house for 'vertical farming' or multilayer cultivation in climate-controlled conditions. The retail group sees multilayer cultivation as part of its wider aim of pursuing more sustainable products, shortened chains and innovation. Colruyt Group aims to start…

"Nigeria’s small farmers are embracing hydroponics"

In May 2016, the invasion of the Tuta absoluta moth was all Nigerians were talking about. The pest, also known as the tomato leafminer, and nicknamed “tomato ebola,” ravaged hundreds of tomato farms in northern Nigeria, where most of the country's tomato crops are located. The episode led to an increase…

Tomatoes and microgreens in space

We have lift-off

Originally scheduled for November 19, the Eu:CROPIS mission, featuring life support system greenhouses that are to demonstrate that growing tomatoes in space is possible using urine, was launched December 3 and is now in orbit. In other space news, December 5 will see another satellite launch, this time from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.…

France: Agricool raises 28 million US dollars for urban farming

With the announcement of a new funding round of $28 million, in addition to the $13 million previously raised, Agricool pursues its ambition to make pesticide-free fruits and vegetables accessible to all. Through its innovative concept, the company has paved the way for a new form of urban and…

leafy greens from a growing machine

Advancements in automated commercial scale vertical farming

Growing produce automated or nearly automated and in any possible location are some of the advantages often supplied by the vertical farming industry. The Canadian company CubicFarms shows how also traditional greenhouse companies can benefit from indoor farming techniques.  DelFresco Pure recently chose CubicFarm Systems to…

Is digging down the future of vertical farming?

Academics at the University of Nottingham have patented a new concept that would see food production in deep farms in cities. The ideas are being promoted by University of Nottingham academics Professor Saffa Riffat, Fellow of the European Academy of Sciences and President of the World Society of…

IKEA: Furniture, meatballs... and vertical farms?

IKEA is curious about the future of sustainable growing and healthier eating. In a new collaboration together with UK based industrial designer Tom Dixon, IKEA will explore urban farming, making homes the new farm land. The ambition is to find affordable and forward thinking solutions that can be used to…

UK: James Hutton Institute welcomes Tay Cities Deal funding boost

The James Hutton Institute has welcomed the signing of the heads of terms of the Tay Cities Deal, which is expected to bring a £700 million investment into Tayside and Angus and create 6,000 direct jobs in the area. Included within the funding announcement are the International Barley Hub (IBH) and the Advanced Plant…

Dozens of cameras film food production on Antarctica

How can we grow fresh vegetables in space or if we ever live on Mars? That is one of the research questions during a large-scale European project on Antarctica. Researchers from the business unit Greenhouse Horticulture at Wageningen University & Research monitor the vegetables on a daily basis, with…

US (MI): Freight farm to grow vegetables for Detroit homeless

A 40-foot shipping container transformed into a freight farm will be used to grow vegetables for 700,000 meals served by Cass Community Social Services each year to those in need. The donation of the container from the Ford Motor Company Fund is part of a $250,000 grant Cass Community Social Services received through the…

"Vertical farming has limits"

Vertical farming - where food is grown indoors in high stacks - will not replace traditional fruit and vegetable growing in New Zealand, but it may supplement it in future if technology makes it economically viable, research finds. As part of her Kellogg Rural Leadership Programme, Horticulture New Zealand environmental policy advisor Rachel…

150,000 metric tons per year of feed, and fruits and vegetables

Chinese company develops aquaculture in Angola

Sino Agro Food has partnered with Nortus Aquacultura e Pesca, a private company headquartered in Angola. The companies have signed an MOU to engage in efforts to develop a vertically integrated farming system in Angola modeled after the conceptual plan of Sino Agro's Aquafarms 4 and 5. In addition to…

Water flow for more efficient aquaponic systems

Ivaylo Nedyalkov, researcher at the University of New Hampshire whose team is studying ways to improve water flow for more efficient aquaponic systems, presented his team's research at the American Physical Society's Division of Fluid Dynamics 71st Annual Meeting, which took place Nov. 18-20 at the…

GCP-2 facstheet final findings: Aquaponics farming

“Promoting healthy diets and agri-business development through Aquaponics farming” is a Global Challenges Programme (GCP) project which received funding in the second Call and ended in January 2018. GCP research is carried out in consortia consisting of Southern and Northern scientific and other partners. The projects…

Belgian King Filip, French President Macron get acquainted with vertical farming

The French president Emmanuel Macron and his wife paid a two-day state visit to Belgium (Europe) on November 19th and 20th. The delegation visited different cities at the invitation of the Belgian King Filip and Queen Mathilde. In addition to the protocol ceremonies, solemn receptions and the state…

Vertical farming robot wins design challenge

The winners of the 2018 Valtra Design Challenge were announced at the EIMA Show in Bologna, Italy. The competition which started in April and ended on September 23rd was targeted globally to designers, academic design students, design studios and automotive suppliers. This year’s challenge was to design…

Two out of the three Board Members of the Association for Vertical Farming have resigned

Tom Zoellner and Penny McBride, two out of the three members of the Board of Directors for the Association for Vertical Farming (AVF), have resigned with immediate effect,…

ComCrop completes 2nd rooftop farm in Singapore

ComCrop, Singapore’s first rooftop farming company, has completed the “Phase One” portion of its new rooftop farming complex in the Woodlands section. This is ComCrop’s second rooftop operation, with its initial rooftop farm atop the Scape Building on Orchard Link. Recently, Joe Swartz, VP of AmHydro,…

UK: Jones Food Company to start first harvest

Run by a new firm called Jones Food Company, a British vertical farm is designed to produce 500 tonnes of plants annually starting with coriander, basil, dill and chives to feed the growing appetite for fresh herbs all year. The first crop was sown as recently as the middle of last month, and by next week, the initial…

Lifecycle analysis report lettuce production

"Sustainable vertical farming found to reduce CO2 outputs by 70% over other agricultural methods"

The agricultural sector emits around six billion tonnes of Greenhouse Gasses (GHGs) in 2011 or about 13% of total global emissions. The agricultural sector is the world’s largest emitter, after the energy sector. (Russell, 2014). According to a report conducted by the Dutch organisation OneFarm, vertical…

Life support system greenhouses to be launched to space

At 19:31 CET on 19 November 2018, the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) Eu:CROPIS mission will be launched into space from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. A Falcon 9 from the US aerospace company SpaceX will carry two biological life support systems…

Moscow, Russia

Video: Multilayer strawberry indoor farming system in action

The video below shows a strawberry cultivation system that was completed in October 2017 and is in operation for the second year in Moscow. "With this innovative system, you can harvest more than 120kg per m2 in one year", Dongho Park, President of PARUS, comments. "PARUS water cooled LEDs and hydroponic…

NL: University of applied sciences controls LED on micromoles with Spectrometer

On Friday 9 November, the first copy of the Certhon Spectrometer was presented to Janneke Grit, lecturer in Horticulture & Arable Farming at HAS University of Applied Sciences. With the Certhon Spectrometer, HAS will no longer control on percentages in the indoor farms, but on the actual light level…

Washington Post delves into indoor farming

How LED lighting influences crops

Diode lights, which work by passing a current between semiconductors, have come a long way since they showed up in calculator displays in the 1970s. Compared with other forms of electrical illumination, light-emitting diodes use less energy, give off little heat and can be manipulated to optimize plant…

Infarm expands ‘in-store farming’ to Paris

Infarm, the Berlin-based startup that has developed vertical farming tech for grocery stores, restaurants and local distribution centres to bring fresh and artisan produce much closer to the consumer, is expanding to Paris. Once again, the company is partnering with Metro in a move that will see Infarm’s “in-store farming”…

US (NJ): Exploring the ethos of sustainability at Princeton

Touring the Cogeneration Plant that powers University buildings. Eating plant-based burgers made by Campus Dining. Sampling herbs from the Vertical Farming Project. Walking in the rain to observe how campus gardens help filter runoff.  Students in the class “Investigating an Ethos of Sustainability at Princeton” use the University…

US (CA): Nonprofit opens aquaponics greenhouse

On October 17, 2018 farmers, civic leaders, educators, restaurateurs and home-enthusiasts toured Ecolife Conservation’s new, state-of-the-art aquaponics system in North San Diego County. At its test and research facility in Escondido, Ecolife designed and built a 900 ft2 system capable of growing 333 lbs. of tilapia,…

Indoor mushroom farms light up New York restaurants

Diners at the Bunker, a Vietnamese restaurant in Brooklyn, may not realise that the mushrooms in their bánh mì were grown in a blue-tinted, spaceship-looking “mini farm” underneath their seats. But it’s just one of a growing number of plug-in fungi farms mushrooming in New York City. Smallhold, the company that created…

Children invited to join Antarctic vegetable mission

If you have or know kids who've always wanted to grow vegetables on Antarctica, now's they're chance. Well, they won't literally go to one of the coldest places on earth, but they can get a piece of the action through the new EDEN ISS competition. The competition is open for children between the ages 6 and 12, who can…

Eating your lettuce straight from the farm

The advent of portable vertical farms has brought the farm ever closer to restaurant tables. It's almost as if you can reach out and pick a few leaves of lettuce right from your seat. Almost, but not quite. At the Good Bank restaurant in Berlin though, it feels like you can - there, you're dining…

Ikea invests in home farming company

Click & Grow, producer of smart indoor gardens, closed its latest financing round led by Estonian-based United Angels VC alongside two strategic investors: Ingka Group, the home furnishing retailer operating 367 IKEA stores, and SEB Alliance, the corporate venture arm of French Groupe SEB. This is…

US (WI): Hydroponics program growing in Menasha schools

Farm to table operations are popular, but what about school to table? That's what the Menasha Joint School District is doing with its hydroponic farm. An unused classroom at Menasha high school has been turned into a farm. According to Brian Adesso, the district's Director of Business Services, "Our population is a low socioeconomic…

US (NY): Mentors push gardens over gangs for Long Island children

Science and engineering students from Brentwood High School are mentoring a bilingual third grade class about growing gardens hydroponically and healthy eating. The older kids are telling the younger ones that having a hobby opposed to the dangerous gang life some are being lured into across Long Island. Their community…

UK: Academics looking to take farming underground

University of Nottingham academics are exploring a new concept for subterranean farms as an alternative approach to large scale crop production, improving food safety, yield and cost efficiency.  The farms would be linked by a network of tunnels for intensive crop farming to feed rising urban populations. They could be…

Tackling the food crisis with a borderless collaboration

After graduating from university in London, Kassim Okara joined the largest specialist distributor of control and automation products in the UK, where he worked on numerous large-scale projects. He decided to leave however, to join Omron Electronics as field sales engineer in 2015, as he had always felt…

South Korea: Tunnel growers spoil plants with high tech and music

Behind a blue wall that seals a former highway tunnel stretches a massive indoor farm bathed in rose-tinted light. Fruits and vegetables grow hydroponically in vertically stacked layers inside,…

US (NH): UNH opens aquaponic greenhouse facility to support sustainable agriculture

In an effort to support sustainable agriculture, the New Hampshire Agricultural Experiment Station at the University of New Hampshire has opened a new aquaponic greenhouse facility that aims to provide a model for integrating land-based aquaculture systems with hydroponic plant production that can be…

Botswana: Government throws weight behind hydroponics project

Department of Crop Production deputy director, Mr Barutwa Thebenala has assured the directors of OLHydro Veggie that government will support them. Mr Thebenala said this at the recent launch of OLHydro Veggie, a company which specialises in supplying hydroponic systems. "Global warming dictates a change in crop production methods in…

Brunei: Students build and sell hydroponic systems

When Norisa ‘Azuma Md Norazmi, Nurwardi Ariffin and Nur Salwana Kamidi graduate from IBTE Agro-Technology Campus at the end of this month, they’re unlikely to be joining the ranks of thousands of graduates who will be out hunting for a job. The trio, part of IBTE’s first cohort HNTec in Agrotechnology have already registered…

Vertical farming: does the economic model work?

A new report has been published by Denbighshire based 2017 Nuffield Scholar, Sarah Hughes. Over the past year, she has been travelling and investigated the following title: Vertical Farming: does the economic model work? Sarah’s key messages are: There are business models where Vertical Farming/Controlled Environment Agriculture would work well The business model…

UK startup seeks partners for co-funded trials in DWC hydroponic growing system

Phytoponics, an award winning AgTech start-up, has developed new Deep Water Culture hydroponic technology that has been used to grow a large crop of tomatoes, resulting in improved crop yield and enhanced quality of produce. The technology’s success has attracted a major commercial grower that has agreed…

Russia: Moscow to get 10 new vertical farms

A Russian start up, Mestnye Korny, which is engaged in the construction of urban vertical farms, will build 10 sites for the cultivation of leafy greens over the next three years, with an overall capacity of 1 thousand tons per year. The project has attracted investments worth 79 thousand euros from the foundation TealTech…

US (NY): Rooftop farm brings organic vegetables to Brooklyn residents

Eagle Street Rooftop Farm is a 6,000-square-foot organic vegetable farm located on a warehouse rooftop in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. The Farm is a product of the collaborative effort between the green roof design and installation firm Goode Green and the Brooklyn-based sound stage company Broadway Stages,…

Plant hormone makes space farming a possibility

With scarce nutrients and weak gravity, growing potatoes on the Moon or on other planets seems unimaginable. But the plant hormone strigolactone could make it possible, plant biologists from the University of Zurich have shown. The hormone supports the symbiosis between fungi and plant roots, thus…

US (WI): Aquaponic grower donates lettuce to area schools

In celebration of National Farm to School Month, on Monday, October 15th, Nelson and Pade donated over one hundred heads of fresh, aquaponically-grown lettuce to the Westfield and Montello public school districts. The lettuce is Certified Naturally Grown and it is grown in Clear Flow Aquaponic Systems at…

Video: Take a look inside Scotland's biggest vertical farm

Earlier this year, Intelligent Growth Solutions unveiled its first vertical farm in Scotland . The Scottish-led team at IGS has developed, patented and productised an IOT-enabled power and communications platform consisting of patented electrical, electronic and mechanical technologies. All this is managed by a…

South Africa: Aquaponics facility launched in Soweto

A new aquaponics facility was launched in Soweto to enrich residents and eradicate poverty in the area. The City of Joburg donated the facility, near Elias Motsoaledi Clinic in Orlando. Inmed Partnerships for Children, with the help of the Mondelez International Foundation, run aquaponics plants which reach up to…

South Korea: Urban farming bonds communities in Seoul

Tucked away in a dark, damp corner of an underground parking lot in Nowon-gu, northeastern Seoul, mushrooms mature under fluorescent lights.  The vertical farm is tended by residents who live right above it, in Sanggye Hyundai Apartment Complex.  Together, the residents grow, share and sell the mushrooms, donating the profits to local charities and…

Current, Powered by GE and Stockbridge Technology Centre partner

New facility to research the farm of the future

Current, powered by GE celebrated the opening of CHAP’s new Vertical Farming Development Facility, supported by Innovate UK and based at Stockbridge Technology Centre (STC), which leverages the company’s Arize horticultural lighting solution to propel commercial urban farming success in the UK. The…

US (OH): Hydroponic program gets boost from police department

Equipment seized by the Boardman police in drug busts is getting a second life at Boardman Glenwood Junior High School. School resource officer Phil Merlo made the connection between equipment used to grow marijuana and Boardman’s hydroponics program when he cleaned out the Boardman Police Department’s evidence room…

Urban farming during World War Two

Urban farming was way more than a fad in the 1940s. Urban gardening may be catching on now, but today's urban gardeners have nothing on their grandparents. During the World Wars, the U.S. government urged citizens to plant their own small vegetable gardens. It was a super positive spin on "We don't have enough war…

New vertical farming light bar/panel hybrid designed to maximize yields with less space

The team of lighting experts at TotalGrow have announced the launch of the new TotalGrow Stratum . The features and benefits of this new light include: Thin profile to maximize space under 4” from canopy to shelf Full spectrum and modular design for extra versatility Broad panel/bar hybrid for improved uniformity and penetration in tight spaces Simple mounting and electrical…

Grow & Roll with vertical farms

Vertical farming is one of the solutions to the problem of the growing demand for food. A multilayer system uses less surface, energy and water. And production takes place all year round, resulting in a higher yield. At Bosman Van Zaal they create vertical production systems, where sustainability, convenience and a higher yield…

TEDx Talk by Joel Cuello:

AI does food

AI will help realize Cuello’s Law, which is the projected industry goal that crop productivity per unit resource use in a tech-dense vertical farm must double every 4-5 years. The Global Marshall Plan for AI-based Food Production is introduced to provide capacity building so that no nation is left behind in AI-based food production, making sure…

US (HI): Researchers help Waimānalo families use aquaponics, improve health

Three researchers at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa have won a national fellowship and will receive $350,000 funding over three years to assist Waimānalo families with backyard aquaponics to sustainably produce healthy food. The project will connect the modern technology of aquaponics with Native Hawaiian food practices.…

UAE: Dubai South selected as site for Emirates Flight Catering project

Dubai South has signed a Memorandum of Collaboration with Emirates Flight Catering. Under the agreement, Emirates Flight Catering will expand its operations in the aviation district to build the world’s largest vertical farm in a joint venture with Crop One Holdings. The facility, which will cover 130,000 square feet,…

US (NJ): Strange-looking hydroponic farm at Forbes College is fully functioning experiment

Just inside the main lobby of Forbes College, an eerie white glow emanates from an alcove containing a strange contraption covered in signs warning passersby not to get too close. The Forbes hydroponic farm may look like a portal to another universe, but its purpose is to show students that crops can grow anywhere by…

US (MO): Urban farming organization visualizes franchise model to produce fish and vegetables

On a cool September morning, Dre Taylor dodged raindrops while talking with several people tending beans, peppers, tomatillos, collards and more outside of a 4,500-square-foot building. This is Nile Valley Aquaponics, a vibrant fixture in Kansas City, Missouri's urban core. The name came from Egypt where…

US (NY): Future chefs educated in hydroponic garden

In his first year as the Director of Sustainability at the Institute of Culinary Education, Chef Bill Telepan has immersed himself in the school’s indoor hydroponic garden, an agriculture system that uses LED light in a climate-controlled environment. Over 50 different crop varieties are grown at any…

US (KS): Professor uses aquaponics to teach sustainability

Kansas State was built as a college of agriculture, but there is a smaller operation in the basement of Seaton Hall that can help communicate the work of producers to the consumers of the world, Stacy Hutchinson, professor of biological and agricultural engineering, said. Hutchinson said she uses a single-barrel aquaponics system…

CAN (ON): DelFrescoPure announces partnership with CubicFarms

A new partnership between DelFrescoPure and CubicFarms has resulted in the LivingCube – a system of automated vertical farming growing machines that continuously produces living lettuce, living basil and microgreens all year long. The LivingCube system has 12 mechanized growing, germination and…

Hydroponic farm as furniture

If someone told you that every home in the future would have its own farm smack dab in the middle of the living room, that’d be a hard sell, wouldn’t it? When you see this design called Aeva, however, it becomes a little easier to believe. Designed to blend in with the existing home atmosphere, this is what happens when…

Vertical farming - the reinvention of horticulture?

Vertical farming has grown to become a world-wide concept since the early 2000s. The basic premise is simple: Instead of spreading production across endless acres of land, horticultural productions are facilitated in vertical layers, requiring far smaller areas to produce the same amount of crop. The potential of vertical…

US (CT): Students work hands-on with data analytics and IoT through aquaponics project

With more employers looking for specialized skill sets, the University of Connecticut's Operations and Information Management (OPIM) Innovate initiative is working to give students real-life experience with 3D printing, internet of things, virtual reality and microcontrollers. In 2018, the program…

EU invests 2 million euros to raise aquaponics awareness

In order to raise public awareness of aquaponics, Interreg France-Wallonie-Vlaanderen is launching the Smart Aquaponics project. The cooperation program between the four border regions (West and East Flanders, Wallonia and the Hauts-de-France and Grand Est regions in France) is receiving two million…

"Having little space is no longer an excuse"

Urban agriculture can transform our cities, bring social benefits to communities and contribute to food production around the world. Here, former Youth Ag Summit delegate Diana Pamela Rico Campos shares why she believes the future of agriculture lies in urban farming – and how having limited space at…

Survey to provide insight on emerging indoor farming trends and challenges now live

Be a part of Agrilyst’s annual State of Indoor Report

Agrilyst has released their third annual State of Indoor Farming Survey. This survey will give Agrilyst and growers insight on emerging trends and challenges in the greenhouse…

Trinidad & Tobago: Aquaponic farmers get refresher course

Beneficiaries of the Digicel Foundation’s Aquaponics programme had the benefit of a refresher workshop on ‘Aquaponics Networking and Sensitisation’, on September 19, 2108. The event took place at the Ministry of Agriculture, Land and Fisheries’ Aquaculture Demonstration Centre, Valsayn. Participants comprised officials from Special Needs…

South Africa: Philippi households to get lessons on hydroponics

About 40 households from Philippi and the surrounding areas will be trained how to use a newly developed hydroponics vegetable garden. It's an initiative between Fresh Life Produce, Food Lovers Market and Investec which will be piloted in the Western Cape. Director of Fresh Life Produce Louis-Gillis Janse van Rensburg says these…

Fancy staying at an aquaponic hotel?

The annual Radical Innovation Award competition always features elaborate and imaginative hotel designs, including water-powered resorts on mountaintops and rooms in flying glass pods. This year, one of the finalists created a hotel design centered on aquaponics. Varinot & Varinot Architectes, a firm based in…

AVF Hong Kong event leads to industry roadmap

Last month the AVF hosted its 5-year Roadmap Event. The intent was to gather individuals and companies from across the spectrum of vertical farming to create an overarching action plan for the industry. There were representations from members of the AVF as well as newcomers from technology companies,…

US vertical farm supplier partners with Spanish greenhouse builder

Green Sense Farms has formed a joint venture with Rufepa, a Spanish greenhouse builder with over 25 years of turnkey project experience. The joint venture will focus on building combined indoor vertical farm and greenhouse projects for third parties to sustainably grow a wide range of vegetables using less land, water…

French strawberry container farms come to Dubai

A French company is trialling a method of farming in Dubai that would allow communities to grow food right on their doorstep, despite the harsh desert climate, and it is beginning to bear fruit. Agricool have already had success in Paris, where the company grows strawberries around the city in recycled shipping containers…

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