Urban Farming — Redefining Agriculture
The rising threat of global food shortage due to crop failures demands an unconventional solution, something more efficient and sustainable, something beyond traditional farming.
Crop blights and dust storms threatening humanity’s survival — an intriguing plot for a Christopher Nolan movie. Yep, all you saw in Interstellar could be possible in near future, however, fortunately, we won’t have to discover a wormhole near Saturn to travel to a distant black hole in search of potentially habitable planets. We could survive unaffected, on our beloved Planet Earth, if we reinvented agriculture if we chose to invest in the future of farming. But for now, a rough idea is enough.
The Ticking Clock
It may sound immature and perhaps we even risk being discredited, but to those keen observers and analysts studying the climate and the agricultural ecosystem, the Interstellar story sounds more like a prediction than a sci-fi drama. It does not take a great deal of genius to figure out that we are losing the war of climate change and our politicians are wasting the time blaming each other for it. Climate change not only threatens humanity with increasing temperature but also with sharp food and resource crunches as a result of the former. This phenomenon has been predicted by Bill Gates (who happens to be the guy who made a foreboding about the Covid-19 pandemic). He described how nations and people will go to war over basic resources. With such a serious and almost imminent problem what is the solution that we should be thinking of?
Urban farming may sound like an oxymoron but with rising urban populations and the threat of global food shortage, as conventional agriculture is confronted with the need to provide food in a sustainable, efficient and cost-effective way, innovators and entrepreneurs are looking beyond traditional farming for a way to feed everyone while having less impact on our land and water resources.
While modern techniques have enabled enhanced production rates, the increasing need for cultivable land creates environmental challenges like soil degradation and loss of wildlife habitat. Furthermore, the distances between farms and cities raise the impact of transportation. Adding to these challenges are a changing climate which disrupts seasonal weather patterns, a lack of suitable soils in close proximity to expanding centers of population, and the risk of frequent crop failures due to disease, like a pandemic for crops.
Urban Farming as a Solution
“Innovations that are guided by smallholder farmers, adapted to local circumstances, and sustainable for the economy and environment will be necessary to ensure food security in the future.” — Bill Gates
Urban farming or vertical farming is one potential solution that is being tried and implemented around the world. It is a concept that sees the sprawling crop farms condensed into much smaller factory-like sites where conditions can be optimized and yields significantly increased. Vertical farms in cities produce crops stacked in layers to optimize space, often in an enclosed environment where almost everything from the lighting and ambient temperature and humidity to soil conditions and nutrients are carefully controlled.
These facilities located on smaller sites closer to urban areas grow a variety of crops and green leafy vegetables using processes like aeroponics which relies on air and mist and hydroponics which uses water solutions. In both these methods crops are grown entirely indoors using a reusable cloth medium. In the absence of sunlight exposure, LED lights of specific colors are used to expose the plants to only certain frequencies of light which enhances the flavor and produces food in the most energy efficient way.
These technologically advanced methods eliminate the requirement of soil and use 95% less water than conventional farms. Also since the process of crop production is shielded from seasonal weather patterns, all varieties of crops and vegetables can be grown round the year and sold at consistent prices. The indoor environment cuts the need for harmful pesticides hence improving the quality of produce. Optimizing the level of nutrients the plants receive solves the challenge of finding suitable farming land.
Though vertical farms do have their limitations, several of them are powered by renewable technologies, use efficient lighting which reduces power consumption, recycle many of their resources and use artificial intelligence to monitor and nourish each crop just up to the right amount. Many vertical farms are served by rainwater harvesting systems. This closed-cycle approach adds the benefit of preventing fertilizers from being washed away in rivers and streams. Though the cost and availability of urban land can prove challenging, many companies use re-purposed shipping containers, old factories and disused warehouses to house their farms.
The Start of an Era
“Strong communities are built around local, real food, food we trust to nourish our bodies, the farmer and planet.” — Kimbal Musk
The relatively new idea of urban farming has attracted famous investors and entrepreneurs from across the world. Kimbal Musk, brother of Elon Musk, has co-founded Square Roots, a shipping container farming company. Under the streets of London, old shelters have been converted into indoor farms. There are small farms under several restaurants in New York City. In Tokyo, many office buildings have their own paddy fields in the lobbies. AeroFarms, a sustainable indoor agriculture company based in Newark, New Jersey, which has been building vertical farms in former clubs and steel mills, has attracted million-dollar investments from Ikea. Bowery Farm of New Jersey has been backed by Silicon Valley investors like Google Ventures and the CEO of Uber. Amazon’s CEO Jeff Bezos has invested in a warehouse farming company in San Francisco. In India, Mumbai-based Herbivore Farms, a vertical farm, grows and delivers leafy greens to doorsteps.
Kimbal Musk has also started the Open Agriculture Initiative which aims to create an extensive open-source digital library containing the specific conditions of temperature, humidity, amount of water and nutrients needed for each type of plant. This climate recipe will enable farms to grow different plants from around the world all year round in any location, saving on resources needed for shipping and storage. As urban farming helps the local economy through job creation and growth of small businesses, with the proper spirit of entrepreneurship and innovation, it is only a matter of time that these new business models emerge into highly profitable enterprises.
An article by Soumyadeep Pal and Bodhisatwa Bhattacharya. Published on Medium by Ecopol.
