Over the next 10 years Precedence estimates a compound annual growth rate for the sector to be just under 23 per cent. The vertical farm industry is worth about $US5 billion ($7.5 billion) annually with a predicted fourfold growth to $US39.9 billion by 2032, says global research company Precedence Research. We use a fraction of the water used to grow conventional crops and the end user is in walking distance. “Our packaging and our set-up is recyclable, compostable or re-useable. “The environmental considerations of what we are doing are quite amazing,” says Fox. A 1 kilogram bag, when rehydrated, can replace a palette of perlite. Instead, Imabayashi has replaced it with a cutting edge microgel called Jelli Grow, which is produced by Nanollose. Gone are the great bags of perlite, a bulky growing medium. “They are lightweight and modular and can be built or packed down and moved on in a matter of a few days,” he says. Japanese-born, vertical farming expert Joji Imabayashi has designed the farm, so it can be installed within three weeks in existing spaces. The salad leaves and edible flowers are grown to order to suit the clients’ needs. Within 12 months he set up another farm in the Edgecliff Centre on New South Head Road. “We started by identifying potential customers and then look for farm locations nearby.” His first farm was in Sydney in the basement of Tower Three at Darling Park on Sussex Street. These supply live plants to nearby hotels, restaurants and businesses. differs from most vertical farm agribusinesses instead of a large central farm, it centres on small community-based farms based in CBD locations. Before that, he ran a TV production company that created Better Homes and Gardens for the Seven Network. It was founded in 2018 by serial entrepreneur Peter Fox, who co-founded travel site Viator (he sold the business in 1999, long before its 2014 $US200 million acquisition by TripAdvisor). The operation is run by Sydney-based vertical farming business. There they are put into compact and attractive microfarms in businesses’ foyers and hotel restaurants. When the plants are ready to eat, the pots are loaded onto a trolley and pushed along the streets to their destination. The plants, which range from the aromatic Japanese herb shiso to vermillion coloured sorrel to dainty, days-old parsley, are destined for some of Melbourne’s finest restaurants, all near the building. Peter Fox keeps a close eye on his vertical planting system. Tall modular racks, covering just 50 square metres, hold pots of microgreens that are hydroponically grown under LED strips. Just a chip’s throw from Crown Casino in Melbourne’s Southbank, a former BMW showroom has been transformed into a productive farm.Īpart from the faint trickle of water, and the whoosh of traffic outside, the farm is almost silent and spotlessly clean. High-tech indoor vertical farms are sprouting up beneath our city buildings and taking over unused CBD real estate.
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