Vertical farms – Why waste land when you can grow food in skyscrapers?

Soil-based agriculture is so passé. Nothing short of an agricultural revolution is underway, spurred on by visionary Dr. Dickson Despommier of Columbia University. His plan is to build 30-story greenhouses in cities around the world, which will allow us to produce more food, for less money, in a healthier way, while freeing up arable land for nature. 

Listen up environmentalists! If you’re serious about relieving mother earth of her burdens as food producer, you can forget about unsustainable and inefficient organic farming (which requires far more space than non-organic). You need to end the hypocrisy and start proponing vertical farming, the viable solution to feeding all the world’s people - not just those who can shop at Whole Foods.

By growing crops without the use of soil - hydroponically - “fields” can be stacked on top of each other in urban areas, to grow fruits, vegetables, grains, you name it. The vertical farms work as a closed circuit, so all the water and nutrients are recycled, and only the produce actually leaves the building.

I his book, The Vertical Farm , Dr. Dickson Despommier explains the considerable advantages vertical farming holds over traditional farming (organic or otherwise):

1. It allows year-round crop production.

2. It provides food to areas lacking arable land.

3. It’s immune to weather-related crop failure.

4. It re-uses the water by collecting it through de-humidification.

5. It has no need for the use of pesticides, fertilizers, or herbicides, and as such makes for healthier, clean food (even more so than today’s organic food which is prone to the bacteria occurring in for instance manure).

6. It drastically reduces dependence on fossil fuels, as the food needn’t be shipped to the city (because it’s there already).

7. There is no crop loss due to shipping or storage.

8. Reduced food costs as a consequence of reduced distance between producer and consumer.

9. Urban farms would create a cadre of related businesses in its vicinity, such as bakers, produce stores etc.

10. It would employ a lot of both skilled and unskilled labor.

11. Vertical farms would be entirely carbon free, and run on wind, solar, tidal or geothermal energy.

Imagine if all the world's farm land was no longer needed? It could be used for, well, nature. A transition to vertical farming could produce clean, cheap food in abundance. My only question is, Why aren’t we already doing this?

You can read more about this inspiring idea in the The Vertical Farm: Feeding the World in the 21st Century and watch the video below.

 

Comments

[Paul]

I read recently that some calculations say there is a problem as the farmscraper (just want to see if that catches on. First coinage here to my knowledge) gets higher, over as little as four stories. Above this the angle at which natural light coming in reduces the amount of light significantly. Has this been addressed?

[Recepti]

Many of the floods and disasters caused the country to get the food which was scare and which had to be thrown from skypers.

[Alex Fogerty]

@Paul: Going by the pictures provided I would have to assume the majority of the light provided would be from artificial sources, much like in an office building.

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the only problem with this system I think would be the starting cost, a building like that will cost a lot of money

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[Herve Leger]

Well said. I appreciate your thinking

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Thanks for your content and I will go back again soon because this place is so interesting .

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Indeed an interesting concept!

I believe that future farms will be also held under water, in salt water! Imagine fields growing in the ocean producing vegetables and not consuming fresh water

[Recepti za kolace]

This is a great idea, both for environment and for people. But it's true that starting costs are high...

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