Since March, the pandemic has impacted everything from beans to strawberries. Plus, vertical farms could help make our food supply chain more resilient. Produce from vertical farms would also be less likely to spoil since it would, in theory, only travel a few miles to the nearest grocery store, market or restaurant, instead of sitting on a plane or cargo ship for hundreds or thousands of miles. In places like Los Angeles or New York, where real estate doesn't come cheap, vertical farms could be installed without taking up much space. Producing more food with less land is a must if we want to keep humanity fed.īy 2050, Earth will have 9.8 billion residents and two-thirds of them will probably live in a city. Santosham claims Plenty's vertical farms will use "about 1% of the land and 5% of the water" required by a comparable traditional farm. " are much more water-use efficient than field production," Neil Mattson, associate professor of plant science at Cornell University, says. With this method, the company claims it can grow 350 times as much produce, per square foot, as a conventional, outdoor farm - all while consuming a fraction of the water. Plenty's approach relies on automation, intricate sensors, machine learning and hydroponic grow towers where plants are cultivated in a nutrient-rich water solution instead of soil. Growth and harvesting can occur year-round. In a vertical farm, you don't need to wait for the right season. The process allows growers to control and monitor light, oxygen, nutrients, temperature, humidity and carbon dioxide levels.
Vertical farming is all about efficiency. "There is just a rich tradition of farming in Compton, and to have Plenty come back in an innovative way is exciting for our community," Compton Mayor Aja Brown says.Ĭity officials are working with the company to connect its facility with nearby schools so kids can learn about vertical farming and the technologies associated with it.
Drawing on that history, Plenty began designing and developing its Compton vertical farm (located a few miles north of Richland) in the summer of 2019. Richland Farms - home of the Compton Cowboys - remains a living link to Compton's agricultural past. With its large lots and agricultural zoning, residents could grow crops and raise livestock to provide for their families and their community. African American families, many of whom had moved to the West Coast to work in military production during World War II, settled there and were drawn to the Richland Farms neighborhood. By the 1940s and '50s, Compton had become a working-class suburb. That particular area - a 10-block neighborhood sandwiched between downtown Compton and what's now the 91 Freeway - became Richland Farms, known for a variety of crops including pumpkins, sugar beets and cauliflower. In 1888, Compton donated his land and the area was incorporated as the city of Compton under the condition that a swath of it be zoned for agriculture. Plenty now hopes to start its first customer deliveries sometime in 2021. The company was hoping its Compton farm would be able to bring produce to market by the end of 2020 but the coronavirus pandemic altered that timeline. They expect prices to be similar to organic leafy greens currently on grocery store shelves. In early August, the company reached an agreement with Albertsons to provide 430 of its California stores with assorted leafy greens.Ĭompany reps say the Compton site will initially focus on producing kale, arugula, fennel and bok choy before adding strawberries to its repertoire.
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The goal for Plenty's Compton outpost, once it's running at full capacity, will be to create enough produce to make regular deliveries to hundreds of grocery stores. "Compton can help us better serve Los Angeles while also allowing us to invest in a community with a long history of farming." "We want to invest in places where we can serve a large number of people," says Shireen Santosham, the company's head of strategic initiatives. It wants to combat food apartheid by bringing healthy, locally-grown crops to communities that lack access to nutritious produce. Plenty's long-term goals go beyond tasty salad greens.
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