Great technology but lousy business - the urban farming revolution that isn't

There's an article in the New Yorker about 'vertical farming' - this is the use of redundant urban spaces to create farms:

No. 212 Rome Street, in Newark, New Jersey, used to be the address of Grammer, Dempsey & Hudson, a steel-supply company. It was like a lumberyard for steel, which it bought in bulk from distant mills and distributed in smaller amounts, mostly to customers within a hundred-mile radius of Newark. It sold off its assets in 2008 and later shut down. In 2015, a new indoor-agriculture company called AeroFarms leased the property. It had the rusting corrugated-steel exterior torn down and a new building erected on the old frame. Then it filled nearly seventy thousand square feet of floor space with what is called a vertical farm. The building’s ceiling allowed for grow tables to be stacked twelve layers tall, to a height of thirty-six feet, in rows eighty feet long. The vertical farm grows kale, bok choi, watercress, arugula, red-leaf lettuce, mizuna, and other baby salad greens.

Pretty interesting stuff especially when you look at the technology involved where the production system uses a tiny proportion of the water typically used to grow those baby salad greens. Indeed this sort of technology holds out considerable opportunity for the further intensification of high added value salad vegetable production - anyone driving through the Fens will see the polytunnels and greenhouses that might form the basis for this technology, especially in a world where water is more expensive, to really make a difference.

The problem is that urban spaces really aren't the best places - even with multistorey production - to do such a business. Here's a clue:

The AeroFarms clamshell package (clear plastic, No. 1 recyclable) appears to be the same size as its competition’s but it holds slightly less—4.5 ounces instead of five. It is priced at the highest end, at $3.99. The company plans to have its greens on the shelves soon at Whole Foods stores and Kings, also in the local area. Greens that come from California ride in trucks for days.

So we've a product that is significantly more expensive that the more traditionally produced product. Even were a tighter ship to be run it is unlikely that AeroFarms will be able to compete with the mass production in California leaving it with a niche market of people who want to buy 'local' production.

This vertical farming requires the acquisition of expensive urban real estate and a significant capital investment just to grow stuff for a niche part of a niche market for salad vegetables. The idea that this sort of production will somehow release current agricultural land for rewilding is pretty much nonsense. The plant in New Jersey featured in the article will have cost some $39 million (including nearly $9 million in government grants) to create a little more than an acre of vertical farmland - right now agricultural land in New Jersey sells for about $10,000 an acre.

The technology here is genuinely exciting but, even in run down urban areas, there is no way that vertical farming on expensive real estate is the solution. And this is before we recognise that businesses like AeroFarms focus on agricultural products with pretty much the highest margins - salad leaves for yuppies - rather than on the sort of production that dominates arable farming in the USA: corn, wheat, potatoes, barley and so forth. Lovely technology but lousy business.

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The nonsense of "Earth Hour"....

Came across this from Ross McKitrick:

I abhor Earth Hour. Abundant, cheap electricity has been the greatest source of human liberation in the 20th century. Every material social advance in the 20th century depended on the proliferation of inexpensive and reliable electricity. Giving women the freedom to work outside the home depended on the availability of electrical appliances that free up time from domestic chores. Getting children out of menial labour and into schools depended on the same thing, as well as the ability to provide safe indoor lighting for reading. Development and provision of modern health care without electricity is absolutely impossible. The expansion of our food supply, and the promotion of hygiene and nutrition, depended on being able to irrigate fields, cook and refrigerate foods, and have a steady indoor supply of hot water.

Absolutely. Read the rest of it!

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Why "Save our Forests" rather disappoints...

A few days ago I wrote about the proposals to dispose of all or part of the Forestry Commission's English estate. I remain of the opinion that the Commission is not the best steward for these estates - either as commercial woodland (which is what most of it is) or as public amenity. The Government is consulting about the proposals - the document is here - and it would be rather more helpful if people thought for themselves rather than herding like sheep behind the cry of "save our forests". The purpose of the consultation is set out clearly:

This consultation is about the future ownership and management of the public forest estate in England – land managed by the Forestry Commission on behalf of the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

It sets out the rationale for a move away from the Government owning and managing significant areas of woodlands in England and the principles which will guide the Government in deciding the way forward. The consultation proposes a mixed model approach to reforming the ownership and management of the public forest estate to create a far greater role for civil society, businesses and individuals.

So first of all, the proposals isn't for a quick sale of the estate (which would be best achieved through simply putting the lot on the market in one big lump) but a more nuanced proposal. Yet all we hear of the ever shriller cries of "save our forests" - including nonsense like this:

They (the forests) could be auctioned and fenced off, run down, logged or turned into golf courses and holiday villages.

I really don't know where to start with this but it's clear written by someone who has never been anywhere near managing a forest - and I really can see why anyone would buy something just to have it "run down".

Logging? Yes dears, that's what the Forestry Commission do now with the woodlands it owns - it's a commercial forest operator. It's also a regulator which really isn't a good idea and explains why 90% of the Commission's woods are conifer monoculture of little landscape benefit, limited in its contribution to biodiversity and rather lacking in amenity or leisure value.

Golf courses? Good grief - a new game of 'golf in the wood', now that's an idea! Why would a developer go to all the expense - not to mention the planning problems - of clearing a whole forest so as to build a golf course when there's plenty of good open land near towns where they can be developed? Makes no sense - a bit like the suggestion!

Holiday villages! A what exactly is the problem with holiday villages? Don't we already have holiday facilities so people can stay in the woods and enjoy them? Isn't this something to be encouraged? In fact what's this - a business called "Forest Holidays" that 'operates entirely within the Forestry Commission Estate'! Wow! Holiday villages!

This entire campaign is unhelpful - not because the forests should necessarily be sold but because it is founded on misinformation and ignorance rather than presenting any rational discussion about the future of the Forestry Commission's English Estates. There are a few such as Julian Dobson who try to get beyond the slogans to suggest possible ways forward:

It doesn’t necessarily follow that the Forestry Commission or the government are the only people who should own woodlands. Indeed, the idea that some of our best-loved forests should be owned in perpetuity by the National Trust is attractive because it reduces the risk of future sales. But - as I argued in a paper for The Mersey Forest published this month - we can’t expect local communities to take over stewardship of our woodlands without help and investment. The need is for a greater emphasis on the community forests programme alongside a clear recognition by government that our woodlands are a resource to be looked after for generations to come.

Julian's focus is on the amenity value of woodland and especially the development of woodland in and near urban areas. But there is a further discussion to be had - that of balancing the different options and opportunities presented by the variety of wood and forest. I see no reason why the upland commercial woodland can't be sold - so long as access rights are guaranteed (and this should, for these forests, extend to include cycles and horses). For the less commercial forests, we need a debate about management, leisure, amenity and different potential uses set alongside an examination of options for future ownership.

It seems to me that the government is consulting with a three-year-old - the opponents simply scream "save our forests" rather than taking the opportunity to ask whether the proposed 'sell-off' actually presents opportunities for trusts, co-operatives and others to secure the woodland for public use and enjoyment.

I find this rather disappointing.

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Dave "..didn't mention climate change." So what!

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According to the Friends of the Earth (and with friends like that who needs enemies) David Cameron’s speech today was a poor do. He failed to mention ‘climate change’:

"With not a mention of climate change, this was not the speech we would have expected from the Prime Minister of the self-declared 'greenest Government ever'."

So what?

Cameron didn’t mention a load of really important things – he didn’t mention housing, he didn’t mention transport, he didn’t mention devolution, he didn’t mention the deportation of Gamu and he didn’t mention the sale of Liverpool football club to an American baseball magnate. As far as I know he didn’t talk about the common agricultural policy, about free trade or about proposals for a landfill site in Denholme. All things that matter just as much to some as 'climate change'.

I could go on filling page after page with things that David Cameron didn’t mention in his speech today. And you know, it doesn’t matter – what matters is what is actually done by the Government not what its leader says on a stage in Birmingham. That’s just rah-rah – cheery stuff (and a bit of a thank you) for the folks who stomped the streets, knocked on the doors and pulled out the votes that gave Dave the job.

If the planet’s pals want to know what the Government is doing – read the Coalition Agreement and look to see whether it’s being implemented. We don’t need off the cuff, on the hoof policy announcements just to get a headline - Blair and Brown did that and look at the mess it got us into.

And we certainly don’t need – at a time when most ordinary people are bothered about their jobs, their mortgages, their kids education and conditions at the local hospital – a load of self appointed guardians of the Earth’s interests (as if they’ve clue) to talk about ‘climate change’.

I am really delighted Dave didn’t mention climate change. It shows he’s getting his priorities right.



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