Infarm, the world's fastest growing urban farming company, that is already present in 10 countries, 30 cities and thousands of stores, continues to realize its vision of a global, connected, sustainable and highly efficient farming ecosystem.
Infarm's goals include driving innovation in the $3 trillion global fruit and vegetable market. To this end, Infarm has unveiled its new automated and modular Infarm Growing Centers (IGC). Each IGC is a local farm and distribution center combined, achieving the harvest equivalent of 10,000 m2 of farmland. This means that, compared to traditional farming, each Growing Center produces food up to 400 times more efficiently.
Vertical Farming 2.0 / Image: InFarm
The cloud-connected, high-yield Growing Centers plug into InFarm's fast-growing, global farm network that learns on its own and continuously improves crop yield, taste and nutritional value, while continually reducing the use of natural resources. With 50,000 m2 of vertical farming space and more than 1,200 in-store farms, Infarm already supplies fresh produce to 50% of the world's largest grocers. Due to the rapid installation and operational capability of the new Growing Centers, Infarm is able to significantly increase production and meet the demand of large and small retailers all over the world. The goal is to expand the Infarm network to 500,000 m2 of growing space by the end of 2025
The Growing Centers consist of multiple Farming Units with heights of 10 and 18 meters, each requiring a footprint of 25 m2 and can be set up in just six weeks. This modular, data-driven and decentralized approach - a combination of Big Data, IoT, cloud analytics and rapid growth on a global scale - sets Infarm apart from all other farming solutions.
Looking at urban centers
"Access to fresh, local and sustainable food is a growing challenge as more and more people move to cities and climate change accelerates," said Erez Galonska, co-founder and CEO of Infarm. "The new Growing Centers enable us to grow even faster, as new technology allows them to be installed in any city in the world in just a fraction of the time, space and capital investment of many other large-scale vertical farming solutions. Both the farms and the software that controls them were designed with urban centers in mind, making fresh produce accessible to anyone, anywhere."
Food retailers already part of the Infarm network include Empire Company Ltd (Safeway, Sobeys, ThriftyFoods), Whole Foods Market, Marks & Spencer, Kroger, Kinokuniya, Selfridges, Aldi South, Amazon Fresh, Auchan, Casino, E. Leclerc, Edeka, Farmdrop, Intermarché, Irma, Kaufland, Metro, Migros, Selgros, Summit in Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Japan, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, the United States and Switzerland.
New food system for people and the planet
"The entire Infarm network is connected to a farm brain that collects over 50,000 growth, color and spectral data points over the lifetime of each plant," explains Guy Galonska, Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer at Infarm. "We have been able to collect over 300 billion data points to date. This data allows us to perfect our growing method, improve the yield, quality and nutritional value of our crops, while continuously reducing production costs."
The large-scale Growing Centers can save up to 10 million liters of water per year compared to soil-based farming for similar crops, while also saving up to 40% energy compared to previous Infarm technologies.
Infarm plans to launch 100 Growing Centers by 2025, representing the equivalent of 1.5 million m2 of farmland and producing 450 million plants. This year, 15 Growing Centers are being built or are currently under construction in major cities - including London, Paris, Copenhagen, Toronto, Vancouver, Seattle and Tokyo.
For more information: infarm.com