The Public Investment Fund signed a joint venture agreement with AeroFarms to establish a company in Riyadh to build and operate indoor vertical farms in Saudi Arabia and the wider Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.
The partnership is expected to enable sustainable, local sourcing of high-quality crops all year round, grown using AeroFarms’ proprietary smart agtech platform, which helps solve broader supply chain needs in the industry. The joint venture plans to build and operate several farms across the region in the next few years. The first farm in Saudi Arabia, which is expected to be the largest indoor vertical farm of its kind in the MENA region, will have an annual production capacity of up to 1.1 million kgs of agricultural crops.
Majed AlAssaf, Head of Consumer Goods and Retail, MENA Investments Division at PIF, said: “The agreement with AeroFarms will lead to the establishment of indoor vertical farms in Saudi Arabia and the wider MENA region, increasing regional reliance on locally produced, high-quality crops grown in a sustainable way using the latest technologies. PIF is enabling the growth of the food and agriculture sector and localizing technology that can benefit private sector industry participants.”
David Rosenberg, Co-Founder and CEO of AeroFarms, commented: “Our mission is to grow the best plants possible for the betterment of humanity, and we created AeroFarms to help solve the greatest agriculture challenges and increase food resiliency around the world. We are excited to partner with PIF to build our first large-scale commercial farm in Saudi Arabia, where the growing conditions are challenging with limited access to fresh water and arable land, and we envision building together smart indoor vertical farms throughout the broader MENA region.”
For more information:
AeroFarms
info@aerofarms.com
www.aerofarms.com