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Urban farms could be incredibly efficient—but aren't yet
In some ways, hyper-local food is a counterculture movement, focused on growing herbs and vegetables in the same dense urban environments where they will be eaten. It trades the huge efficiencies of modern agriculture for large savings in transportation and storage costs. But is urban farming environmentally friendly?
According to researchers at Australia's University of New England, the answer is pretty complex. Within their somewhat limited group of gardeners, urban agriculture is far more productive for the amount of land used but isn't especially efficient with labor and materials use. But the materials issue could be solved, and the labor inefficiency may be a product of the fact that most urban farmers are hobbyists and are doing it for fun.
The researchers—Robert McDougalla, Paul Kristiansena, and Romina Rader—defined urban agriculture as taking place within a kilometer of a densely built environment. Working in the Sydney area, they were able to find 13 urban farmers who were willing to keep detailed logs of their activity for an entire year. Labor and materials costs were tracked, as was the value of the produce it helped create. The energetic costs of the materials and labor were also calculated in order to assess the sustainability of urban farming.
The plots cultivated by these farmers were quite small, with the median only a bit over 10 square meters. Yet they were extremely productive, with a mean of just under six kilograms of produce for each of those square meters. That's about twice as productive as a typical Australian vegetable farm, although the output range of the urban farms was huge—everything from slightly below large farm productivity to five times as productive.
For the vast majority of crops, however, the urban farms weren't especially effective. They required far more labor than traditional farms, and, as a result, the total value of the inputs into the crop exceeded the income from selling it. In other words, the urban farmers were losing money, at least by traditional accounting measures.
PNAS, 2018. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1809707115 (About DOIs).
(Score: 4, Insightful) by MostCynical on Saturday December 29 2018, @08:51AM (28 children)
home grown vegetables taste better thn anything bought in a store - even good grocery stores.
The watering and weeding are massively disproportionate to the yield.
Keeping local wild rabbits and birds from eating any of the stuff is also difficult.
But the quality and taste of home grown organic (no, not paying for "certification") vegetables is *almost* worth it.
Cost? When you buy soil, make planter boxes, and buy seedlings: also excessive..
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday December 29 2018, @09:34AM (19 children)
Watering, true. I don't get it why weeding is massively disproportionate.
No need to buy seedlings (unless you want to diversify), you can raise them yourself from seeds.
On the run, in my case, watering is the main cost.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Saturday December 29 2018, @09:40AM (10 children)
S.O.'s laziness/desire for instant gratification, crossed with being time-poor means seedlings appear after trips to nursery.. Weeding is excessive, as I have to it all, as rest of family gets bored after a few minutes..
Watering, at least, is automatic.
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday December 29 2018, @09:59AM (9 children)
Automatic as it may be, for the last 3-4 years the cost of water alone is higher than the cost of the produce that I'm obtaining from the veggie patch (about 80-90sqm in raised beds. Grass clippings make a fertilizer good enough between crops, I haven't bought manure or extra soil since I established the patch about 10 years ago).
It still worth it for the taste.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 5, Insightful) by VLM on Saturday December 29 2018, @03:00PM (3 children)
I can't speak for anyone but its possible OP was being sarcastic; being east of the Mississippi I get near four feet of rain per year and I only actively water my container garden because it drains too well or there's a short term drought (two weeks or so). Fairly common to skip many watering days due to rain.
This will never work in Las Vegas or CA in general, but bad places to live are just bad places to live. Kinda like don't move to the UP of Michigan if you don't like snow, don't live in a desert if you like to garden anything other than psychedelic cactus (which might be fun?)
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday December 29 2018, @08:53PM (2 children)
Australia's weather patterns vary considerable in space/time (OP lives downunder too).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Funny) by gawdonblue on Saturday December 29 2018, @09:18PM (1 child)
Australia - that's in Texas, right?
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday December 29 2018, @10:02PM
West Texas to be more precise
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by tibman on Saturday December 29 2018, @05:53PM (4 children)
Water is free if you have a rain barrels. My county sells barrels and conversion kits for 25$. Less water going into draining ditches is better for everyone.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @06:50PM (1 child)
And that's probably illegal to do that. Here in Seattle, the city bought the water rights to most of the city, so if you're located in one of those areas, you're both free and encouraged to collect as much rain that falls on your property as possible. Due to most of the water immediately running off into the ocean, the water rights must not have been very expensive. It's also a bit of a benefit in that it helps those times when we get 5" of rain in a single day.
But, in most of the country, it's not legal to collect rainwater as you don't own the rights to it. I don't think it's a commonly enforced law when it comes to people's houses, but it isn't legal.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @11:42PM
That's not even uniform in the USA. It's mostly true in western states but it's not necessarily true in the east.
There's a whole history this, related to how pioneers came in and then were in conflict with later settlers who violated their early norms ... complex topic.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday December 29 2018, @08:46PM (1 child)
I have rail water tanks, I just don't have enough rain.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday December 29 2018, @08:49PM
s/rail/rain/g
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @09:54AM (7 children)
Compare manual work bent 90° or on your knees vs. a huge tractor that drags 69' wide cultivator at 6-10 mph autonomously, by GPS. It does not make sense to grow anything on small fields, unless you just want to.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by c0lo on Saturday December 29 2018, @10:08AM (6 children)
Why should I bend to 90° when 30° is enough? (grin)
Raise beds means I get to spare at least my knees.
In any case, some produce don't need tractors - have a Toshiba lettuce [qz.com] grown in former clean rooms. Haven't tasted it tough.
And yes, one can't self sustain oneself from hobby gardening - that's clearly a choice.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday December 29 2018, @04:36PM (5 children)
Humanity has had subsistence farmers for thousands of years. Today, we have ways of massively increasing yields, while reducing and automating the work. Maybe a hobbyist can sustain themselves with a shipping container sized garden. Of course, that might cost them $100k and they need some land to stick it on. But it could be a better investment than buying a boat.
Fast forward 20 years and the hobbyists could be even better off. Imagine a container that had a plexiglass roof with an automatically retractable cover, and sensors to let in a fixed amount of sunlight. The outside of the container could be covered in flexible solar panels to power internal LED grow lights. You could have little robots inside capable of harvesting the produce at exactly the right moment. Sensors could determine the health of each plant and when a tomato, cabbage, whatever will not benefit from remaining unpicked. Aquaculture (fish) could be integrated into the system to provide nutrients. Etc. I can't guarantee this arrangement would provide the dietary variety you need, but excess produce could be sold, traded, or preserved/canned.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @04:47PM (2 children)
Bad news: the problem with cost is very real in the scenario you describe. You can get jaw-dropping levels of production if you use layered aeroponics, with solar panels feeding carefully placed, tuned LED grow lights, with doped water sprays and calibrated environmental controls, CO2 injection and drone-based maintenance.
Of course, by then you'd damn well better be harvesting gold nuggets, or it's just not worth it.
This is the problem with farming: it's a terribly capital-intensive industry, producing commodities, with wildly varying price structures based on unforeseeable events. Your cyberpunk farmtronic proposal will turn a profit possibly once a decade, and the rest of the time bleed money like a drunkard in Vegas.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday December 29 2018, @05:00PM
No problem, just hand out some tax breaks and call them victory gardens!
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday December 29 2018, @09:52PM
Depends on the crops and weather conditions
In Australia growing lettuce, kale, herbs in shipping containers [abc.net.au] is a reality. The investment is jaw-dropping ($200-300K for a 40ft module), but one has some advantages:
- no weeding or using pesticides, sterile crops (or go bust) at harvest with no need for washing
- the "farms" can be placed very close to highly urbanized area - there are the eateries and restaurants with a predictable volume so you can plan for capacity
- no (chilled) storage space necessary, practically no transport cost
- very fresh produce makes a premium produce - the affluence of people working in the business district means you can put a modicum premium on the price.
In the linked:
The retail price for a lettuce head in supermarket is around $2 - 2.5. At this price, my guts feel a ROI in 7-10 years (if ever; power prices is a killer in Australia) - quite far from being a highly attractive business proposition.
However, in highly urbanized areas, like Hong Kong or Japan, it may make business sense.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @05:44PM
What would you want a fixed amount of sunlight for? AFAIK there aren't many crops that are so dependent on daylight-length that this is necessary, and it would be cheaper just to go full-growlight for those. For temperature regulation, a purely mechanical system using pneumatic pistons to open/close a vent depending on the temperature is cheap and efficient (completely passively, dependent only on temp changing internal pressure).
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday December 29 2018, @10:17PM
You mean something more like Modular Farms [modularfarms.com.au]?
'Cause, no, if you don't stack the crop vertically, all you have is a(n automated) glass-house - you already are in the "diminishing returns" zone relatively to normal glass-houses. And if you go with vertical farming, a retractable roof won't get you enough light. Plus, the roof/wall surface won't get you enough PV surface to power all the LEDs you need to use.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Saturday December 29 2018, @12:00PM (1 child)
Do you do Square Foot Gardening?
I find my garden is REALLY more productive than my wife's, who does traditional row gardening, and it keeps the weeding down once the veggies get growing.
AND I'm going to have some really nice asparagus this summer from what I saw this fall. Will just have to squish more bugs again.
Gonna eat some, can some, pickle some, freeze some......mmmmmmm.....
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday December 30 2018, @01:45AM
Gross. I'm glad I won't be eating at your place!
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Saturday December 29 2018, @12:55PM (2 children)
Given a commercial or semi-commercial concern, that has invested in greenhouses. I wonder what weeding would be like inside the greenhouse. Here, on my property, there are thousands of years worth of wild seeds accumulated in the soil. Turn up a bit of soil, and you've exposed seeds that have been lying under the surface for years, decades, or even centuries. All it needs is the proper mix of moisture, sunlight, and temperature, and it sprouts. There is simply no way to ever remove all of those seeds, just waiting for something to trigger it. And, every single year, wild seeds are spread across the property again, blown in from they neighbor's yard, as well as from miles away. (Ever wonder how far a dandelion seed might travel, when a gust of wind picks it up?)
In a greenhouse, I would suppose that you might start with dirt brought in from a *more* sterile location. I've heard that Washington state has areas where the "topsoil" might be fifty feet deep. I suppose that few seeds that far below the surface remain viable, so that would be a great starter. Once the dirt is inside of the greenhouse, you can prevent the annual accumulation of seeds blown in from wherever.
Does anyone here have any experience to back up that speculation? Given a greenhouse a hundred feet long, and fifty feet wide, maybe you would only get a couple hundred weeds to pull, vs the tens or hundreds of thousands that I get in my garden, roughly the same size. The only way around all of that weeding, is a very liberal application of mulch. The problem with mulch is, it can get very costly, negating any financial benefit to a garden.
Of course, "green mulch" is probably the best way to go, although I never did it. Get some winter crop, such as hairy vetch, and plant it in the autumn. It grows up, and covers the ground pretty thickly, preventing any seeds from sprouting in the spring, and/or starves any seedlings of sunlight. Then, at planting time, you make just enough of a hole in the covering vetch to plant seeds individually, or perhaps cut a line in the vetch, into which you sprinkle your seeds. It sounds good, in theory.
What I've always seen, in practice, is tilling everything, plant the seeds, then fight those weeds until your crops are tall enough to smother the competition. It's a HELLACIOUS amount of work!!
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @04:50PM
I have some of the experience you describe.
The smart start for greenhouses is basically to pave them, or at least cover the base with a weed barrier, then do your actual planting in something like hot composted sewage solids.
Plants grow like hell, and basically no weeding, give or take introduced seeds.
There are other problems with pathogen management in what amounts to a fungus's wet dream, but that's a different story.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday December 30 2018, @01:31AM
"In a greenhouse, I would suppose that you might start with dirt brought in from a *more* sterile location. "
duh... of course. There is no weeding in a greenhouse. Plants are gown in trays on tables.
My parent ran one in the midwest until the cost of LP gas to keep it heated skyrocketed in the 70's
One of my jobs was to 'cook the dirt' at the start of the growing season.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Saturday December 29 2018, @02:45PM (1 child)
Rapidly becomes a labor vs capital thing. My planters are made of cedar and stainless steel fasteners and I slap deck finish on them every five years and they look new. Supposedly untreated cedar touching bare dirt will last a century in my climate; not sure if I believe it.
I have an extra expense of my planters are really a decorative shell for 5-gallon buckets with holes in bottom. Then big gravel, then landscape cloth sheets holding dirt. The planter (and overhanging cloth) protects the pails from sunlight so they'll last forever. I don't care if the pails are organic or not, but they were new food grade when I bought them and any water that touches them is by definition draining out and after two decades they've outgassed anything they're gonna outgas.
The only problems I have are my neighbor's tree has grown from a sapling to a giant and it blocks my best growing area (I can move the planter, but then its in an annoying location) and the dirt drains too well to the point that I "need" to water the plants daily.
Of course its more fun than work to water the plants.
I grow mint and turn it into mint juleps and mint junk food (ice cream, etc) and basil for basil butter and pesto and bell peppers for general snacking. Once in awhile for no apparent reason the bugs will decimate one species for a season. Weird. Oh well.
To some extent its like a journalistic expose on the topic of puppy mills not being profitable so no one should buy dogs planning to open 100 million puppy mills therefore no one should own dogs. I'm pretty happy at a very small scale.
Also there are scaling issues where basil and mint are incredibly expensive such that I'm running a net profit in the first year, although I could never container garden wheat or other grains and be competitive with industrial scale farms.... or could I? Hmm maybe next spring I do whatever needs to be done to grow one single corn plant in a bucket...
Containers are where its at. I'm strong enough that the bucket weighs nothing so I can work in extreme comfort and as things grow and shade each other its trivial to move stuff. Also once you get multiple planters you can shuffle the containers between them as you see fit, whereas transplanting dirt plants is much harder.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @04:41PM
You'll need at least 2 corn plants, unless you're close (~mile or so IIRC) to someone growing some.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @04:31PM
My mom built planter boxes with removeable fences and wooden sides that extended 2 feet below the soil surface - we don't have rabbit problems (I occassionally run over a baby with the lawnmower but don't see them otherwise), but deer and groundhogs are common. For most families, composting/vermiculture isn't going to produce a lot of soil, but many municipalities give away compost (a truckload from a neighboring city's composting operation filled up 2 1x3 meter boxes nicely). Weeding is largely a waste of time after you get transplants/seeds in the soil, and watering is mostly plug-in and forget with a cheap timer on the hose and a couple hours of work building and burying a grid of irrigation hoses in the boxes.