Strawberries grown in vertical farms debut in Singapore markets

Sus-tenir Agriculture, an agricultural company in Singapore, has apparently announced the launch of its vertical farm-grown strawberries across selected supermarkets in the nation.

Speaking on the sidelines of a visit to an R&D lab of the firm, Singapore's Senior Minister for Trade and Industry, Koh Poh Koon was quoted stating that the government authorities would require to bring about a change in rules to aid the growth of vertical farming. He further acknowledged that the agencies would need to liberalize regulations and be more flexible to accommodate the requirements of the companies such as Sus-tenir Agriculture.

He also added that among the many solutions the Government is looking to address the challenges faced by the vertical farm industry is to locate such farms near R&D firms, universities, and commercial companies. Explaining the need of such clusters, Koh stated that it will let farmers in the urban settings leverage the mastery in other fields that would help them in devising technological solutions which are cost-effective.

For the record, almost all vertical farm companies grow premium vegetables such as kale that could be sold at economical rates compared to the imported versions.

Sources familiar with the development claim that finding spaces for vertical farming has been a major obstacle and the Government has been looking forward to assisting farmers who identify buildings and areas to construct such facilities.

Reportedly, the Co-founder of a vertical farming firm SING.Fresh, James Liu has been one such farmer to have faced the challenges of getting approvals from several government authorities for utilized unused areas. He stated that the higher costs of such spaces for vertical farming would translate into high costs for customers.

According to the statistics published by the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority of Singapore (AVA), the number of commercial indoor vertical farm spaces stands at 26 as of April 2018.