Infarm vertical farming units in Empire food stores

19-03-2020 | Smart farming | News

Infarm field grower Lelaina Beyer does the first harvest as Infarm launches its very first U.S. urban farm in collaboration with Kroger / QFC in Kirkland, Washington on November 25, 2019. The first harvest marks the bringing of high-quality, sustainably- grown herbs and leafy greens directly in their neighborhood. Photo by Marcus Donner Infarms are modular and can stack to fit any given space. You ll find them in supermarkets, restaurants and distribution centers, where the produce is harvested and offered fresh, living and full of flavor, right in your neighborhood. We remotely control all infarms through our cloud-based farming platform, that learns, adjusts and improves itself continuously, so each plant grows better than the one before. Each infarm is a controlled ecosystem with the perfect amount of light, air & nutrients. An optimal set of conditions that enables our plants to express their natural tastiness to the fullest. By recreating different growing environments from around the world, we are growing plants previously too delicate, rare or expensive to survive the long journey to your plate. As we install infarms in neighbourhoods around the world, we re saving thousands of food miles, preserving water and natural resources, and laying the foundation for a new urban food system.

Infarm’s vertical farming units will be placed in Sobeys, Safeway and Thrifty Foods stores across Canada.

Empire’s family of brands is partnering with in-store farming platform Infarm, to grow and harvest a range of fresh produce in select Sobeys, Safeway and Thrifty Foods stores across Canada.

Each Infarm vertical farming unit is a stand-alone ecosystem, enabled by machine learning and AI technology, that creates the optimum environment required for plants to flourish.

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The individual farms are connected and remotely controlled from a central farming platform. – Photo: Infarm

No use of pesticides

Infarm says the in-store farms produce fresh, nutritious and flavourful produce all year round without the use of chemical pesticides. According to the company the vertical farms use 95 per cent less water, 90 per cent less transportation and 75 per cent less fertiliser than industrial agriculture.

Farms are remotely controlled

The individual farms are connected and remotely controlled from a central farming platform that gathers up-to-the minute information about the growth of each plant and learns, adjusts and improves the growing conditions.