New Ways Of Agriculture: Urban Farming And Vertical Farming

Urban farming as the name suggests is the new and modernized way of agriculture. It includes cultivating and distributing the farm produce within and outside the village area. It also includes horticulture, animal husbandry, and agroforestry. It is also termed as urban gardening and urban agriculture.

Urban farming is the essential part of urban system. It includes urban organic wastes as raw materials, urban residents are used as workers for farming, the policies and plans are also influenced by urban system. Most of the people involved in urban farming are urban poor. Women are also an integral part of urban farming as it involves processing and cultivating of plants.

Urban farming can be practiced inside the cities or around the cities. The urban practices can take place on public lands like parks, private lands like plots, conservative areas or areas around hospitals and schools. The products grown by urban farming are crops, grains, mushrooms, vegetables and fruits. Food products from animals like rabbits, goats, cattle, sheep, fishes and poultry are also produced in urban agriculture. Medicinal herbs and ornamental plants are also included. High valued vegetables and fruits and perishable animal products and by- products are produced more as compared to other farm products.

Urban farming is also being practiced in places like Florida. Due to shortage of agriculture and organic food in the country the people in Florida started converting their lawns into farms to produce vegetables. Buffington in 2014 developed this system called as Growing Orlando, Florida to solve the problem of limited farm products by retailers. Growing Orlando converted small vacant lawns into agricultural farms. This process is a great success and is profitable in Florida. This project made the distribution and supply of food easier. the food produced also resulted in sending products to neighbourhood cities. The economic benefit of this project is that the money remains within the economy instead of spending it on other market retailers.

Vertical farming is also a new way of growing plants. In this type of farming, food is produced in vertical layers. Vertical farms also have a hydroponic system. Minimum amount of water is used to produce a lot of food. It also takes less space as compared to other traditional methods of farming.

Vertical farming is also being practiced in many countries like Florida. The plants are a grown in small pots placed on top of one another in a vertical position. By this method acres of fruits and vegetables are produced there without taking much space.

As per the experts, with the growing population, if we continue this practice by 2050 we will be so sufficient in food and our own farms that there is no use of converting any lands further into farms. Vertical farming also controls the environment. As it controls the environment, pesticides will be used less and organic crops can be grown for future. The use of fossil fuels is also reduced as there is no use of tractors etc.

Both urban farming and vertical farming are creating employment opportunities in many countries and by practicing these methods countries are able to maximize their yields with less cost.