A panel of experts discussed what lies ahead for controlled environment agriculture in Asia at Asiafruit Business Forum
Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) is a broad church ranging from the small scale greenhouses that existed when the term was first coined to high-tech indoor vertical farms that push the boundaries of fresh produce production.
The breadth of the sector and the challenges and opportunities faced by the CEA industry were discussed on Day Two (5 September) of Asiafruit Business Forum at Asia Fruit Logistica’s Asiafruit Knowledge Centre.
The session ‘High-tech farming: new solutions for Asia’ began with a presentation from executive director of the CEA Alliance Tom Stenzel, who outlined the development of CEA and provided a brief overview of what lies ahead.
“The road ahead for CEA is positive, it is one of the most exciting developments in agriculture and for the first time we are separating location from agriculture, agriculture can now take place anywhere. The benefits are clear, but we are still early in the process,” said Stenzel.
He was then joined by Jessica Naomi Fong of Common Farms, Lionel Wong of Upgrown Farming Asia and Marc Oshima of Oshima Good Food for a broader discussion of CEA.
Wong set the scene for CEA in Asia noting that indoor farms only make up a small percentage of the market, and they are focused mainly in cities supplying foodservice.
“A lot of the growth we are seeing is modernising traditional farms with no technology at all,” he said.
“The main challenge (for indoor farms) is competing with traditional farms. It is a very price-sensitive market and it can be difficult to convince a consumer to buy something more expensive that looks the same. That’s where a lot of education and marketing comes in.”
Oshima sees technological advances at both ends of the spectrum and an improved understanding of how to grow using CEA opening doors.
“There are more options and more off-the-shelf solutions now. It’s exciting because it creates more opportunities for people to embrace farming in all different types of markets,” he said.
Common Farms started its journey with a 90m2 indoor growing facility and has now scaled up to 3,000m2. Fong said the key to success was having demand drive any expansion in supply.
“There is constant calibration and you have to be patient. Be very conscious and methodical about the economics,” she said.
When it comes to the next leap forward for indoor farming, fruit seemed to be the answer.
“Berries are probably the next frontier,” said Oshima. “What is driving that is people are enamoured by the margin opportunities and we are seeing some large-scale farms coming online.”
However, Wong noted the extra energy requirements that accompany indoor fruit farming may provide a hurdle. He pointed to the Middle East – and its access to affordable energy – as one of the key regions for CEA development.
