Could this be the future of farming? Inside Europe’s biggest vertical farm
Outside it is the bleak midwinter. We are smack bang in the middle of some of the country’s best agricultural land.
But inside the cavernous warehouse where we’ve come, you wouldn’t have a clue about any of that: there is no daylight; it feels like it could be any time of the day, any season of the year.
We are at Fischer Farms – Europe’s biggest vertical farm.
The whole point of a vertical farm is to create an environment where you can grow plants, stacked on top of each other (hence: vertical) in high density. The idea being that you can grow your salads or peas somewhere close to the cities where they’re consumed rather than hundreds of miles away. Location is not supposed to matter.
Farm 2 of Fischer Farms
So the fact that this particular one is to be found amid the fields a few miles outside Norwich is somewhat irrelevant. It could be anywhere. Indeed, unlike most farms, which are sometimes named after the family that owns them or a local landmark, this one is simply called “Farm 2”. “Farm 1” is to be found in Staffordshire, in case you were wondering.
Farm boss’s dizzying ambition
These futuristic farm units are the brainwave of Tristan Fischer, a serial entrepreneur who has spent much of his career working on renewable energy in its various guises. His ambition now is dizzying: to be able to grow not just basil and chives in a farm like this but to grow other, trickier and more competitive crops too – from strawberries to wheat and rice.
Only then, he says, can vertical farming stand a chance of truly changing the world.
The idea behind vertical farming itself is more than a century old. Back in 1915, American geologist Gilbert Ellis Bailey described how it could be done in theory. In theory, one should be able to grow plants hydroponically – in other words with a mineral substrate instead of soil – in a controlled environment and thereby increase the yield dramatically.
In one sense this is what’s already being done in greenhouses across much of Northern Europe and the US, where tomatoes and other warm-weather-loving vegetables are grown in temperature-controlled environments. However, while most of these greenhouses still depend on natural light (if sometimes bolstered by electric bulbs) the point behind vertical farming was that by controlling the amount of light, one could grow more or less everything, any time of the year. And by stacking the crops together one could yield even more crops in each acre of land one was using.
The tunnels are 12 levels high and bathed in bright LED lights
Look at a long-term chart of agricultural yields in this country and you start to see why this might matter. The quantity of crops we grow in each acre of land jumped dramatically in the second half of the 20th century – a consequence in part of liberal use of artificial fertiliser and in part of new technologies and systems. But that productivity rate started to tail off towards the end of the century.
‘Changing the equation’
Vertical farming promises, if it can make the numbers add up, to change the equation, dramatically increasing agricultural productivity in the coming decades. The question is whether the technology is there yet.
And when it comes to the technology, one thing has certainly changed. Those early vertical farms (the first attempts actually date back to the 1950s) all had a big problem: the bulbs. Incandescent bulbs were both too hot and too energy intensive to work in these environments. But the latest generation of LED bulbs are both cool and cheap, and it’s these bulbs you need (in vast numbers) if you’re going to make vertical farming work.
Read more from Sky News:
In a time of change Sky News spent a critical year on a farm
How climate change could be jeopardising UK access to affordable food
The farm is growing basil but the ambition is to grow much more than simple herbs
Here at Farm 2, you encounter row after row of trays, each stacked on top of each other, each carrying increasingly leafy basil plants. They sit under thousands of little LED bulbs which are tuned to precisely the right spectral frequency to encourage the plant to grow rapidly.
Mr Fischer says: “We’re on this downward cost curve on LEDs. And then when you think about other main inputs, energy – renewable energy – is constantly coming down as well.
“So you think about all the big drivers of vertical farming, they’re going down, whereas compared to full-grown crops, everything’s going up – the fertilisers, rents, water is becoming more expensive too.”
Just over a month after the basil was seeded, it is now fully grown and trays of the crop are moved to the harvesting machine
This farm – which currently sells to restaurant chains rather than direct to consumers – is now cost-competitive with the basil shipped (or more often flown) in from the Mediterranean and North Africa. The carbon footprint is considerably lower too.
“And our long-term goal is that we can get a lot cheaper,” says Mr Fischer. “If you look at Farm 1, we spent about £2.5m on lights in 2018. Fast forward to Farm 2; it’s seven and a half times bigger and in those three years the lights were effectively half the price. We’re also probably using 60 to 70 percent less power.”
Farm boss Tristan Fischer speaks to Sky’s Ed Conway
It might seem odd to hear a farmer talk so much about energy and comparatively less about the kinds of things one associates with farmers – the soil or tractors or the weather – but vertical farming is in large part an energy business. If energy prices are low enough, it makes the crops here considerably cheaper.
But here in the UK, with power costs higher than anywhere else in the developed world, the prospects for this business are more challenged than elsewhere. Still, Mr Fischer’s objective is to prove the business case here before building bigger units elsewhere, in countries with much cheaper power.
In much the same way as Dutch growers came to dominate those greenhouses, he thinks the UK has a chance of dominating this new agricultural sector.
The Bank of England has cut the interest rate for the fifth time in a year to 4% but warned that climbing food prices will cause inflation to jump higher in 2025.
In a tight decision that saw members of the rate-setting committee vote twice to break a deadlock, the Bank cut the rate to the lowest level in more than two-and-a-half years. Households on a variable mortgage of about £140,000 will save about £30 a month.
Andrew Bailey, governor of the Bank of England, said: “We’ve cut interest rates today, but it was a finely balanced decision. Interest rates are still on a downward path, but any future cuts will need to be made gradually and carefully.”
Money latest: What interest rate cut means for savers and borrowers
The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC), the nine-member panel that sets the base interest rate, voted in favour of lowering borrowing costs by 0.25 percentage points.
However, rate-setters failed to reach a unanimous decision, with four members of the committee voting to keep it on hold and another four voting for a 0.25 percentage point cut.
Alan Taylor, an external member of the committee, initially called for a larger 0.5 percentage point cut but after a second vote reduced that to 0.25% to break the deadlock. Had they failed to reach a decision, Mr Bailey, the governor, would have had the decisive vote.
It is the first time the committee has gone to a second vote and highlights the difficulty policymakers face in navigating the current economic climate, in which economic growth is stagnating, with at least one rate-setter fearing a recession, but inflation remains persistent.
Although the central bank voted to cut borrowing costs, it also raised its inflation forecasts on the back of higher food prices.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
‘We’ve got to get the balance right on tax’
The bank predicted that the headline rate of inflation would hit 4% in September, up from a previous estimate of 3.75%.
The September inflation rate is used to uprate a range of benefits, including pensions.
The increase was driven by food, where the inflation rate could hit 5.5% this year. About a tenth of household spending is devoted to food shopping, which means it can have an outsized impact on inflation.
The Bank said this risked creating “second round effects”, whereby a sense of higher inflation forces people to push for pay rises, which could push inflation even higher.
Economists at the Bank blamed poor harvests, weather conditions, and changes to packaging regulations but also, in a blow to the chancellor, higher labour costs.
It pointed out that a higher proportion of workers in the food retail sector are paid the national living wage, which Rachel Reeves increased by 6.7% in April.
Economists at the Bank also blamed higher employment taxes announced in the autumn budget. “Furthermore, overall labour costs of supermarkets are likely to have been disproportionately affected by the lower threshold at which employers start paying NICs… these material increases in labour costs are likely to have pushed up food prices.”
There is also evidence that employers’ national insurance increases are causing businesses to curtail hiring, the Bank said. It comes as unemployment in the UK rose unexpectedly to a fresh four-year high of 4.7% in May. Separate data shows the number of employees on payroll has contracted for the fifth month in a row,
The Bank said the unemployment rate could hit 5% next year and warned of “subdued” economic growth, with one member – Alan Taylor – warning of an “increased risk of recession” in the coming years.
Donald Trump has announced 100% tariffs on computer chips and semiconductors made outside the US.
The move threatens to increase the cost of electronics made outside the US, which covers everything from TVs and video game consoles to kitchen appliances and cars.
The announcement came as Apple chief executive Tim Cook said his company would invest an extra $100bn (£74.9bn) in US manufacturing.
Soon, all smartwatch and iPhone glass around the world will be made in Kentucky, according to Mr Cook, speaking from the Oval Office.
“This is a significant step toward the ultimate goal of ensuring that iPhones sold in the United States of America are also made in America,” said Mr Trump.
“Today’s announcement is one of the largest commitments in what has become among the greatest investment booms in our nation’s history.”
Mr Cook also presented the president with a one-of-a-kind trophy made by Apple in the US.
Trump seen through the trophy given to him by Tim Cook. Pic: AP
Trump’s tariffs hit India hard
Mr Trump has previously criticised Mr Cook and Apple after the company attempted to avoid his tariffs by shifting iPhone production from China to India.
The president said he had a “little problem” with Apple and said he’d told Mr Cook: “I don’t want you building in India.”
India itself felt Mr Trump’s wrath on Wednesday, as he issued an executive order hitting the country with an additional 25% tariff for its continued purchasing of Russian oil.
Indian imports into the US will face a 50% tariff from 27 August as a result of the move, as the president seeks to increase the pressure on Russia to end the war in Ukraine.
Mr Trump told reporters at the White House he “could” also hit China with more tariffs.
Read more:
Trump could meet Putin as early as next week
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
‘Good chance’ Trump will meet Putin soon
Apple’s ‘olive branch’
Apple, meanwhile, plans to hire 20,000 people in the US to support its extra manufacturing in the country, which will total $600bn (around £449bn) worth of investment over four years.
The “vast majority” of those jobs will be focused on a new end-to-end US silicon production line, research and development, software development, and artificial intelligence, according to the company.
Apple’s investment in the US caused the company’s stock price to hike by nearly 6% in Wednesday’s midday trading.
The rise may reflect relief by investors that Mr Cook “is extending an olive branch” to Mr Trump, said Nancy Tengler, chief executive of money manager Laffer Tengler Investments, which owns Apple stock.
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Sports2 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike