Using technology to make young salad leaves more nutritious

NIAB

Project objectives

Growing food where it will be eaten, and only growing the amount of food you need, could help to reduce both food waste and emissions. Vertical farming technology, such as growing with LEDs and hydroponics, integrated with machine learning and image processing, could help to improve indoor growing systems. This project will explore new technologies to move to net-zero food production. It will also investigate how new technology can help to grow young brassica crops with higher nutritional value to support healthy diets. Evogro make personal vertical farms for hospitality operators and homes. They use the same technologies as industrial vertical farms, but scaled down to appliance size. Based in East Malling, the business provides an integrated system and support service so their customers can grow high-quality crops without needing horticultural expertise.