The Journal of Horticultural Science and Biotechnology

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Vertical farming - smart urban agriculture for

enhancing resilience and sustainability in food
security

Soojin Oh & Chungui Lu

To cite this article: Soojin Oh & Chungui Lu (2023) Vertical farming - smart urban agriculture
for enhancing resilience and sustainability in food security, The Journal of Horticultural Science
and Biotechnology, 98:2, 133-140, DOI: 10.1080/14620316.2022.2141666

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/14620316.2022.2141666

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THE JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURAL SCIENCE AND BIOTECHNOLOGY
2023, VOL. 98, NO. 2, 133–140
https://doi.org/10.1080/14620316.2022.2141666

Vertical farming - smart urban agriculture for enhancing resilience and

sustainability in food security
Soojin Oh and Chungui Lu
School of Animal Rural and Environmental Sciences, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, UK

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

Global food security has been significantly threatened by the Covid-19 pandemic and several Accepted 18 October 2022
prolonged challenges such as climate change, population increases, shortage of natural
KEYWORDS
resources, energy crisis, and rapid urbanisation worldwide. Although numerous attempts Vertical farming; smart
have been made to secure resilience in the food system, many countries are suffering from farming; urban agriculture;
hunger and malnutrition, particularly in African and some Asian countries. This review paper hydroponic; aeroponic
presents one of the sustainable farming practices – vertical farming that could play a key role in
mitigating global food security in the current uncertain world. It addresses the recent devel­
opment of vertical farming with advanced precision monitoring and controlling system by the
Internet of Things (IoT) applications. It also provides information about the opportunities and
challenges of vertical-urban agriculture and how urban agriculture meets economic, social and
educational needs.

Introduction
Global food security has been significantly threatened
by the Covid-19 Pandemic along with the prolonged
drivers of food insecurity including climate change,
shortage of agricultural resources, an energy crisis, an
increase in population, and urbanisation (Oh et al.,
2021). Land/soil degradation is a particularly serious
issue for global food security highly affecting the scar­
city of arable land for crop production. Reduction in
the global land area will require a 50 to 100% increase
in food production per unit hectare on existing land by
2050 (Searchinger et al., 2018). Many countries
depending on imports for their food supplies are
struggling to afford food and there are less choices
for healthy food due to their higher prices and inse­
curity of accessibility (Hardy et al., 2021). Therefore,
we urgently need to rethink the way we farm.
Vertical farming is a modern agricultural practice
of growing crops, stacked vertically in a protected
indoor environment, which mainly utilises
a hydroponic or aeroponic cultivation system.
Vertical farming offers numerous potential benefits,
including more efficient uses of space, reduced water
usage, shorter growing times, reduced need for pesti­
cides/herbicides, and shelter from extreme weather. In
addition, since vertical farms can be set up practically
anywhere, even underground, they could enable
hyper-localised production, thus shortening food sup­
ply chains and providing fresh and nutritious local
foods all year around (Eldridge et al., 2020;
Shamshiri et al., 2018).
This review paper aims to review the recent devel­
opment of vertical farming-smart urban agriculture.
The objectives are to (i) present the current develop­
ment of vertical farming and urban agriculture world­
wide; (ii) determine state-of-the-art of vertical farming
with modern and precision technologies; and (iii)
identify current challenges and opportunities of verti­
cal farming for food security.
Vertical farming: mitigation for food security
Urbanisation has continuously increased worldwide
and 55% of the world’s population inhabits urban
areas. Whilst the population of rural areas residents
is expected to drop by 11% in 2030, the number of
urban settlements will be continuously increased
(United Nations [UN], 2018). As the demand for
food supply in city residents has increased, smart
urban-vertical farming has been highlighted. Urban
agriculture mitigates societal, environmental and eco­
nomic challenges related to food security owing to
controlled and optimal growing conditions such as
temperature, humidity, CO2 and lighting conditions.
It eventually contributes to shortening the growing
cycle and increasing plant density and enhancing har­
vest yield (Khan et al., 2020; Treftz & Omaye, 2016).
Owing to urban accessibility, urban agriculture allevi­
ates energy and expenses for transportation, distribu­
tion and storage management, and enables the
reduction of the carbon footprint of food crops
(Avgoustaki & Xydis, 2020b).

CONTACT Chungui Lu Chungui.Lu@ntu.ac.uk School of Animal Rural and Environmental Sciences, Nottingham Trent University, Brackenhurst
Campus, Nottingham, UK
© 2022 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-
nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or
built upon in any way.
134 S. OH AND C. LU

According to Armanda et al. (2019), several coun­
tries in Europe and Asia and the United States of
America have been practising commercialised vertical
farming systems. Unlike conventional controlled
environmental agriculture such as glasshouse cultiva­
tion with natural sunlight, indoor vertical farming is
based on fully controlling and monitoring the growing
condition including artificial light sources with a high
yield in less space. Farms vary in location, such as
underground, in abandoned areas or on rooftops,
reflecting that each farm applies distinctive technolo­
gies for specific microenvironments. Overall, urban
agricultural farms focus on growing leafy vegetables
with a high annual food production (Armanda et al.,
2019). Vertical farming has been widely employed in
East and Southeast Asian countries, including China
(e.g. Smart farm in Fujian Province), Japan (e.g.
Nuvege Plant Factory), Singapore (e.g. Sky Green
Farms) and South Korea (e.g. NextOn) (Shamshiri
et al., 2018). In North America, the USA and Canada
feature several urban farm projects (e.g. AeroFarms).
The AeroFarms is based in New Jersey and it is one of
the largest indoor vertical farms in the world with
8400 square metres of growing space using an aero­
ponic growing system (Hardy et al., 2021).
Because of the significant rate of urbanisation,
urban agriculture is rapidly developing and practised
in Asian countries. However, there are several chal­
lenges to its implementation in Asia. For instance,
there is a lack of arable areas in urban or peri-urban
regions and significant requirements for residential
areas as opposed to urban farms. Varying legislation
and regulations in different regions also hinder the
urban agriculture development (Akaeze &
Nandwani, 2020). Although urban agriculture faces
several challenges, numerous examples have shown
that urban agriculture not only delivers food crops
successfully but also provides socioeconomic benefits,
including environmental (e.g. provision of biodiver­
sity and sustainability in urban areas) and socioeco­
nomic benefits (e.g. leisure, education and reduction
of transportation for food crops) (Akaeze &
Nandwani, 2020).
In European countries, urban agriculture is
expected to handle the societal transformations of
both urban and rural areas, such as ageing and gen­
erational renewal in the agriculture (Piorr et al., 2018).
There are several successful commercialised urban
farms in Northwest European countries including
Belgium (e.g. BIGH Farms), France (e.g. Agricool
and La Caverne), Germany (e.g. InFarm), the
Netherlands (e.g. RotterZwam), Sweden (e.g. Urban
Oasis), and the United Kingdom (e.g. Zero Carbon
Food Ltd/Growing-Underground, Intelligent Growth
Solutions Ltd., Jones Food Company and Fischer
Farms (Armanda et al., 2019; Shamshiri et al., 2018;
Figure 1).
The importance of urban agriculture/vertical farm­
ing is significant in low- and low-middle-income
countries such as in sub-Saharan Africa and parts of
Southern Asia. Unlike in high- or high-middle-
income countries, urban agriculture has greatly
impacted small growers since it is practised for the
purpose of self-sufficiency in low- and low-middle-
income countries. Therefore, there are relatively few
urban agriculture projects on a large scale, such as at
the community or national level. However, recent
urban agricultural programmes have attempted to
enhance food security and mitigate the adverse effects
on the environment based on an understanding of the

Figure 1. Indoor vertical farming with the automated controlled system in the UK. (a) via a unique modular and scalable system
called total controlled environmental agriculture (TECA), Intelligent Growth Solutions Ltd. use 50% of less energy required by
comparable systems for growing vegetables (photo provided by Intelligent Growth Solutions company). (b) Growing-
Underground is the first commercial hydroponic farm of Zero Carbon Food Ltd. which utilised the discarded underground shelter
in the UK (photo provided by Zero Carbon Food Ltd/Growing-Underground).
 THE JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURAL SCIENCE AND BIOTECHNOLOGY
current barriers to urban agriculture, including formal
settlement issues, rights of property and distance from
urban farms to food retailers (Davies et al., 2020; FAO,
2012).
Vertical farming technologies
There are controversies about the efficiency of vertical
farming due to the high initial costs and high main­
tenance requirements in urban areas. However, by
removing the seasonality of growing fresh vegetables,
it would be possible to increase yield and profits in
vertical farming (Beacham et al., 2019). According to
Kozai et al. (2015), indoor vertical farming shows 100
times higher productivity in leafy lettuce compared to
conventional cultivation and 15 times that of glass­
house cultivation (Kozai et al., 2015). Vertical farming
creates economic benefits not only by increasing yield
but also decreasing the expenses for transportation or
storage (Van Gerrewey et al., 2022). Farmers in turn
will benefit from reduced crop losses, improved yields
and more secure supply chains as well as reduced
environmental impact and improved agricultural sus­
tainability. Soilless cultivation systems have been
improved by subsystem upgrading such as utilising
an ultrasonic atomisation system in aeroponics
which enables more precise and effective control of
the supply of nutrient solution than does the use of
water pumps in hydroponic systems. Within the dro­
plet size range (1–5 µm), the ultrasonic atomisation
method is significantly impacted by the aeroponic flow
rate and temperature of the root zone (e.g. nutrient
solution) (Niam & Sucahyo, 2020).
Known as ‘Aeroponic 2.0”, fogponic has been high­
lighted as a high-energy efficient cultivation system as
operates like aeroponics. In the fogponic systems,
ultrasonic fog generates fine foggy mist ranging from
5 to 30 μm and it guarantees sufficient oxygen
Figure 2. Vertical farming with LED lights technology. (a) LED lights for the shipping container farming in Nottingham Trent
University. The effect of different light quality and intensity on plant quality has been investigated. (b) Data interpretation with
optimal LED light systems in growing-underground farm (photo provided by Zero Carbon Food Ltd/Growing-Underground).
135
availability for plants by circulating nutrient fog
within the air conditioner. Compared to conventional
hydroponic and aeroponic systems, fogponics reduces
water and fertiliser usage by up to 50% to 60% respec­
tively (Rakib Uddin & Suliaman, 2021; Venkatesh
et al., 2020).
Methods of growing plants without soil and soilless
cultivation have been widely used in protected agri­
culture and horticulture and reduced sources of both
water and nutrients since the initial application of
these approaches. Along with the subsystem develop­
ment, numerous research articles have been published
highlighting technology developments in the opti­
mum growing conditions for indoor vertical farming.
The plant grown in vertical farming is primarily based
on artificial lights such as light-emitting diodes (LEDs)
sources instead of natural sunlight (Figure 2).
Therefore, light conditions, such as light intensity
and spectral quality, greatly influence plant growth
and development by improving crop nutritive value
along with the regulation of the proton motive force
(Pocock, 2015). LEDs constitute the most promising
artificial lighting source within controlled environ­
mental horticulture as supplementary or a single
source of illumination due to their stable output, dur­
ability, applicability in specific light spectrum, man­
ageability, and cost efficiency (Avgoustaki & Xydis,
2020; Shamshiri et al., 2018; Zhang et al., 2020). LED
light has high photon-use efficiency because it emits
specifically targeted wavelengths with a narrow-
waveband monochromic light (Lu & Grundy, 2017).
Based on LEDs’ characteristics, various attempts have
been made to understand the effect of different light
compositions, intensities and photoperiods on crops
grown in indoor vertical farming including far-red,
red, green, blue and UV light respectively and in the
combination of different light spectrums (Wong et al.,
2020). For instance, moderate LED light application
136 S. OH AND C. LU

during their production stage could significantly
enhance plant growth and metabolism by enhancing
the nutritional level and reducing nitrate content in
food crops (Bian et al., 2018; Table 1).
Automation and precision urban farming
One of the major concerns in vertical farming is varia­
bility in food crops which is possibly caused by
unequal growing conditions such as temperature or
light (Beacham et al., 2019). However, controlled
environment growing systems in vertical farming
allows monitoring and controlling of the growing
conditions precisely by real-time based sensors. For
instance, big data and the Internet of Things (IoT)
technology can lead to advanced knowledge and
future smart ‘intelligent’crop production with the
application of software or firmware (e.g. LED lights
and nutrient recipes). Big data analytics in agricultural
databases will be extremely useful for precision farm­
ing development. To achieve optimal crop growth,
resource use efficiency (e.g. energy, water, nutrients),

Table 1. The state-of-the-art technologies in vertical farming/urban farming (2017–2022).

Cultivation
Materials method Technology Key findings and performances References
Spinach Aeroponic IoT for online and Based on the real-time and online system, IoT system allows Jamhari et al. (2020)
automated monitoring monitoring following key parameters including relative
humidity, root temperature and light intensity. Within the
system, it was possible to control for ideal temperature for
spinach in an aeroponic system.
Lettuce Aquaponic Centre for hydroponic Centre for hydroponic and aquaponics technology (CHAT) are Lizbeth and Rico
(Lactuca and aquaponics based on the data which are evaluated and validated by the (2019)
sativa) technology (CHAT) automated monitoring and controlling system. The real-time
data was collected regarding pH and temperature of nutrient
solution. Automated pH controller enables to maintain the
optimal condition for hydroponic system indicating well growth
of lettuce.
Plants Hydroponic IoT for smart irrigation Smart irrigation system based on the real-time analysis, so called Lakshmiprabha and
system with real-time ThinkSpeak IoT platform, monitor and control the follows Govindaraju (2019)
hardware parameters including the rate of water flow, temperature and
humidity. Furthermore, compared to conventional irrigation
system, smart irrigation system enhances crop yield with high
efficiency.
Plants Hydroponic Wireless sensor and The wireless sensor and actuator networks (WSAN) were utilised to Stefan et al. (2019)
actuator networks control the environmental condition of two hydroponic
(WSAN) chambers. The system obtained heterogeneous data from
hydroponic source and send the data to monitoring centre.
Plants Hydroponic Smart hardware Smart system allows to control humidification with optimal Supriyanto and
temperature for plant and to monitor water temperature, pH Fathurrahmanim
level and nutrient level in water tank by utilising micro- (2019)
controller and further sensor.
Pakcoy Aquaponic IoT system within the Owing to automagical control and monitor system, the following Zaini et al. (2018)
(Brassica smartphone mobile parameters were successfully evaluated within small error
rapa) results which are temperature, water level, pH, ammonia gas
within the sensor. The accurate IoT system and smartphone
application allows produce better quality of crops.
Mustard Hydroponic IoT to monitor and Utilising device called Raspberry Pi allows to monitor and to Nurhasan et al. (2018)
greens control control the environmental parameters including pH,
(Brassica temperature, humidity and circulation of water effectively
juncea) based on the real time data. The plant grown with IoT
controlling and monitoring system shows better growth
performance.
Lettuce Hydroponic Smart farming system The overall quality of lettuce grown in smart system present better Changmai et al.
(Lactuca growth performance than normal growing system. The smart (2018)
sativa) system analyses optimal practices for hydroponic lettuce within
effective system for temperature control and automatic
preparation of nutrient solution.
Vegetable Hydroponic IoT application for smart Smart farming system is combined with the remote sensing Thakare et al. (2018)
crops farming system and data which are collected from water module and
environment testing towards decision tree algorithm.
A decision support system will produce for growers to optimal
management of plants with remote monitoring system.
Stevia (Stevia Hydroponic Prototype using Arduino It is greatly critical for growing Stevia to consider the relative Ossa et al. (2018)
rebaudiana) IDE humidity. Within the integrated monitoring and controlling
system, Stevia is grown. In order to carry reliable measurements,
further developed system are required within the various
adjustments.
Vegetable Hydroponic NI LabVIEW and AVR Combined system with NI Lab VIEW and AVR microcontroller Adhau et al. (2018)
crops microcontroller system is an automated based on the real time data. The smart
system suggests very successful implementation indicating
great stability and control actions which is a user-friendly
system without human intervention neither monitoring.
 THE JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURAL SCIENCE AND BIOTECHNOLOGY
reduce costs and ultimately move towards growing
crops with higher quality, further continuous moni­
toring and control systems are required based on the
measurement of plant physiological traits and micro­
environmental conditions that creates precise and
timely proprietary big data, generated against multiple
inputs/ingredients from the Vertical Farming growing
environment. Primary parameters include light, nutri­
ent solution, plant phenotyping and environment (e.g.
temperature, relative humidity, CO2 concentration in
the air and oxygenation level of the water) (Stefan
et al., 2019). The data can be transmitted through
a wireless solution, and then be presented in a cloud-
hosted monitoring and control platform that offers
real-time data, remote management of robotics (to
ensure optimum conditions are maintained), an end-
user dashboard and alerts. All data can be stored in the
wireless sensor and actuator networks, to be utilised by
data scientists/vertical farming specialists to develop
an algorithm including deep learning and AI
approaches to calculate optimum growing recipes for
nutritionally dense crops and ensure optimum energy/
resource efficiency (Kozai et al., 2018; Mohmed et al.,
2022).
An automated system would be an excellent alter­
native for indoor vertical farming in combination with
real-time data from an IoT system allowing the
enhancement of cost-efficacy monitoring and control
systems and the reduction of human interaction, along
with smartphone applications (Adhau et al., 2018).
Additionally, smart growing systems with automation
enable growers to customise the environmental con­
ditions for functional foods. Automated urban farm­
ing constitutes one of the most promising techniques
that offset the high initial installation costs of vertical
farming by utilising low-cost sensors and reducing
extra labour inputs.
Discussion - overall opportunities and
challenges
Vertical farming takes traditional farming to new
levels. Unlike conventional soil-based farming and
horizontal crop growth on a single level, vertical farm­
ing implements soilless cultivation into vertical
growth on multiple levels in a protected indoor envir­
onment (e.g. glasshouse, buildings). This allows
growers to provide fresh, safe and nutritious
food year-round whilst promoting crop yield and
profitability without interference from soil-borne
pathogens (Treftz & Omaye, 2016). Vertical farming
and urban farming significantly increase plant produc­
tivity per unit of area compared to horizontal hydro­
ponic culture (Kalantari et al., 2018; Touliatos et al.,
2016). Automatic monitoring and control systems
allow growers to plan flexible growing schedules and
nurture crops by securing optimal environmental
137
conditions and nutrient solutions based on precise
calculations.
Furthermore, resource use can be highly efficient in
terms of water, CO2 and fertiliser with minimum
adverse environmental pollution (Kozai et al., 2015).
Vertical farming permits enhanced efficiency in the
use of resources, including land, water, light energy,
electrical energy and inorganic fertiliser. Agriculture
currently uses 70% of all water consumed globally,
vertical farming can help prevent water scarcity
(closed-loop water systems). A reduction in unsus­
tainable global demand for land and water for arable
use could attract investment for industrial-scale farms
to become commercially viable (Kalantari et al., 2018;
Kozai et al., 2018).
Although vertical farming and urban agriculture
are promising sustainable mitigation for food security,
several challenges remain. First, the high initial
expense of infrastructure is one of the major chal­
lenges for vertical farming. To offset the high costs, it
is necessary for modern vertical farming to enhance
resource efficiency to improve crop yield and quality
along with the installation of an intelligent automated
controlling system to enhance labour and energy effi­
ciency (Kalantari et al., 2018). Also, the complexity of
the system requires teamwork and optimally designed
tasks and processes. Secondly, there is controversy
regarding energy-intensive use, including light, tem­
perature, and humidity that needs to be controlled
(Kozai et al., 2015). Kozai et al. (2015) suggested
several ways to reduce electricity costs in vertical farm­
ing by; i) a new cheap and energy-efficient LED light­
ing usage; ii) installing a well-designed light system to
match spectral characteristics with plant type and
physiology for greatly increased yield; and iii) using
renewable energy (e.g. solar energy wind-based or
geothermal based energy), waste heat, which would
reduce energy expenses and increase energy use effi­
ciency (Avgoustaki & Xydis 2020; Kozai et al., 2015).
Thirdly, there is a limited range of crops that is
suitable for this business model (Nin et al., 2018).
Technically vertical farming allows the cultivation of
all kinds of vegetables, including leafy greens, herbs,
medicinal plants, fruiting crops, root vegetables, and
grains. At present, the variety of crops grown commer­
cially in vertical farming is typically limited to leafy
vegetables and microgreens. However, in addition to
the crops mentioned above, vertical farming can also
grow functional foods from medicinal plants and
micronutrient fortification in food crops that have
high value and profit. For instance, previous studies
found that several cereal crops and tuber crops could
grow well in vertical cultivation with controlled envir­
onmental conditions including the strawberry
(Wortman et al., 2016) potato (Čížek & Komárková,
2022), bean (Stoochnoff et al., 2022), and wheat
(Asseng et al., 2020). Further advanced technologies
138 S. OH AND C. LU
are needed to facilitate the growing various crops
vertically.
Conclusions
There are significant challenges that hinder the pre­
valence of vertical farming including high initial
expenses, shortage of expertise, and requirement for
a controlled growing system. However, vertical farm­
ing is rapidly becoming more appealing to the world
due to its ability to deliver reliable and sustainable
food. It can reduce water consumption and land
degradation, lower pesticide/fertiliser use, and shorten
the food supply chain. Therefore, we suggest that more
research and collaboration are important to bring
together the current technological practices to increase
sustainability. Furthermore, it is expected to optimise
product quality in vertical farming and urban agricul­
ture for new capabilities in the agricultural and horti­
cultural industries.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Data availability statement
The authors confirm that the data supporting the findings of
this study are available within the article and its supplemen­
tary materials.
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