Farm Transformed into a Modern Agricultural Factory: Who Is Actually Growing the Vegetables?
Who Is Growing the Vegetables
“In plain terms, a plant factory is factory-style plant production, growing crops the way products are mass-produced in a factory”, Wang Haibo, vice president of the Hebei Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences, told the Economic Daily reporter. Plant factories are characterized by standardized growing procedures, uninterrupted growing time, and unrestricted growing seasons.
On the second floor of the Nongzhong Wulian plant factory in Pinggu District, Beijing, the reporter saw rows of wild vegetables such as Chinese toon, plantain, and wuta-tsai growing on the “assembly lines” of the “workshop”. Their roots were either soaked in nutrient solution or planted in substrate, completely detached from soil, and their leaves grew vigorously under the illumination of LED lights; on the first floor, rows of growing racks cultivated edible fungi such as agaricus blazei, golden oyster mushrooms, and cordyceps flower. Project manager Yao Xu said this is a comprehensive, complementary agricultural production method that takes advantage of the different growing environments required by different crops.
Light, temperature, water, fertilizer…… In a plant factory, all of this can be completely handed over to a computer system —— an agricultural Internet of Things built with information technology integrates multiple sensor devices for temperature, humidity, PH value, light, and more in the IoT system, monitoring the physical parameters in the environment in real time.
Taking the plant factory the reporter visited as an example, under artificial LED lighting, crops can grow without interruption, mature in a short time, and produce multiple batches within a year; under the control of the water and fertilizer system, nutrient solution and oxygen can be delivered “precisely” to the plant roots; with the help of the central monitoring system, 54 people can easily work on 26000 sq m of crops, and using the remote control system of a mobile phone APP client, technicians can monitor and control the crops right from the office. With just a tap on the phone screen, steps such as pollination, fertilization, and watering can be completed.
A Wide Variety of Products
The production technology of plant factories first took shape in countries with tight land resources such as Japan, Israel, and Denmark, and their operating models have already matured. Only in recent years has China gradually built plant factories and continuously advanced localized technology. However, Yao Xu admitted that building a plant factory currently still faces 3 major difficulties: first, high investment cost; second, high operating cost; third, low rate of technology conversion. Taking the plant factory established by Zhejiang University in Changxing County, Zhejiang Province as an example, an 800 sq m experimental space required an upfront investment of up to tens of millions of yuan, and after the project began operating, the monthly electricity bill for just the electric lights and air conditioning alone reached two to three hundred thousand yuan. At the same time, the cycle for technology conversion is also relatively long. It is understood that Nongzhong Wulian, after 3 years and an average of 19 generations of artificial domestication, cultivated only over 100 product types.
However, we can see that the variety of products in plant factories is also rich and diverse. According to Yao Xu, the crops currently produced by Nongzhong Wulian include 5 major categories: edible fungi, leafy greens, solanaceous fruits, medicinal materials, and flowers. At full capacity, it is expected to produce about 7 million kg of vegetables and fruits annually.
Some people also believe that vegetables from factories “taste inferior to naturally grown vegetables”. Wang Haibo said in response that crops cultivated in plant factories rely entirely on external additives for their nutrition, and their growing time is short, so they may differ in taste from naturally grown crops, but there is no difference in nutritional value. At the same time, technicians can adjust and improve the taste of the products by adjusting the proportion of ingredients in the nutrient solution.
You must not underestimate plant factories and think their products are only crops. In fact, the “products” of plant factories also include providing technical services to enterprises and farmers, building production facilities, creating a business model of enterprises plus farmers, and promoting information technology to agricultural production. In addition, in response to the desire of urban dwellers to have their own “vegetable garden”, many plant factories have launched cost-effective “home farm equipment”, and one “balcony farm” product from Nongzhong Wulian costs even less than ten thousand yuan.