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diversifying food sources
urban farming includes examples like vertical farming
govt work tgt with URA to make space for such urban farming

ok linked below has good infographics

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we actly hv 238 licensed farms in 2020!
other farms facts linked below/above [idk padlet works in mysterious ways]
bollywood veggies! i think cfm got hear before
the farms some grow organic, some have farm to table concept, some are pesticide free [basically lots of sustainable growing methods i think]

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TheSmartLocal - Singapore's Leading Travel and Lifestyle Portal

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8 Urban Farms In Singapore For Locally-Grown Vegetables Of High Quality

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For a nature lesson, find out more about the processes of growing our own vegetables and fruit from these urban farms all around Singapore.

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can be seen by the partnering with Redmart/ supermarket chains [eg Fairprice Finest]

idk if relevant?
but extra info: Citizen Farm [ in article above] hires those with intellectual disabilities -- link to community?

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1. diversifying of our food sources, less reliance on imports

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To make Singapore a great city to live, work and play.

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The need to secure food during a crisis and preserve land for a livable climate is changing the focus of farming from rural areas to cities. At the forefront of this shift is Singapore, a city-sized country that aims to produce 30% of its own food by 2030. But with 90% of Singapore's food coming from abroad, the challenge is a tall order. The plan calls for everyone in the city to grow what they can, with government grants going to those who can use technology to yield greater amounts.

"This target took into consideration the land available for agri-food production and the potential advances in technologies and innovation," said Goh Wee Hou, the director of the Food Supply Strategies Department at the Singapore Food Agency. "Local food production currently accounts for less than 10% of our nutritional needs."

The food items with potential for increased domestic production include vegetables, eggs, and fish. According to the Singapore Food Agency, these three types of goods are commonly consumed but are perishable and more susceptible to supply disruptions. Alternative proteins such as plant-based and lab-grown meats could also contribute to the "30 by 30" goal. In 2020, there were 238 licensed farms in Singapore.

Only 1% of Singapore's land is being used for conventional farming. That created the constraint of growing more with less. The government has put its hopes in technology, stating that multi-story LED vegetable farms and recirculating aquaculture systems can produce 10 to 15 times more vegetables and fish than conventional farms.
🎧 For more intel on sustainable farming, listen to the Quartz Obsession podcast episode on kudzu. Or subscribe via: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Google | Stitcher.
Since 2017, land has been leased in two districts on the edge of the city-Lim Chu Kang and Sungei Tengah-to large-scale commercial farm projects. While the optimization of these farms to produce at maximum capacity is being determined, the idea of growing food in the more urban spaces of Singapore has emerged: from carpark rooftops to reused outdoor spaces and retrofitted building interiors.

Urban farms in Singapore

1. Urban farms using hydroponics on parking structure roofs

Citiponics is one of Singapore's first rooftop farms. The farm is on top of a carpark, a structure that services almost every neighborhood in Singapore.
Read more: How a parking lot roof was turned into an urban farm in Singapore
2. Installing urban farms into existing buildings

Sustenir Agriculture has created an indoor vertical farm that can retrofit into existing buildings (including office buildings). The company grows foods that can't be produced locally, displacing imports and cutting carbon emissions.
Read more: The indoor urban farm start up that's undercutting importers by 30%
3. Building a better greenhouse for urban farms in tropical climates

Natsuki's Garden is a greenhouse in the center of the city, occupying reused space in a former schoolyard. The greenhouse is custom designed for the tropical climate to allow for better air circulation. Yielding 60-80 kg of food per square meter, the greenhouse caters to a small local market.
Read more: How a Singaporean farmer is building a better greenhouse for tropical urban farming
High production urban farms still need to be sustainable

Open to applications later this year, a new $60 million government fund will provide funding for more agritech businesses. According to the Singapore Food Agency, the fund will assist with start-up costs catering to large-scale commercial farms, no matter the location.

But as Singapore tries to advance, there are some left behind. The traditional farms that do exist in Singapore are being displaced, their knowledge no longer valued because they are not seen as hi-tech, according to Lionel Wong, the founding director at Upgrown Farming Company, a consultancy that helps equip new farming business owners across Singapore. "While we are trying to increase production, the net result could actually be reduced production because the traditional growers are being removed from the equation in the long term."

In the long-run, high production of food within Singapore will need a sustainable market of consumers, to Wong that market isn't completely clear at the moment. "'30 by 30' is really just a vision. The Food Agency deserves a lot of credit in terms of what they're trying to push, but there's a lot of room for improvement." Wong continued, "productivity doesn't necessarily equate to sustainability or profitability."

Whether Singapore is able to produce its own food sustainably for the long-run remains to be seen. But the endeavor is certainly an exciting moment for entrepreneurs pushing the boundaries of what farming and cities can be.

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Three ways Singapore is designing urban farms to create urban food security

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The need to secure food during a crisis and preserve land for a livable climate is changing the focus of farming from rural areas to cities. At the forefront of this shift is Singapore, a city-sized country that aims to produce 30% of its own food by 2030.

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profitable as sustainable business model currently/in the future
maybe limited bec of society's lack of awareness / stereotypes abt locally grown food

theres a need for more support for local farming industry so that they can grow more varieties at lower cost and enable every1 to hv access to fresh locally grown produce

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Don't give Shannon Lim the excuse that there isn't enough space in Singapore for people to become full-time farmers. Not when he produces up to 200kg of seafood a week from his cluster of fish ponds dotted around the city - from a former car park in Shaw Tower to a makeshift space hidden away in Dempsey Village behind an upscale butchery.

The founder of Onhand Agrarian started his fish farming business 10 years ago out of a love for nature and a great distaste for large fishing trawlers that destroy marine life as they literally dredge the oceans for seafood. He started out in his own backyard in Changi where he reared ornamental and edible fish using a lowtech, eco-friendly aquaculture system that keeps the water cleaner for longer than other fish farms.

This closed loop system is officially termed as an Integrated Multi-Trophic Aquaculture System (IMTRAS). Basically how it works is that waste from fish is recycled as food for crustaceans and in turn for other bottom feeders, which break down the waste into fertiliser for algae and other plants. In turn, they release oxygen into the water to nourish clams and other shellfish. But the bottom line is that he supplies fresh grouper, snapper, seabass, prawns, crabs, mussels, squid and cuttlefish to a steady clientele of subscribers who pay a fixed monthly amount for a mixed bag of whatever he harvests fresh from the farms.

The 32-year-old divorcee runs his business with about 30 volunteers who share the same views on sustainability. It's tough work but being an urban farmer doesn't mean living hand to mouth either. "The business is extremely profitable and sustainable as long as one has the sense to cultivate one's brand and assets," says the former financial planner.

(RELATED: How to live more sustainably in 2019)

Plus he gets a kick out of seeing "the positive effect that local farms have on families that we feed," he adds. "It's heartwarming to see grandparents connect with their grandkids when they wander about our Shaw and Dempsey farms, explaining how to hold chickens and dig for sweet potatoes." Besides seafood, his farms also grow vegetable crops. The Shaw Tower farm, for example, grows endangered strains of corn besides bananas and root vegetables.

He's definitely noticed an increase in urban farming, "with lots of new farms popping up" and reckons that the interest is driven by media coverage of people like him. "There's also the fact that Singaporeans are quite desperate to get out of their office environments and get their hands dirty, especially the women."

But what about the perception that farmed fish is not as good as wild-caught?

"The wild/farmed comparison has actually been one of the best things for us. When people try our fish, they're immediately stunned by how there's no 'fishy' taste because they're just healthy fish grown in reasonably clean environments. Also, the negative perception most people come with helps set the bar so low that even our very average quality blows them out of the water."

Although he's 'decades away' from his goal of putting big fishing trawlers out of business, he says that aquaculture now accounts for more than 50 per cent of the world's seafood. While the debate continues about the breeding practices in fish farms, Mr Lim is clear about his own, and he has the customers to support him on that.
www.onhandagrarian.com
The Farmers

When your last name is Farmer, do you really have any choice about what your life-long vocation will be?

Scott Farmer holds a corporate job by day, but has gone the way of the land with his Singaporean wife Justine Ong. The couple are The Farmers - a small urban farm business that Ms Ong gave up her full time fashion job to concentrate on. The 'farm' is really Ms Ong's parents' home in Yio Chu Kang, where the couple - he is 31 and she is 27 - grow vegetables in the garden and on a patch of land outside the house. They grow all the ingredients needed for nasi ulam - a Peranakan herb and rice salad - the star dish of the cooking/farming workshops that they organise to teach people more about living and eating sustainably.

(RELATED: The Peak Next Gen | How Benjamin Swan of Sustenir Agriculture is spearheading sustainable farming in Singapore)

The duo had been burnt out at their respective jobs when they decided to quit in early 2018 and travel through Europe, the US and South America for nine months. They were taken by how good locally grown, seasonal produce tasted, and how the home-stays they stayed at had small edible gardens, which the owners tended to as part of their lifestyle. When the couple returned home, they commandeered Ms Ong's parents' 10 sq m garden and started growing herbs and vegetables by trial and error, since they had zero farming experience at the time.

For Ms Ong, who worked in fast fashion and "struggled to connect with the values of the industry", their trip made them realise how "in Singapore, where we import so much, we've become disconnected from where our food comes from."

Armed with their desire to live simply, spend time outdoors and be closer to their food sources, they decided that Mr Farmer would work full-time, while his wife focused on the farm. They run monthly workshops but are looking to run them more frequently after their upcoming wedding. Currently, the business - they also do private catering - is barely breaking even but they are not discouraged. "Scott and I both grew up in families where money and career were never really used as a measure of how good we were. We believe as long as you earn enough and live within your means, that's plenty."

As they build up their business ("the last few months has been very promising"), their aim is to make farming more accessible to people. "Our philosophy of growing is really to try and make do with whatever resources you have and what you can find. There are so many pockets of land around that we could use to grow edibles instead of ornamentals. Everybody has to eat. We should at least try to grow some of our food. It's better for us and better for our earth."

Mushroom Kingdom

You may not have heard of Mushroom Kingdom but chances are you've been enjoying their chemical-and pesticide-free fungi since 2016.

Not only does the local enterprise supply fresh portobello, grey oyster mushrooms and black fungus to companies including Hai Di Lao, Prive and Creative Eateries, the brand's own range of healthy shiitake snacks, Shroom Bites, can also be found in 7Eleven stores across Singapore.

But don't mistake the founders - Philbert Khoo, Janson Chan and Jay Neo - as merely mushroom peddlers. The trio wants to change the way Singaporeans eat, one shroom at a time.

"Mushroom Kingdom wants Singapore to become self-sufficient in fresh food production. People should be able to have peace of mind when wanting to dine healthier, from having a sustainable, traceable source to a product that's high in nutrition at an affordable price," explains Mr Neo, who doubles as the chief marketing officer.

He explains that the company is doing a lot more farm-to-table agribusiness (as compared to traditional farms). Rather than just focus on their produce, they understand that education is essential for people to start eating right - for themselves and the environment.

Their offerings include the My Mushroom Garden grow kit (S$17.90), for consumers to try growing their own grey oyster mushrooms in an eco-conscious manner. Made of rice bran, limes and corn husks, spores require only watering four times a day before sprouting a hefty bunch in 12 days. "We think this helps consumers understand that food doesn't magically appear through a deliveryman or at the supermarket," explains Mr Neo.

Besides hosting cooking classes and farm tours, they work closely with science teachers from local primary and secondary schools to construct mushroom farms on school grounds. "There, the next generation can see how mushrooms are grown and learn the benefits of incorporating them into their diets."

But he feels that Singaporeans are still far from growing their own food due to the "convenience and cost savings by food providers and delivery services."

(RELATED: Online grocers delivering gourmet produce straight from the farms)

But he says that a symbiotic relationship between businesses is the way to truly raise awareness.

"While it's understandable that brands are not keen to talk about another as it's extra expenditure on their part, everyone will benefit if we featured each other's strengths. And we walk the talk. We design ads and videos for eateries and shops carrying our products. By highlighting their brand story as well as ours, we aim to reach and inspire more people."

Edible Garden City

To date, Edible Garden City (EGC) has designed, built and maintained about 200 food gardens. The latest of which is Funan's rooftop garden that doubles as an actual farm for NOKA by the Spa Esprit Group, making it their second collaboration after Open Farm Community.

"Farm-to-table is a great way to connect city dwellers with what we do and get them interested in urban farming in Singapore," explains Sarah Rodriguez, the marketing and PR manager.

On a tour of the 5000 sq ft garden, she highlights the many pesticide-free produce, such as Okinawan spinach, purslane, red leaf hibiscus and ulam raja, growing in the garden terrace and climate control chambers refurbished from shipping containers. They are even attempting to cultivate dragon fruit in the R&D section.

If, like many, you're wondering how this relatively confined space can supply a 72-seater eatery, Ms Rodriguez says that there are two other production farms nearby - Queenstown (100 varieties) and Raffles City Shopping Centre (30 varieties).

NOKA's setting is ideal to show Singaporeans that farms don't have to be in far-flung locales or require huge, open spaces. The activation of under-utilised spaces has been the core of Edible Garden City's operations (80 of its farms are atop buildings) and goes hand-in-hand with founder of Spa Esprit Group, Cynthia Chua's ethos. "I love creating ways for people to live better and it's important for me to champion the grow-your-own-food movement here," says Ms Chua. Adds Ms Rodriguez. "We want to demonstrate how built up spaces have the potential to become productive land."

While Edible Garden City reported an increased revenue of 20 per cent in the past year, she admits that for the farm-to-table scene to become more widespread, it has to touch on all types of cuisine and price points. "Currently, restaurants showcasing local produce tend to be up-market," she says. "We're looking to make local produce a staple in hawker centres, fast food joints and mom-and-pop eateries. The way to do so is to have more support for the local farming industry, allowing us to grow more varieties at a lower cost and enable everyone to have access to fresh, locally grown vegetables and herbs."

(RELATED: Restaurant Labyrinth: Championing local produce)
This article was originally published in The Business Times. Photos: Shinta Ro Tay, The Farmers, Mushroom Kingdom & Edible Garden City

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Singapore urban farmers proving that farm-to-table works in Singapore

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Don't give Shannon Lim the excuse that there isn't enough space in Singapore for people to become full-time farmers. Not when he produces up to 200kg of seafood a week from his cluster of fish ponds dotted around the city - from a former car park in Shaw Tower to a makeshift space hidden away in Dempsey Village behind an upscale butchery.

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SINGAPORE: It is a vision that predates COVID-19. Spurred by threats like climate change, Singapore set about having 30 per cent of its food produced locally by 2030, to improve its food security.

But food security expert Paul Teng thinks the country is not going far enough with its "30 by 30" goal set last year.

"Even if we achieve that in 10 years' time, we're still dependent on the rest of the world for the remaining 70 per cent. If all things are normal, then it should be enough ... to create a buffer," he says.

"But if indeed all the worst-case climate change scenarios come true, and there are many other black swan events, then we may need more than two or three months' worth."

The professor, an adjunct senior fellow at Nanyang Technological University's S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, sees COVID-19 as a "wake-up call" to do more.

"I don't imagine that the COVID-19 pandemic will be the last time that we'll be disrupted in terms of food supplies ... If you look around Asia at the moment, you've got a whole host of issues affecting us," he notes.

"The armyworm is just one example. But there are many other pest problems, disease problems ... Anything could flare up and affect our supply chain. Then there's also politics."

There are 220 farms in Singapore as of last year, producing mainly leafy vegetables, fish and eggs.

Millions of dollars are being poured into this growing agri-food industry. But it still produces less than 10 per cent of the country's food, and the rest is imported from more than 170 countries and regions.

The other solution, he believes, is a bigger land area. One of the reasons the work on the farm is laborious is its current size, agrees his son Zach, who works there.

For example, while large farms overseas "can invest in a big tractor" to aerate the soil, Farm 85 uses hand-operated soil tiller machines, cites the 26-year-old.

Less than one per cent of Singapore's land is used for agriculture. In recent years, new plots have been released for farming, but in smaller parcel sizes ranging from about 0.6 to two hectares.

The largest plots awarded have been about six hectares, which means farmers still need to reduce their reliance on land.

Short leases have been another disincentive to making long-term investments in better equipment or infrastructure. It is one of the reasons, along with lack of technical know-how, that farmers are not as productive they could be, according to Teng.

Today, the new plots have longer lease terms of up to 20 years, compared with previous ad-hoc lease extensions that were as short as three years.
PRODUCTIVITY PLATFORMS AND PITFALLS
To further help with productivity, the government has made several grants available since 2014. At least three are targeted specifically at the agriculture industry.

One is the Singapore Food Agency's (SFA's) S$63-million Agriculture Productivity Fund. It is meant for farmers to invest in more innovative systems that can boost their yield, for example under a scheme - capped at S$50,000 - for the purchase of equipment.

There is also a scheme for farmers to convert their farm into a more high-tech farming system.

There are "still a lot of challenges on the ground", an industry insider tells Ming. "There aren't that many dedicated contractors who can build farms ... Almost always the infrastructure cost starts ballooning," he says.

Plus ... you need to spend time, effort and money training everyone from scratch literally. We don't have a ready pool of skilled indoor farmers.

In this high-tech farming space, proprietary technologies have been brought in from different parts of the world, but "these are also varied in terms of how (they're) translated on the ground in Singapore, in the context of a tropical environment".

"There's a lot of clamour, sound ... and hype coming," he adds. "Still ... they all need to translate into a viable business."
IT'S EARLY DAYS YET
According to the SFA, the outlook for high-tech farms is not bleak.

To create a flourishing industry, he says "we have to build an ecosystem".

"Then we need the support of the food agency to make sure that Singaporean consumers see the quality, the safety and the nutritional value of what's grown here in Singapore ... and say, 'That's a gold standard,'" he adds.

"We still haven't seen the full repercussions of the food supply problems that've been created by COVID. If we don't change how much we're growing here, we're going to be paying more for food no matter which way we look at it."
BRIDGING THE NUTRITION GAP
In the supermarket, however, some consumers have a preference for one type of vegetable over the other. Demand for vegetables from soil-based farms is higher than for those from high-tech farms, according to NTUC FairPrice, Singapore's largest supermarket chain.
WATCH: Why aren't Singaporeans buying more locally farmed produce? (5:26)

THE NEED TO CHANGE PERCEPTIONS
There are more than 20 agricultural universities in Holland that prime people for the industry. In contrast, there are no universities or polytechnics in Singapore offering agriculture as a full-time course. Most farmhands here are foreign workers.

"Not a lot of Singaporeans want to come to a farm and work. It's hard work, it's all day ... and you have to be here, rain or shine," says Zach.

Although he is an anomaly, he has helped out on his father's farm since he was in school. Bjorn Low is even more of an outlier. Eight years ago, he quit the advertising industry to become an urban farmer.

The co-founder of Edible Garden City now has a team of 40 people, with an average age of 25. He thinks it is important to change the perception of farming and to have more young people see it as a career.
WATCH: The full episode - Growing more of our own food: Can Singapore get there? (47:24)

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Singapore's farms face an even greater challenge in a post-COVID-19 world

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SINGAPORE: It is a vision that predates COVID-19. Spurred by threats like climate change, Singapore set about having 30 per cent of its food produced locally by 2030, to improve its food security. But food security expert Paul Teng thinks the country is not going far enough with its "30 by 30" goal set last year.