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Woman: Farming used to be such a drag. You were exposed to the elements, isolated from
cool city nightlife, and forced to wear overalls and silly straw hats. But all of this is about
to change. Say hello to the farms of the future.
Vertical farms or farmscrapers are hydroponic wind or solar-powered high-rises that have
been converted into multi-layered grow-ops for the year-round production of food crops.
They're the best thing to hit the agricultural world since irrigation. Because in addition
to looking super sleek and modern, since the plants are grown indoors, they allow us to
cut back on water use and pesticides, producing organic crops at three times the yield that
could be expected using traditional farming.
By spreading upwards instead of outwards, vertical farms also conserve land and prevent
deforestation. But most importantly, they bring sustainable farming into urban centers,
reducing the environmental cost of transporting produce and potentially making cities self-sustainable.
Food stability will be one of the biggest global threats in coming years. By 2050, the
world population will reach nine billion people. And to feed them using traditional farming
would require an additional 10 billion hectares of land, just over the area of the United
States.
So, unless we find a spare North America floating around, innovations like these will quickly
go from environmentalist dream to virtual necessity.
But on the on the bright side, now that farms are vertical, we'll have a lot more room for
parking. [cuts off]