FarmFresh
Imagine a small plant where you can grow lettuce or tomatoes without soil, in water, and use the same freshwater to irrigate. The waste from rabbits or chicken is converted to fertilizer for plants. That is ponics. In other words, ponics is a technology that combines aquaculture with hydroponics (cultivating plants in water) based on recycling water, nutrients, and energy.
What are the benefits?
Soilless culture is an expanding agricultural practice. The benefits are many. Meanwhile, ponics is a technique that has its place within the wider context of sustainable intensive agriculture. The sustainability of ponics considers the environmental, economic, and social dynamics.
Decreased presence of soil-borne diseases and pathogens because of sterile conditions
Improved growing conditions that can be manipulated to meet optimal plant requirements leading to increased yields
The possibility to develop agriculture where suitable land is not available.
Increased water- and fertilizer-use efficiency
Ponics is a particularly great solution for arid regions or areas with non-arable soils or for using marginal lands in urban areas for food production closer to markets. The unsustainable use of land and water resources is already a challenge in Armenia resulting in soil eutrophication.
- Economically, these systems require a substantial initial investment but are then followed by low recurring costs and combined returns from both animals and vegetables.
- Environmentally, ponics enables greater water and production control. Ponics does not rely on chemicals for fertilizer or control of pests or weeds which makes food safer against potential residues.
- Socially, ponics can offer quality-of-life improvements because the food is grown locally and culturally appropriate crops can be grown. At the same time, ponics can integrate livelihood strategies to secure food and small incomes for landless and poor households.
FarmFresh: food production and management system brand from The Distrikt.
Now imagine a local grocery shop on the corner of the street where you will find fresh vegetables by the local farmers. The food production and management systems are regulated by the FarmFresh – a startup from the District.
FarmFresh Startup suggests mobile and web application which controls production in real-time and manages ponics’ farm data using IoT system by ensuring the greatest efficiencies in production and preventing imbalances in the system. FarmFresh will let you:
Manage farming process via Mobile and Web application
Create projects and follow the data via charts and histograms
Add team members and set checklists to control the working process
Pull up informative libraries and gain access to the insights from experts
Become a part of the digital community of buyers and sellers
Sell, Buy, Make orders online and get the fresh food once it is harvested.
FarmFresh marketplace: benefits
- Food production and management
- Complete production system which monitors the well-being of the animals and plants.
- AI Software to do analytics and production analysis.
- Direct sails and scheduling process for the production with an interface to both commercial clients and direct to consumers.
- More profit for farmers and less food waste.
- Sustainable income for the rural communities.
The passive solar greenhouse of The Distrikt
The ponics system will be implemented in the greenhouse of The Distrikt which will be a symbol of the circular economy.
The greenhouse will be heated with the geothermal heating and cooling system, which is a clean and renewable energy source. While the excess organic waste will be fed into the bio digestor to be converted into biogas.
Moreover, the greenhouse will be equipped with rainwater harvesting tanks which will allow reducing the water use even more.
This article reviews current literature published on aquaponics, a growing technology which uses aquaculture effluent to grow plants. →
