What technologies would help to grow trust for Vertical Farmers?

Vertical Farming is a rapidly growing industry, but yet not widely known by the customer, consumers, investors and decision & policy makers. The building of relationships and networks is of critical importance to the future of the industry, but these must be based above all else upon trust. Accurate, credible information and communication is needed to generate and nurture thattrust through verifiable data and the use of standards.

How can vertical farms best address this challenge? What technologies, methods & approaches will most aid the building of these crucial relationships?
Future Farm Technology Expo and UKUAT have brought together some of the leading experts in Vertical Farming to discuss these issues and help UK Vertical Farmers decide what their next steps should be.

Speaker info:

Laura Vickers gained her Ph.D. in 2012 from the University of Birmingham before working as a postdoc at Harper Adams University (HAU). She took up her role as Lecturer at HAU in 2014 and was also awarded a NERC Knowledge Exchange Fellowship in Horticulture, where she worked with the Horticulture Innovation Partnership in producing a R&D strategy for the Ornamental industry. She is now a Senior Lecturer at HAU and a leading member of the Urban Farming Group. She has led sector consultation events and EU Green Week conferences in Urban Agriculture. Her research focuses on plant adaptation, the value of plants as green infrastructure and in citizen health, how citizens engage with urban agriculture, and how urban food systems can contribute to sustainable food production.

David Farquhar is the CEO of Scottish indoor farming operation Intelligent Growth Solutions. He is a transaction-oriented serial entrepreneur with a track record of delivering shareholder value, mostly recently in the turnaround, transformation, growth and exit of global enterprise SaaS vendor Workplace. In the past 25 years he has completed 28 transactions as a founder/CEO, angel investor and business mentor, including risk capital investments (PE, VC and angel), acquisitions and trade sales in Europe, North America and Asia.

Mark Horler has been involved in the Vertical Farming industry for around 7 years. He is the Founder of UK Urban AgriTech (UKUAT) collective, bringing together the leading companies, universities and individuals in the UK urban agritech industry. He is also the Co-Founder of The Soya Project and does freelance consulting work across the industry. In his work he has dealt extensively with industry standardisation, sustainability certification, vertical farming education and vertical farming policy. His expertise is in building networks and associations that maximise value for their members, and for the industry as a whole. Mark’s primary interest is in taking a systemic overview of how vertical farming can be integrated with other systems, to deliver on its promises of regenerative food production and resilient societies.

Jack Farmer is the Co-Founder and Operational Lead of LettUs Grow, a start-up using innovative aeroponic technology to design the next-generation of indoor farms. Their mission is to reduce the waste and carbon footprint of fresh produce by empowering anyone to grow delicious food near its point of consumption.
He’s a passionate advocate for the use of social enterprise, policy and the circular economy to bring about a more sustainable future. Jack specialises in controlled environment agriculture and its use as a means to reduce agricultural pressures upon natural ecosystems.