COMMITTING TO VERTICAL GROWTH – THE NEXT PHASE OF AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION (2023)

Issue

Farming is an expensive career path. Youth are finding it increasingly difficult to access funds to pursue farming even when their families have been farming for generations. Fewer farmers contribute to food insecurity and raise the price of food with broader economic implications.

Many regions across B.C. are facing land shortages. This issue is exemplified in the Lower Mainland, but it permeates throughout the entire province. With a growing population, more land is being set aside for housing, limiting agricultural land capacity.

With the increased difficulty in entering the traditional farming sector, and the advent of technological advancements, municipalities across the province need to capitalize on innovative growing practices that are both space-saving and highly productive. One option is vertical growing in light-industrial zones. By utilizing industrial areas as well as traditional agricultural zones, there is opportunity for newer technologies to produce more than what was possible on traditional agricultural land.

Background

Cost of Farmland Across B.C.

The price of land has been increasing dramatically across the province. Following a shocking 18.1% average increase in 2021, the average price continued to rise in 2022, on average 8%. In the Kootenay region, farmland values rose by a record 33.6% in 2022, the greatest regional rate of change in Canada.

The South Coast region, which contains Metro Vancouver, holds the record for the highest average farmland values across Canada at $139,000 per acre.1 With farmland near urban centres highly sought after for hobby farmers, rural residents, and investments, the high cost of land makes it difficult for agricultural businesses to turn a profit. New farmers in the region are often leasing land, without the ability to own.

The Cariboo-Chilcotin region saw an 11.1% increase in farmland values between 2021 and 2022, while the Peace Region-Northern B.C. had a 6.6% increase over the same period, with the highest quality land going for a premium. A few years ago, new farmers could reliably relocate north to purchase land and escape Southern B.C. real estate hotspots, they are now finding themselves priced out of the market all across the province.

The Okanagan region, driven by its wine production and orchards, increased a further 14.3% between 2021 and 2022, with a top value per acre of up to $95,800 per acre.

Food Insecurity

The inability for new farmers to enter the market due to exorbitant land costs, and the fact that other countries are able to produce for much cheaper adds to the food insecurity problem. High prices may drive people away from consuming locally even though there is a market for people who want to consume locally produced goods.

Population growth in B.C. will also increase the amount of food consumed in B.C. It is projected that there will be an annual population growth of 1.2% in B.C. from 2019 to 2041. The highest growth areas will be the Mainland/Southwest, which includes Vancouver, Burnaby, the Tri-Cities, Richmond, New Westminster, Surrey, White Rock, Langley, and Abbotsford. The other highest growth area is the Nechako region.

Innovation

Food and agriculture innovation have generated remarkable amounts of investor capital in recent years and could become a $700 billion market globally by 2030, according to a Union Bank of Switzerland.[1] One innovative form of (add in ‘urban’?) farming includes vertical farming.

Vertical farming is a new form of farming that allows for the production of crops, primarily leafy greens, on minimal land space. This farming method uses the concept of controlled environment agriculture, and stacks production space upon itself like a high-rise building.[2] These buildings may be new, purpose built, or renovation of disused older structures.

Vertical farms must overcome the financial challenge of large start-up costs. Since they can be located in the centers of major cities, owners of vertical farms would have to pay the occupancy costs that any other office in the same zone would have to pay if zoned the same. A vertical farm with a yield per hectare factor 50 times larger than a traditional outdoor farm’s yield, may take 6-7 years to break even[3].

And because profitability is so elusive, some of the early promises of high-tech urban agriculture and vertical systems are slowly being realized. Steep start-up costs mean farmers must grow crops that generate major cash: specialty items, such as flowers, or food crops that have quick growth cycles, such as leafy greens. The five main indoor crops that are currently grown in a vertical farm are leafy greens, microgreens, herbs, flowers and tomatoes – although these are rare – items that are a pull for those of high socioeconomic status but aren’t go-to products for low-income people.

Additional potential benefits of vertical farms include:

• Close integration of agricultural amenities into urban planning with agricultural capacity scalable to urban growth, cycling of organic resources, reduction or elimination of “food deserts”, increase in local employment, and revitalization of urban areas in decline[4].

Moving forward

With SFU launching the urban agriculture program and KPU’s existing horticulture, agriculture and food-system programs, the ongoing dialogues about local food security combined with the ALR challenges, there’s already a convergence occurring around making food systems more compact and efficient, which Surrey could use as a launching pad for pitching the eco-industrial “discovery” park and the vertical farm. This could be the location of a pilot project. The potential could be realized across the province but to start, there needs to be an investment from the Province, Municipal, and Federal Governments.

Vertical farms can and have happened in major city centres.[5] [6] [7] Municipal governments could move this new discipline forward if they can be encouraged to broaden their land designations/zoning categories. Currently in many municipalities, farming can only occur on designated farming land. This however needs to be amended to allow innovation such as vertical farming to develop.

THE CHAMBER RECOMMENDS

That the Provincial Government:

1. Work with municipal and federal government to allocate funding for innovative research in vertical farming.
2. Ensure that vertical farming can occur on ALR land without the need for rezoning.