Vertical Farming

The Vertical Farms Changing the Face of Rehabilitation in South Carolina and California Prisons

Thu, 26 Mar 2026 20:26:34 GMT

Editor’s note: This story is part of an ongoing Sowing Change series about urban farming.

In the volatile landscapes of Afghanistan’s Kandahar province, David Flynn learned that a road is a lifeline for a struggling economy. Years later, as the CEO of AmplifiedAg, he is applying that same mission-driven mindset to a different kind of isolated environment: the U.S. correctional system.

By deploying high-tech vertical farms inside prison walls, AmplifiedAg is creating a new path for incarcerated individuals, one that leads away from recidivism and toward specialized careers in the growing ag-tech sector. Flynn says agriculture reentry programs have the lowest recidivism rate — at 19% —among any other programming.

AmplifiedAg has spent years honing the modular approach to indoor farming, using upcycled refrigerated containers to grow produce in environments where nature has largely bowed out. While the technology is sophisticated — involving proprietary internet-connected sensors and climate control — the most significant impact of this work is currently being felt behind the barbed wire of the Camille Griffin Graham Correctional Institution in Columbia, S.C., and the Central California Women’s Facility in Chowchilla, Calif.

The path to these prison yards began years ago in Afghanistan. During his military service, Flynn observed how the local economy in the Arghandab district relied on a fragile irrigation system to sustain its world-famous pomegranate orchards.

“My view of combat was about 30% violence and 70% everything else that you do,” Flynn says. “Part of that ‘everything else’ was trying to help the local economy.”

He saw firsthand that food security was the cornerstone of a stable society, a lesson that now drives AmplifiedAg’s mission to provide for underserved and isolated populations.

“Our system isn’t just focused on labor,” says AmplifiedAg CEO David Flynn. “It’s designed to create skill sets that make somebody attractive for employment on the other side.”

(Photo courtesy of AmplifiedAg)

In South Carolina, that mission took the form of a partnership with the state’s corrections department. Director of Agriculture Rick Doran was looking for a way to modernize the state’s prison farms, moving beyond traditional row crops into the future of agribusiness. However, placing a high-tech, internet-connected farm inside a maximum-security prison presented a unique set of logistical headaches.

“The one that caught us off guard the most was just the software access,” Flynn says.

In an environment where internet use is strictly controlled to prevent illicit communication, AmplifiedAg had to work closely with prison IT professionals to create a “restricted pipe.” This ensures the farm’s sensors can communicate with the cloud, but the participants cannot wander elsewhere on the web.

“We have to provide them with a URL that is specifically for the farm’s control,” Flynn says, noting that the security of the facility always remains the top priority.

The program, known as Cultivating Futures, is designed to be more than a source of labor. By the time the women at the correctional facilities complete the program, they have been immersed in a curriculum that covers everything from horticulture and food safety to the business of entrepreneurship. Flynn is adamant that the goal is to create a professional bridge to the outside world.

“Our system isn’t just focused on labor,” he says. “It’s designed to create skill sets that make somebody attractive for employment on the other side.”

A classroom inside the Camille Griffin Graham Correctional Institution.

(Photo courtesy of AmplifiedAg)

To ensure that attractiveness translates into a paycheck, the program has secured letters of intent from the Palmetto Agribusiness Council, ensuring that graduates get a fair shot at interviews upon release.

The benefits are as much psychological as they are economic. A study published by the National Institutes of Health found that prison gardening and farming programs function as a “restorative sanctuary,” significantly reducing symptoms of depression and anxiety among participants. And the National Library of Medicine shows exposure to plants , green space and gardening is beneficial to mental and physical health, reducing symptoms of anxiety and depression, thus improving daily life behind bars and overall well-being.

The production capacity of the corrections container farm model is as impressive as its mission, yielding approximately 48,000 pounds of fresh, nutrient-dense greens annually. This harvest directly enhances the diet of the incarcerated population by being served in the prison cafeteria, and it extends its reach into the surrounding community.

Solving for the Impossible

While the work in South Carolina and California is a primary focus, AmplifiedAg continues to test the limits of modular farming in other underserved and extreme spaces.

Saltwater solutions — The company helped enable Heron Farms, the first saltwater vertical farm, which successfully grows sea beans using seawater.
Scientific research — Working with USDA, AmplifiedAg’s systems are used to study cultivars like cucumbers, peppers and rice to help traditional field growers combat pathogens.
Hyperlocal resilience — Unlike massive warehouse farms, Flynn argues the container model is more resilient because it provides a hyperlocal solution that complements traditional agriculture rather than trying to compete with it.

“Indoor agriculture is not designed to compete with traditional agriculture, but more so to complement it and provide an off-season and year-round type of solution,” Flynn says.

For the women in South Carolina and California, that solution isn’t just about the lettuce; it’s about the growth that happens when a person is given the tools to harvest a new life.

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Salad Days Completes 68K-Square-Foot Hydroponic Greenhouse Expansion in Mississippi

Thu, 19 Mar 2026 19:09:35 GMT

Regional grower Salad Days has reached full operational capacity at its new 68,000-square-foot hydroponic facility in Flora, Miss. The Mississippi-based company says the completion of this controlled-environment site positions it as one of the Southeast’s largest regional suppliers of greenhouse-grown lettuce.

“Our focus has always been on delivering a consistent, high-quality product our customers can depend on,” says Leigh Bailey, president of Salad Days . “This facility is a big step forward for Salad Days, allowing us to scale that commitment while maintaining reliable supply, freshness and responsiveness across the region.”

The facility in the Flora Industrial Park officially opened March 17. Using Prospiant greenhouse systems and FGM moving-table automation, the operation is capable of producing up to 3 million heads of lettuce annually for distribution across the Southeast.

State and local officials attending the opening event included Mississippi Agriculture Commissioner Andy Gipson, USDA Mississippi Director Dane Maxwell, Madison County Economic Development Authority Executive Director Joey Deason and Flora Mayor Les Childress.

The new greenhouse significantly expands Salad Days’ production capacity and enables year-round supply of hydroponic lettuce varieties for foodservice operators and grocery retailers across Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee, Alabama and Florida.

Product from the Flora operation is now shipping daily to restaurants, food service distributors and regional and national grocery chains.

(Photo courtesy of Salad Days)

The facility uses controlled environment agriculture to deliver pesticide-free leafy greens while maintaining consistent production regardless of seasonal conditions.

“This expansion moves us from a niche grower to a scaled regional supplier,” Bailey says. “Demand from chefs and retailers across the Southeast has outpaced what we could produce for years. With this facility fully online, we can finally deliver the volume the market has been asking for.”

Product from the Flora operation is now shipping daily to restaurants, foodservice distributors and regional and national grocery chains.

The project received support from the city of Flora; the Madison County Economic Development Authority; the Mississippi Land, Water and Timber Board; the Mississippi Development Authority; and USDA.

Deason says the investment further strengthens Madison County’s growing specialty food manufacturing and agriculture cluster, commenting, “Facilities like this demonstrate that advanced agriculture can thrive in Mississippi.”

Additionally, Gipson notes the project reflects increasing diversification within the state’s agricultural sector.

“A facility of this scale producing fresh food for the Southeast highlights Mississippi’s leadership in agricultural innovation,” he says.

Inside the High-Tech Lab of Georgia’s Youngest Vertical Farmer

Tue, 20 Jan 2026 22:36:36 GMT

Editor’s note: This story is part of an ongoing “Sowing Change” series about urban farming.

Malon E.D. James is not your typical farmer. Instead, he’s a 15-year-old high school graduate (who actually graduated at 13) and a pioneer in controlled environment agriculture. While his Atlanta peers are navigating the 10^th grade, James is managing a sophisticated hydroponic operation that bridges the gap between old-world tradition and the digital frontier.

It started in the kitchen of his grandmother, Mattie James. Affectionately known as “Mimi,” James says watching her grow plants in simple glasses of water left a lasting impression on him.

“Standing in her kitchen, just seeing her plants really grow, the roots take ... it’s just so much life,” he says.

This early exposure to the magic of growth gave him a clear vision of his path: “That’s how I know where my food is, that’s how I know where it’s coming from. That really gave me a picture that this is what I’m going to pursue.”

At just 15 years old, Georgia’s youngest certified vertical farmer is blending his grandmother’s wisdom with high-tech innovation to fight food deserts from a lab in Atlanta.

(Photo courtesy of Malon E.D. James)

A Pandemic-Driven Mission

While his interest began at age 10, it was the onset of COVID-19 in 2020 that transformed a hobby into a global mission. Deeply moved by the vulnerabilities in the food supply chain, James began researching food deserts and climate-related agricultural failures.

His focus expanded to Liberia, where monsoons frequently wash away traditional soil crops and infrastructure. This inspired his drive to create indoor systems that offer safety and security by allowing people to grow food directly in their living rooms, shielded from the elements.

Turning this vision into a commercial reality required more than just a green thumb; it required capital and persistence. James successfully navigated the bureaucracy of the USDA Farm Service Agency to secure a youth loan, allowing him to move his operations out of his home and into a professional facility.

“The FSA loan I received was specifically for equipment and supplies. [A mentor], Judge Gundy helped me secure the space I’m in several months before I received the loan or modest marketing grant,” James says.

The transition wasn’t without its hurdles. James says that older generations in traditional farming can sometimes be skeptical of oversophisticated technology. However, he has proven that his high-tech approach is viable, scaling up to 24 farm stands capable of producing dozens of plants simultaneously.

James’ facility is a “lab-to-table” environment where he is assisted by Jarvis, an artificial intelligence system that monitors his actions, flags inconsistencies and manages rigorous schedules. This tech-forward approach has allowed him to move beyond standard leafy greens to experiment with over 42 varieties, including challenging crops like cotton.

“Cotton was something I really had to maneuver and understand,” James says, noting that it demands far more precise climate and nutrient scheduling than a simple head of cabbage. His research even extends to the molecular level, where he is currently working on a patent for a custom biodegradable substrate designed to help plants hold nutrients more effectively.

Of working with Jarvis as his assistant, James says: “Jarvis doesn’t know much about the science of hydroponics yet, but he is a great student. Mostly, he proofreads my work and monitors. I don’t want people to get the impression that AI can help you become a great hydroponic grower. It depends on how you program your AI.”

Beyond the Harvest

Despite the high-level research and AI-driven data, James remains motivated by the simple, human act of sharing food. He remembers his first successful harvest of tomatoes. Though he isn’t a “tomato person” himself, he says the experience was transformative.

“It just gave me a sense of security,” he says. “I know I can do it again and again and again. I can feed my whole family with [this].”

As he looks toward his next steps of expanding into a larger lab and developing new models, his message to other young entrepreneurs remains one of pure resilience: “Don’t let anybody discourage you from doing it ... Looking at something from a negative standpoint will never let you see the positive.”

James’ future looks filled with light and growth as well.

“It’s my wish to attend MIT after I complete my research project in Liberia,” he says.

Tomato Grafting: Where It Delivers, Where It Doesn’t

Thu, 15 Jan 2026 21:57:22 GMT

Tomato grafting has long been part of the controlled-environment agriculture conversation, but it rarely sits at the center of debate. That’s changing as growers face mounting disease pressure, labor constraints and rising production costs, all while also demanding longer crop cycles and more consistent yields.

Those issues were discussed during Indoor Ag Conversations Presents: Tomato Grafting — Where It Delivers, Where It Doesn’t, and What’s Changed, a Jan. 13 webinar moderated by Matt Korpan, executive director of research and innovation at BiopHi.

Panelists included Hande Saganak, vegetable grafting operation and research and development leader of The Morning Star Company, and Ben Pieterse of TTA-ISO, an automation solutions company.

What Hasn’t Changed

The plant still sets the rules.

Despite advances in rootstock breeding and propagation technology, Saganak says tomato genetics, and basic plant physiology, still dictate outcomes.

“Tomatoes still need a certain amount of nitrogen, light, humidity and heat,” she says. “You can’t bypass that with grafting.”

What has changed is uniformity. In the early 2000s, Saganak recalled working with rootstocks that varied widely in stem diameter, complicating grafting success. Today, improved breeding and propagation practices have made it easier to match scions and rootstocks, one of the most critical factors in successful grafting, she says.

“Matching diameter is one of the most important parts,” Sagaak says. “We adjust growing techniques specifically, so rootstock and scion align at the right time.”

The panelists repeatedly returned to one theme: Grafting is essentially plant surgery, and hygiene failures can wipe out thousands of plants quickly.

After grafting, young tomato plants are left with open wounds that require high humidity and careful environmental control to heal. That same environment also creates ideal conditions for disease if sanitation slips.

“Hygiene, disinfection and sanitation are among the most important factors,” Saganak says. “Anything that touches the plants can introduce disease.”

That includes shoes, tools, hands and even food brought into the greenhouse. Panelists noted many operations now rely on strict zoning protocols, disinfectant footbaths, protective clothing and air and water sanitation systems to reduce risk.

Korpan says propagators, particularly in North America and Europe, have raised the bar in recent years, driven by grower expectations and the high cost of crop failure.

“Growers want to know the plants are coming in clean,” he says. “They’ve already invested heavily in sanitation before those plants ever arrive.”

Automation Shifts the Economics

Labor remains the biggest cost barrier to grafting, particularly for processing tomatoes and outdoor production. That’s where automation is changing the equation.

Pieterse says automated grafting machines are allowing nurseries to reduce labor needs dramatically while improving consistency.

“A machine does the same thing every time,” he says. “People are flexible, but they’re not consistent over long periods, and grafting demands consistency.”

At Morning Star, automated grafting has reduced labor requirements from nine workers to roughly one or two per line, Saganak says. While automation doesn’t eliminate overseeding or plant losses, she says it improves predictability and makes grafting more feasible at scale.

Sorting technology is another key lever. Removing weak or non-germinated plants early saves greenhouse space, energy and labor — critical in high-input CEA systems.

“If you can sort early, you stop wasting resources on plants that won’t make it,” Pieterse says.

When Grafting Makes Sense and When it Doesn’t

Not every grower grafts, and the panelists were clear that grafting isn’t a universal solution.

For high-tech greenhouse tomatoes, grafting often delivers value by extending crop life to 10 to 12 months or longer, improving resistance to diseases such as tomato brown rugose fruit virus, and supporting plant vigor through high-stress periods like summer heat.

In lower-tech systems, or in greenhouses intentionally running short crop cycles, grafting might not pencil out. Some growers opt for fast, non-grafted crops when energy prices spike or disease pressure makes long-term production risky.

“There has to be a payoff,” Korpan says. “If you don’t need the plant to last a full season, grafting may not make sense.”

While the webinar focused on indoor and controlled environments, interest in grafting is expanding into field production, particularly where soil-borne diseases, broomrape or declining soil health limit yields.

Saganak says trials in processing tomatoes have shown 25% to 30% higher yields with grafted plants, even at lower planting densities, though cost remains the primary hurdle.

“Automation is what makes that possible,” she says. “Without it, the labor cost is too high.”

A Tool, Not a Shortcut

Ultimately, the panelists framed grafting as a precision tool rather than a silver bullet. Success depends on matching rootstock and scion to production goals, whether that’s longevity, disease resistance, fruit quality or speed to harvest.

“Rootstock choice reflects priorities,” Saganak says. “Strength, taste, short-term versus long-term production, you have to decide what matters most.”

Kakadoodle and Spira Farms Prototype a Tech-Enabled Local Supply Chain

Fri, 09 Jan 2026 12:14:17 GMT

In the traditional local food model, the seasonal gap and fragmented logistics have long been the Achilles’ heel of regional produce. However, a high-tech collaboration in the Midwest between Kakadoodle, a decentralized distribution hub, and Spira Farms, an indoor vertical microgreens operation, is providing a blueprint for a resilient, year-round supply chain that mirrors industrial efficiency through artificial intelligence and deep technical integration.

For Marty and MariKate Thomas, founders of Kakadoodle , scaling a local food business to $60,000 in monthly revenue required a fundamental shift in how “local” is branded. Marty Thomas argues that the modern consumer, who typically shops at conventional grocers, craves the polish and reliability of established institutions.

A former software engineer who pivoted to agriculture following a personal battle with cancer, Thomas’ Kakadoodle has evolved from a small pastured-egg operation into a sophisticated decentralized distribution hub. Headquartered in a state-of-the-art facility in Frankfort, Ill., the company serves as an “online farmers market” for over 600 households, aggregating chemical-free products from more than 30 regional producers.

Marty and MariKate Thomas’ company, Kakadoodle, serves as an “online farmers market” for over 600 households, aggregating chemical-free products from more than 30 regional producers.

(Photo courtesy of Kakadoodle)

By replacing traditional marketing with “vibe coding,” using AI to build custom logistics and communication software, Thomas has created a tech-forward marketplace that prioritizes convenience and institutional trust, proving that local food can compete with the reliability of big-box grocers.

“I think our modern consumer would trust the chicken at Chick-fil-A more than they would trust going to the farm and buying chicken from the farmer,” Thomas says. To meet this expectation of professionalism, Kakadoodle leverages AI and high-quality branding:

AI-Enhanced Visuals: The company uses AI to transform low-quality product photos into high-end, “beautiful” imagery suitable for a digital marketplace.
Institutional Reliability: Rather than relying on traditional marketing, which Thomas says never worked, they focus on “boring” fundamentals such as maintaining a high percentage of “perfect deliveries” to build institutional trust.
Tactile Professionalism: The brand invests in high-quality, bright yellow branded grocery bags that act as a mobile marketing tool at markets and on doorsteps.

Kakadoodle isn’t just a delivery service; it’s a software-first enterprise. Thomas uses a method called “vibe coding,” using AI to write and debug code via natural language. This allows the hub to operate with the agility of a large tech firm without the overhead of a massive IT staff.

“I don’t even write code anymore,” Thomas says. Instead, he uses AI as a “group of 10 software engineers” to diagnose logistics errors. For instance, when a customer recently had two deliveries scheduled for the same day, Thomas told the AI to find the error in the logs, write a fix and create a debugging script to prevent a recurrence. This automated backend allows the business to scale customer communication via AI-managed SMS, allowing them to manage accounts and upsell products with extreme efficiency.

Spira Farms: Solving the “Basket Size” Problem

While Kakadoodle manages the interface, Spira Farms provides the consistent, climate-controlled production required to sustain a year-round model. Operating out of a 6,000-square-foot vertical warehouse, Spira grows approximately 40 varieties of greens on an outracking system.

Founded by Chris Borek, the family-run Spira Farms specializes in nutrient-dense microgreens grown in a climate-controlled outracking system that uses 95% less water than traditional field farming.

(Photo courtesy of Spira Farms)

Founded by Chris Borek, the farm specializes in nutrient-dense microgreens grown in a climate-controlled outracking system that uses 95% less water than traditional field farming. By using solar power and compostable packaging, Spira eliminates the volatility of the Midwestern climate to provide a consistent, year-round harvest. More than just a greenhouse, the farm functions as a data-driven production engine, using custom software to track 40 varieties of greens at the tray level and syncing its planting cycles directly with consumer demand.

For Borek, the partnership with Kakadoodle solved the primary headache of small-scale farming: logistics. Historically, home delivery for niche products like microgreens failed because “basket sizes” weren’t large enough to be cost-effective.

“What Kakadoodle is doing ... they are able to create that basket where it makes sense to deliver directly to consumers,” Borek says.

The integration is more than just a vendor relationship; it is a digital handshake, he says.

Data-Linked Planting: Thomas and Borek built a custom API bridge that allows Spira’s internal application to extract order data from Kakadoodle weeks in advance.
Precision Harvest: This allows Spira to plant exact amounts based on projected demand rather than speculative yields.

The Season of Survival and AI-Optimized Margins

As they look toward 2026, both companies are using AI to navigate after a “season of survival” in 2025. For Kakadoodle, this means using AI to maintain a strict 50% margin. This focus was sharpened after Thomas discovered that rising cattle commodity prices had quietly pushed their cost of goods for ground beef to $10.50, putting the business in “dangerous territory.”

Now, AI automatically calculates costs across complex value-added products, tracking everything from the initial carcass purchase to secondary processing for items such as hot dogs and bacon. By using AI to provide alerts when margins “creep up,” Kakadoodle aims to reach a $100,000 monthly break-even point. This synthesis of AI-driven logistics and precision vertical farming isn’t just about local food, Thomas says, it’s about building a smarter, more profitable local food industry.

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Robot Bees? Check Out This New Pollination Innovation

Mon, 27 Jan 2025 18:56:44 GMT

Scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have developed advanced robotic insects that could aid farming through artificial pollination. They could prove especially useful in the controlled indoor environments of high-tech ‘vertical farms’.

“These type of robots will open up a very new type of use case,” co-lead author Suhan Kim, from the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), told Reuters.

“For instance, we can think of artificial pollination. So since our robot looks like an insect, and it’s real lightweight and small, if you can really precisely control the robot we might be able to do something on top of flowers or leaves, which really requires very delicate interactions.”

The robots, each lighter than a paperclip, can hover for approximately 1,000 seconds, over 100 times longer than previous models. They are also capable of performing high-speed acrobatic maneuvers, including double aerial flips.

The new design halves the size of the team’s earlier model, with increased stability while also freeing up space for electronics.

“We want the robot to be able to have a [circuit] board, battery and the sensors on board. So to do that, we need much higher payload than now. So what we’re currently pushing very hard right now is to optimize the robot design to be able to lift more and more so that we can afford these potential payloads,” said Kim.

Long term, the team hope this will enable autonomous flight outside the lab. This technology could significantly boost crop yields in multi-level warehouses by providing a more efficient method for artificial pollination.

Vertical farming, the name given to the production of crops in a series of stacked levels, often in a controlled environment, is a fast-growing industry with billions of dollars being pumped into projects across the globe.

It is seen as part of the solution to the food security challenge posed by population expansion at a time when climate change and geopolitics threaten supply.

“This doesn’t really mean that we want to entirely replace honeybees in nature, but what we sometimes hear from the people in the relevant field is that there are really good cases where we can’t rely on honeybees anymore, such as like indoor farming, where we can’t really have honeybee homes in it because of safety issues or some environmental issues. So in that case, we can start thinking of using our robot, if it works well, for tools like indoor farming,” added Kim.

Despite the team’s improvements, the robotic insects still cannot match the capabilities of natural pollinators. However, the researchers aim to improve the robots’ flight time and precision to enable them to land and take off from the center of a flower.

The research was published in the journal Science Robotics.