mylocalgreens is brought to you by Ufnetwork which was in turn conceived as a team project by three course mates from a technology entrepreneurship course offered by Venture Lab from Stanford University.
While many of the projects in the course are geared towards big data, health analytic, rethinking education, etc... we looked at the appalling state of farm produce imports in cities like Singapore and wondered if we can take on farming in cities to bring decent local produce to local committees.
The idea started after an article was published in the Singapore Straits Times stating that only 7% of vegetables are grown in Singapore (1). We calculated the figure to be closer to 4.28% using data from publicly accessible sources (2). Over the last ten years, production of vegetables has increased 23%2 while the population has grown 29% (3) over the same period. At these rates, Singapore had to increase the amount of imported vegetables to meet growing demand. Singapore also limited land use to grow food giving higher priority to non-farming uses. While farm production has increased, land use for farming fell 10% (2) over the last 10 years.
Source:
1) http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/1233261/1/.html
2) http://www.ava.gov.sg
3) http://www.singstat.gov.sg/stats/keyind.html
While many of the projects in the course are geared towards big data, health analytic, rethinking education, etc... we looked at the appalling state of farm produce imports in cities like Singapore and wondered if we can take on farming in cities to bring decent local produce to local committees.
The idea started after an article was published in the Singapore Straits Times stating that only 7% of vegetables are grown in Singapore (1). We calculated the figure to be closer to 4.28% using data from publicly accessible sources (2). Over the last ten years, production of vegetables has increased 23%2 while the population has grown 29% (3) over the same period. At these rates, Singapore had to increase the amount of imported vegetables to meet growing demand. Singapore also limited land use to grow food giving higher priority to non-farming uses. While farm production has increased, land use for farming fell 10% (2) over the last 10 years.
Source:
1) http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/1233261/1/.html
2) http://www.ava.gov.sg
3) http://www.singstat.gov.sg/stats/keyind.html
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