UAE: World’s Largest Indoor Farm is in Abu Dhabi!

A “GreenFactory” is moving to the desert emirate of Abu Dhabi, the size of 32 football pitches and capable of growing 10,000 tonnes of fresh vegetables a year. In order to develop what will be the world’s largest indoor plant, Dutch agricultural technology company GrowGroup IFS has joined Abu Dhabi investor RainMakers Capital Investment. The aim is to build a framework of 17.5 ha with a farming area of 16 ha, equivalent to around 32 football pitches. John Breedveld, chief executive of GrowGroup, told a Dutch website that the €150m project arose from investors’ interest in “Dutch quality”. He said: “We will cultivate baby leaves like spinach, rocket, herbs and kale.” The initiative ties in with the goal of the UAE government to become a “world-leading center for food security driven by creativity.”

The country ‘s climate is too hot for eight months of the year to grow crops, so the building can shield the plants from heat and excess sun exposure. It will use indoor growing systems built in the Netherlands that are pesticide-free. With 5% of the water that would otherwise be required, it will also be able to grow the product, an important factor in the UAE, which may face a water shortage in coming years (see further reading). According to GrowGroup, to produce real time data on the output of plants, the farm will be planted with sensors. GAAS Wageningen and Delphy, Dutch ‘agtech’ firms, will install automated devices to manage and manage the farm. As the project is named, GreenFactory Emirates will be built in three stages and is expected to produce 10,000 tonnes of leaves a year when completed. Until Expo 2020 Dubai, rescheduled in the middle of the pandemic for October 2021, the first stage is projected to increase.

In a press release, UAE Food Security Minister Mariam Hareb Almheiri commented: “The UAE is making concerted efforts to increase its domestic food production, with agricultural technology playing an extremely important role.” In reality, the main goals of the government’s National Food Security Strategy launched in November 2018 are to produce a 30 percent increase in yields from technology-enabled development and to make the UAE a leading global hub in food security driven by innovation by 2051.

The Dutch-UAE team is preparing parallel farms in other parts of the world where the climate limits regular agriculture.