Onward and upward

The government should come up with policies to incentivise vertical farming

With landholdings shrinking to unviable dimensions and conventional agriculture becoming unprofitable, vertical farming has begun to attract attention as a lucrative mode of crop cultivation. This innovative system of farming involves growing plants in containers stacked on shelves attached to walls or hung from vertically inclined frames or pillars, allowing enough space for the plants to grow to their full height and the light to reach each plant. Growing crop plants on rooftops, balconies and other portions of the multi-storey urban buildings is also viewed as part of vertical agriculture. Th best results are, however, obtained when such cultivation is