Israel: You’ve got kale: Grocery chain to sell salad leaves, herbs grown on ‘green wall’
Vertical Field has signed ‘multi-million dollar’ deal with Rami Levy supermarkets to offer customers fresh produce picked from vertical farms
By Shoshanna Solomon
The Times of Israel
13 December 2020
Excerpt:
The crops, which include lettuce, basil, parsley, kale and mint, will be sold daily, directly to clients after harvest, “at competitive prices,” the statement added.
The walls will be in containers stationed outdoors, on the premises of the supermarkets. Customers will be able to buy the produce on the spot from a seller who will pick the produce from the container and hand it over, with payment happening on the spot.
Customers will also have the option of purchasing the produce with the soil bedding that it was grown in, “allowing the customers to enjoy all the nutritional benefits of a freshly harvested crop and a longer shelf life,” the statement said.
The containers are already stationed at Rami Levy stores in Bnei Brak, Ashdod and Modiin, a spokeswoman for Vertical Field said.
The “vertical farm” was developed at the company’s research headquarters in Ra’anana, Israel.
“The portable urban farm that we have developed is designed to be located in indoor and outdoor spaces at supermarkets, restaurants, shopping malls, rooftops, and other on-premise locations,” said Guy Elitzur, the CEO of Vertical Field. “Over the past year we conducted a number of successful pilot projects, and installed vertical farms adjacent to supermarkets and restaurants in the United States and Israel.”
