Osaka Marubeni to open plant factory
MARUY | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating -- Major trading company Marubeni Corp. will open an indoor "plant factory" on Wednesday for growing vegetables at its Osaka branch in Chuo Ward.
About 10 kinds of plants, including herbs, radishes and lettuce, are to be grown in a 200-square-meter cultivation area remodeled from a conference room on the building's second basement level. The plants will be sold to restaurants.
The company will also sell the plant factory system for 80 million yen per 330 square meters to businesses looking to use unoccupied space in buildings and factories for agricultural purposes.
Furthermore, the company will use the facility as a promotional showroom, with the goal of attaining annual sales of 4 billion yen after five years.
The plant factory uses soil with high water retention developed by a venture business that manufactures soil improvement materials in Kanagawa Prefecture.
While many plant factories primarily use a water culture system for growing lettuce and other leaf vegetables, the new soil system also can grow root vegetables, such as radishes and burdock, according to a spokesman for the company.
At the new factory, light intensity can be controlled through the use of light-emitting diodes that can vary the wavelengths of light and fluorescent light to grow plants faster and with greater nutritional value. The system also makes it easy to grow plants without pesticides.
As the system can easily grow high-value products, the Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Ministry and the Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry are promoting it with the aim of tripling the number of similar plant factories from 50 at the end of fiscal 2008 to 150 at the end of fiscal 2011.
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