Strategic Market Analysis

Project: The goal of the project, called FoodMap NY, is to provide long-term changes in our food system that increase affordable, healthy food access, while supporting economic development and quality employment in food production, processing, and distribution. Via FoodMap NY, NYU and Cornell are examining the potential of controlled environment agriculture (CEA) to address food insecurity through the year-round growing of healthy foods. The goal is to help develop a public–private partnership that will lead to the creation of a commercial indoor farm (e.g., greenhouses, sunless/vertical farms) that will help increase nutritional food security in NYS. The SGE Immersion team will evaluate whether CEA is an economically viable approach to grow affordable, nutritional food indoors. The team will want to examine economic and operational factors which may be impacted by NYS policies related to no- or low-cost land and discounted energy available through New York Power Authority (NYPA); benchmark CEA companies whose models have proven financially successful, have a commitment to or interest in deploying CEA to address food insecurity, and that could expand in areas of NYS where people face high food insecurity; and identify barriers and opportunities for greenhouses and vertical farms in expanding to highly food-insecure areas, including rural counties.