SOHOM INFRA CONSULTING PVT.LTD.

Hydroponics

SOHOM team motivated and shown an interest in the current context of environmental degradation, over-consumption and junk food culture, taking care of ourselves and our environment enables us to take a step down the path to healthy cities and communities.
SOHOM delivers the daily pleasures of gardening are simple, inexpensive and profoundly satisfying and meet our need for relaxation and leisure. Hydroponic gardening in dense and sprawling cities is a novel way to use spaces like rooftops, patios and balconies and transform them into liveable spaces that are lush, productive and purifying.

SOHOM goal is to make planting edible oases in the city easier, so that more and more people will take up hydroponic gardening on rooftops and discover its benefits by making less/reduction of the carbon footage. SOHOM Services are created and included to help individuals, gardening enthusiasts and groups to set up and maintain an urban rooftop edible hydroponic garden that do not have the necessary ground space to do so.
SOHOM team consists of gardening enthusiasts with rich experience in soilless growing - The common interest being Nature conservation and urban gardening.

 

Introduction

 

SOHOM Team analysed the future problem and rigorously studied all related experiments and their solutions. SOHOM took the initiative decision to educate and serve the nation by implementing all related hydroponic techniques to all our individuals and corporate to solve the future demand and become as an entrepreneur savvy.

 

The daily pleasures of gardening are simple, inexpensive and profoundly satisfying. But in the ever-increasingly dense and sprawling cities, gardening on rooftops, patios and balconies is the only way to transform them into liveable spaces that are lush, productive and purifying.

 

Although, many of us in cities nurture this dream but gardening is a very time consuming activity and due to our fast paced and busy lifestyles there is not enough time in our daily lives to realize this dream.   Rooftop gardening / Vegetable growing through hydroponic technique is a veritable way of life and enables you to take pleasure in new, green spaces that meet the needs for daily utility usage of Organic vegetables, relaxation and leisure

 

Hydroponics - Food Production of the Future?

 

In 1960, when the world population was only 3 billion, approximately 0.5 hectare of cropland per capita was available, the minimum area considered essential for the production of a diverse, healthy, nutritious diet of plant and animal products. Increases in grain production brought about by irrigation and synthetic fertilizer-pesticide inputs have peaked and begun declining.

Although, the cultivable land has been increased by clearing more forests and improved irrigation techniques, the available per capita land today is reduced to .25 hectares (current population of 6 billion). Over the past 40 years, approximately 30% of the world's cropland has become unproductive. During the past 40 years nearly one-third of the world's cropland has been abandoned because of soil erosion and degradation. About 2 million hectares of rain fed and irrigated agricultural lands are lost to production every year due to severe land degradation.

As consumption surpasses production, the world's stocks of stored grain have been falling relative to each year's use. When supply can no longer meet demand, free market price competition may starve the poor. By 2050, when the world population reaches 9 billion, the available per capita land will reduce further to .16 hectares (17,222 sq feet or 0.4 acres). With conventional agriculture it is impossible to feed the entire population.

Hydroponics is the only alternative to achieve food security for all. Improved space and water conserving methods of hydroponic food production are already in experimental stages and have shown promising results. Dr. Dickson Despommier, a professor of microbiology at Columbia University, originally came up with the idea of the Vertical Farm Project, as a solution to the future pressure on land and resources and as a way of reducing the carbon footprint of our cities. Since the beginning of the project, a number of environmentally friendly ‘vertical farms’ have been designed for New York, Toronto and Paris.

Toronto scientist, Gordon Graff designed a concept building known as the SkyFarm which would sit in the centre of the city’s theatre district. His 58 floor tower design could provide enough food at the centre of the city for an estimated 35,000 people, every day. It would comprise of different crops, vegetables and fruits, all being grown hydroponically, using water in place of soil. During hydroponic growth, plants are fed nutrients dissolved in water in a strictly controlled environment. 

The benefits to the environment of producing food in vertical greenhouse-like farms in the centre of town would be multiple. Not only are distribution vehicle emissions cut by growing food in the place where it will be eaten, but there is also no need for ploughing, no digging, and no seasonal droughts. Crops are protected from the elements and run off or ‘dirty water’ is eliminated as water can be recycled within the hydroponic system of the building. 

Also, because plants grown hydroponically are in a controlled environment, with no soil, there are also no soil borne diseases or pests to worry about; the city’s food could be produced without the need for chemical pesticides or fertilizers.  Hydroponic growth requires only one twentieth of the water used to irrigate a farm growing the same number of plants, yet yields are higher. Because there is a continuous flow of nutrients to the plant, the plant can concentrate its energy on producing fruit rather than roots. Hydroponic lights and a CO2 rich atmosphere within the building could also increase food production by stimulating photosynthesis and lengthening the daylight hours available to the plants.

 

Why Hydroponics?

 

Imagine growing a vegetable garden without having to fight the soil. No more worries about too much water; or too little water; or how much fertilizer; or when to fertilize; or the labours of cultivating and weeding to provide just the right soil consistency and texture; and how much space to give each plant to avoid competing for food and water; etc.

There are many advantages of growing plants hydroponically;

 

1. Hydroponic gardens produce the healthiest crops with high yields and are consistently reliable
2. Gardening is clean and extremely easy, requiring very little effort
3. Due to nutrients fed directly to the roots, plants grow faster and with small roots plants may be grown closer. In general hydroponically      grown garden      needs 1/5 of the overall space when compared with soil gardens
4. Hydroponically grown plants do not come in contact with soil borne pests and diseases thus saves costs of soil preparation, insecticides,      fungicides
5. Since the amount of nutrient solution is fed directly to the plant roots, there is no wastage of water due to run off or evaporatio

 

Overall, the main advantages of hydroponics over soil culture are - more efficient nutrition regulation, availability in regions of the world having no arable land, efficient use of water and fertilizers, ease and low cost of sterilization of the medium, and higher density planting, leading to increased yields per acre.

 

Please contact our “SOHOM TEAM” or mail to info@sohomconsulting.com