FEEDING THE GEM CITY
By Mickey S
I am excited to introduce the protein and vegetable I've chosen for my Gem City! Tepary Beans were chosen as our community's protein source because they are a power house of protein, nutrients and fiber. They're very adaptable, easy to grow and yield a high return on space used. Carrots were chosen as our vegetable because they are also easy to grow, versatile, and are one of the top nutrient dense vegetables on earth. Both also taste great and should be pleasing to most people, both young and old.
Tepary beans are heat, drought and pest resistant. They were a staple food of the prehistoric Native Americans and are Native to the Arizona Desert and Southwest region and have been traced back over 8000 years. They can easily grow with very little water. One acre of non-irrigated crop land can yield 700 pounds of beans! Adding water will double that. The Tepary Bean is excellent in nutritional content and disease fighting power and has a higher protein and fiber content than any other common bean. They have much higher levels of vitamins and minerals and have the lowest glycemic index (the rate at which a food raises blood sugar levels) of all beans. There are two types of Tepary beans, White, or Brown. Both types have similar nutritional values, which are totally amazing! For example, a 1/2 cup (99 grams) serving of Brown Tepary Beans provides 350 calories, 26 grams of fiber, 21 grams of protein, and 66 grams of carbohydrates. That same serving size also provides 25% of the recommended daily value of Calcium, 10% Magnesium, and 30% Iron! As you can see, these beans are a power house food source. An average adult can meet their daily dietary requirement for protein with about 1 cup of beans per day. Tepary beans are easily prepared and they can be served in a variety of ways. An interesting note to add is that recent studies from the U.S. and Mexico suggest that Tepary beans are useful for treating cancer, and they could be ten times more effective than chemotherapy!
Carrots are a root vegetable, usually orange in color, (though purple, white, yellow, and red varieties exist) and it has a crisp texture when fresh. They can be traced back to over 5000 years ago. The tops, or carrot greens, can also be consumed so farming carrots is really like getting two for the price of one. Carrots are low in calories but rich in anti-oxidants, vitamins and fiber. Carrots can help protect people against different kinds of cancers. Because carrots can be planted and harvested all year long, there will always be a supply of this fresh vegetable for the citizens of Gem City. Just one medium carrot counts as one serving of vegetables and has only 25 calories, 6 grams of carbohydrates, and 2 grams of fiber. The veggie is an excellent source of vitamin A, providing more than 200% of the daily requirement in just one carrot.
The best farming solution for my Gem City is a Vertical Farm, which is when stacks of crops are grown upwards in an urban environment, rather than a traditional farm crop that uses a large area of land. My vertical farm will be located in a sky scraper type building Downtown, in the heart of Gem City. This central location will allow people to walk a short distance to get their food. It will also encourage other businesses to open nearby to manufacture and sell goods related to these crops. Farmers and Engineers will work together to design the building and they will make sure that everything is done just right and include enough space to provide healthy food for all Gem City residents. They will look at how the water will be transported in and recycled. They will ensure that the air quality and temperature is just right through the use of solar paneled fans. Luckily both Tepary beans and Carrots are hardy and easily adaptable which will make the engineer’s job easier. The outside of the farm building will be bright and colorful and will have glass windows, which will provide a beautiful view for the City’s residents. Community members can volunteer their time in any of the farm building areas which will include areas for seed sorting, planting, plant monitoring, and harvesting. Citizens will enjoy working together and learning more about the new age method of farming.
Both the Tepary Beans and Carrots will mostly need water and light. The method of Hydroponics will be used in place of traditional soil, as it produces a faster, better growth of plants and greater yields. Hydroponics recycles water and nutrients and offers cleaner, safer, healthier food. Natural lighting will be available through the glass windows and extra lighting will be provided by using LED lights which can be recharged through the use of solar energy panels. Solar energy will always be available in the desert and using this free and natural resource will be extremely energy efficient and operate with very little expense.
Agricultural Engineers and Architectural Engineers will work together to design the Gem City Vertical Farm. They will need to be creative, intelligent and willing to try new designs for energy use and efficiency. They will listen to traditional farmers as well as organic and urban farmers and use the best ideas from each to design the most efficient, inexpensive Vertical Farm available. They might also ask for help from Environmental, Electrical, and Mineral Engineers. Once all of the different parts come together, Gem City will be able to offer one of the coolest, most sophisticated, energy efficient Vertical Farms in the World. It will also provide nutritious and delicious food for all Gem City citizens and will have food to share with neighboring cities! Gem City will be a proud World leader in Urban and Vertical Farming.
I am excited to introduce the protein and vegetable I've chosen for my Gem City! Tepary Beans were chosen as our community's protein source because they are a power house of protein, nutrients and fiber. They're very adaptable, easy to grow and yield a high return on space used. Carrots were chosen as our vegetable because they are also easy to grow, versatile, and are one of the top nutrient dense vegetables on earth. Both also taste great and should be pleasing to most people, both young and old.
Tepary beans are heat, drought and pest resistant. They were a staple food of the prehistoric Native Americans and are Native to the Arizona Desert and Southwest region and have been traced back over 8000 years. They can easily grow with very little water. One acre of non-irrigated crop land can yield 700 pounds of beans! Adding water will double that. The Tepary Bean is excellent in nutritional content and disease fighting power and has a higher protein and fiber content than any other common bean. They have much higher levels of vitamins and minerals and have the lowest glycemic index (the rate at which a food raises blood sugar levels) of all beans. There are two types of Tepary beans, White, or Brown. Both types have similar nutritional values, which are totally amazing! For example, a 1/2 cup (99 grams) serving of Brown Tepary Beans provides 350 calories, 26 grams of fiber, 21 grams of protein, and 66 grams of carbohydrates. That same serving size also provides 25% of the recommended daily value of Calcium, 10% Magnesium, and 30% Iron! As you can see, these beans are a power house food source. An average adult can meet their daily dietary requirement for protein with about 1 cup of beans per day. Tepary beans are easily prepared and they can be served in a variety of ways. An interesting note to add is that recent studies from the U.S. and Mexico suggest that Tepary beans are useful for treating cancer, and they could be ten times more effective than chemotherapy!
Carrots are a root vegetable, usually orange in color, (though purple, white, yellow, and red varieties exist) and it has a crisp texture when fresh. They can be traced back to over 5000 years ago. The tops, or carrot greens, can also be consumed so farming carrots is really like getting two for the price of one. Carrots are low in calories but rich in anti-oxidants, vitamins and fiber. Carrots can help protect people against different kinds of cancers. Because carrots can be planted and harvested all year long, there will always be a supply of this fresh vegetable for the citizens of Gem City. Just one medium carrot counts as one serving of vegetables and has only 25 calories, 6 grams of carbohydrates, and 2 grams of fiber. The veggie is an excellent source of vitamin A, providing more than 200% of the daily requirement in just one carrot.
The best farming solution for my Gem City is a Vertical Farm, which is when stacks of crops are grown upwards in an urban environment, rather than a traditional farm crop that uses a large area of land. My vertical farm will be located in a sky scraper type building Downtown, in the heart of Gem City. This central location will allow people to walk a short distance to get their food. It will also encourage other businesses to open nearby to manufacture and sell goods related to these crops. Farmers and Engineers will work together to design the building and they will make sure that everything is done just right and include enough space to provide healthy food for all Gem City residents. They will look at how the water will be transported in and recycled. They will ensure that the air quality and temperature is just right through the use of solar paneled fans. Luckily both Tepary beans and Carrots are hardy and easily adaptable which will make the engineer’s job easier. The outside of the farm building will be bright and colorful and will have glass windows, which will provide a beautiful view for the City’s residents. Community members can volunteer their time in any of the farm building areas which will include areas for seed sorting, planting, plant monitoring, and harvesting. Citizens will enjoy working together and learning more about the new age method of farming.
Both the Tepary Beans and Carrots will mostly need water and light. The method of Hydroponics will be used in place of traditional soil, as it produces a faster, better growth of plants and greater yields. Hydroponics recycles water and nutrients and offers cleaner, safer, healthier food. Natural lighting will be available through the glass windows and extra lighting will be provided by using LED lights which can be recharged through the use of solar energy panels. Solar energy will always be available in the desert and using this free and natural resource will be extremely energy efficient and operate with very little expense.
Agricultural Engineers and Architectural Engineers will work together to design the Gem City Vertical Farm. They will need to be creative, intelligent and willing to try new designs for energy use and efficiency. They will listen to traditional farmers as well as organic and urban farmers and use the best ideas from each to design the most efficient, inexpensive Vertical Farm available. They might also ask for help from Environmental, Electrical, and Mineral Engineers. Once all of the different parts come together, Gem City will be able to offer one of the coolest, most sophisticated, energy efficient Vertical Farms in the World. It will also provide nutritious and delicious food for all Gem City citizens and will have food to share with neighboring cities! Gem City will be a proud World leader in Urban and Vertical Farming.
FOOD PRODUCE IN CHINA 2050
by Zach B.
A common Chinese tradition is celebrating the elements of balance and symmetry. If you went to China on this holiday you would most likely see the Yin-Yen, a perfect demonstration of balance and symmetry. In China they celebrate by finding foods that support the Yin-Yen. The two foods we found are chicken and spinach. China thinks these two foods are perfect because spinach is a cold food and chicken is warm.
The foods meet the nutritional needs for China because spinach is a vegetable that helps your brain think. Chicken is nutritionally healthy because it has a lot of protein for your bones and muscles to use when working. These foods meet the preferences of the citizens in our city because China has had a tradition of eating chicken and spinach for many years. Our vertical farm is a new structure that is exotic and it will catch your eye. The factors used to decide the farms location consists of one question that I asked myself, “Does the farms location have the right amount of water, sunlight, and nutrients to allow spinach and chicken to be produced?” The farms light source is mostly natural light with some artificial light when needed.
The farm gets water from an irrigation system that catches rain, sends it to the vertical farm, and then that water is distributed among the plants. At the farm the climate is controlled in containers made out of recycled plastic. The city’s efficient farming system does not allow pesticides, instead the farm has weeds removed by hand. Nutrients are fed to the plants by the soil, water, and fertilizer. The weeds are fed to animals by allowing weeds to grow freely for them to eat. The farm is energy efficient because we use 90% natural light and the other 10% is artificial light that is powered by solar panels. The farm relies on rain water collected and distributed among the plants, and the majority of the farm is made of recycled materials.
The farm has no environmental issues because of the energy it relies on. The farm will recycle waist products to reuse and make more soil for the plants and provide another source of energy. The farm won’t need many valuable trades but it will need recycled plastic and some steel to be built. Engineering will play the biggest role in building this farm because of finding the right materials to build it, finding how strong the materials need to be, what the most efficient way of transferring the energy to the farm, from the solar panels and wind turbines, and what foods were best to be used on the farm.
There are some foods that are easy to grow in the city’s location and those are spinach and chicken. There are not many other foods that would be more desirable for the citizens of the city because the two foods chosen were based off of a famous Chinese tradition. There are many benefits to producing spinach and chicken for the entire city including the nutritional needs. Some of those nutritional benefits will be a clear and healthy brain and healthy muscle growth. Another benefit is the time it takes for spinach to germinate. The germination of spinach is only five to nine day period. The Vertical Farm proves to be an efficient and self sustaining building while being healthy for our environment.
A common Chinese tradition is celebrating the elements of balance and symmetry. If you went to China on this holiday you would most likely see the Yin-Yen, a perfect demonstration of balance and symmetry. In China they celebrate by finding foods that support the Yin-Yen. The two foods we found are chicken and spinach. China thinks these two foods are perfect because spinach is a cold food and chicken is warm.
The foods meet the nutritional needs for China because spinach is a vegetable that helps your brain think. Chicken is nutritionally healthy because it has a lot of protein for your bones and muscles to use when working. These foods meet the preferences of the citizens in our city because China has had a tradition of eating chicken and spinach for many years. Our vertical farm is a new structure that is exotic and it will catch your eye. The factors used to decide the farms location consists of one question that I asked myself, “Does the farms location have the right amount of water, sunlight, and nutrients to allow spinach and chicken to be produced?” The farms light source is mostly natural light with some artificial light when needed.
The farm gets water from an irrigation system that catches rain, sends it to the vertical farm, and then that water is distributed among the plants. At the farm the climate is controlled in containers made out of recycled plastic. The city’s efficient farming system does not allow pesticides, instead the farm has weeds removed by hand. Nutrients are fed to the plants by the soil, water, and fertilizer. The weeds are fed to animals by allowing weeds to grow freely for them to eat. The farm is energy efficient because we use 90% natural light and the other 10% is artificial light that is powered by solar panels. The farm relies on rain water collected and distributed among the plants, and the majority of the farm is made of recycled materials.
The farm has no environmental issues because of the energy it relies on. The farm will recycle waist products to reuse and make more soil for the plants and provide another source of energy. The farm won’t need many valuable trades but it will need recycled plastic and some steel to be built. Engineering will play the biggest role in building this farm because of finding the right materials to build it, finding how strong the materials need to be, what the most efficient way of transferring the energy to the farm, from the solar panels and wind turbines, and what foods were best to be used on the farm.
There are some foods that are easy to grow in the city’s location and those are spinach and chicken. There are not many other foods that would be more desirable for the citizens of the city because the two foods chosen were based off of a famous Chinese tradition. There are many benefits to producing spinach and chicken for the entire city including the nutritional needs. Some of those nutritional benefits will be a clear and healthy brain and healthy muscle growth. Another benefit is the time it takes for spinach to germinate. The germination of spinach is only five to nine day period. The Vertical Farm proves to be an efficient and self sustaining building while being healthy for our environment.
emerald city urban farm
by Taylor A.
Emerald City is in Egypt near Alexandria. This is the city of the future. It will have vertical and underground farms, underground transportation, and much more ecofriendly solutions of the future.
Currently food is grown on hundreds of acres of land and then shipped all over the world. The food they grow also has chemicals in them that make them bigger, plus lots of other affects. In Emerald City the farms will be vertical or underground. If our farms are vertical, they can save a lot of space as well as if they are underground. We could grow many different kinds of plants and food with vertical farming. With underground you can grow root veggies like carrots, potatoes, and so on. We will also be able to have these farms in the city or at least very close to the city. So it will not need to travel far to get to the closest market. Plus with both of these types of farming we will have both vegetable and protein foods. A vegetable food is anything that is a plant based crop, a protein food is anything that is a protein based crop (plant or animal). All the food we will grow will also be organic so the people who live in the city will be healthier and happier.
Another big problem we will be able to fix with these two types of farming are the climate issues. In Egypt it does not rain a lot and it can get very dry. With these two types of farming the plants will be able to stay moist all the time with a special type of water.. In one of our systems we will be using waste from Tilapia fish mixed with water to use as great food and water for the plants. We will also get protein food from fish if it ever overpopulates. With this matter our plants will never suffer drought. Plus they will be healthier than usual plants.
The designs of our farms are simple. For the vertical farming a water pump will very slowly turn a Ferris wheel like structure with plants growing in each tray that is being rotated. They will be watered with sprayers that will come on automatically each day with a timer. The water they will be spraying will have the Tilapia fish waste in it from the Tilapia pond on the bottom of the farm. With the water power pump it will also be energy efficient. for the underground farming the Tilapia fish will be in a very deep hole and on the sides of the Tilapia fish pond there will be growing plants that will not need to be watered because they are absorbing the water from the pond that will also have Tilapia fish waste in it.
Emerald City will be very successful in the future and lots of people will want to live there. It will be one of the most ecofriendly and energy efficient cities in Egypt.
Emerald City is in Egypt near Alexandria. This is the city of the future. It will have vertical and underground farms, underground transportation, and much more ecofriendly solutions of the future.
Currently food is grown on hundreds of acres of land and then shipped all over the world. The food they grow also has chemicals in them that make them bigger, plus lots of other affects. In Emerald City the farms will be vertical or underground. If our farms are vertical, they can save a lot of space as well as if they are underground. We could grow many different kinds of plants and food with vertical farming. With underground you can grow root veggies like carrots, potatoes, and so on. We will also be able to have these farms in the city or at least very close to the city. So it will not need to travel far to get to the closest market. Plus with both of these types of farming we will have both vegetable and protein foods. A vegetable food is anything that is a plant based crop, a protein food is anything that is a protein based crop (plant or animal). All the food we will grow will also be organic so the people who live in the city will be healthier and happier.
Another big problem we will be able to fix with these two types of farming are the climate issues. In Egypt it does not rain a lot and it can get very dry. With these two types of farming the plants will be able to stay moist all the time with a special type of water.. In one of our systems we will be using waste from Tilapia fish mixed with water to use as great food and water for the plants. We will also get protein food from fish if it ever overpopulates. With this matter our plants will never suffer drought. Plus they will be healthier than usual plants.
The designs of our farms are simple. For the vertical farming a water pump will very slowly turn a Ferris wheel like structure with plants growing in each tray that is being rotated. They will be watered with sprayers that will come on automatically each day with a timer. The water they will be spraying will have the Tilapia fish waste in it from the Tilapia pond on the bottom of the farm. With the water power pump it will also be energy efficient. for the underground farming the Tilapia fish will be in a very deep hole and on the sides of the Tilapia fish pond there will be growing plants that will not need to be watered because they are absorbing the water from the pond that will also have Tilapia fish waste in it.
Emerald City will be very successful in the future and lots of people will want to live there. It will be one of the most ecofriendly and energy efficient cities in Egypt.
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