Controlled environment agriculture and containerized food production in northern North America

Alex Wilkinson,Henry Penn,Meriam Karlsson,Craig Gerlach

doi:10.5304/jafscd.2021.104.001

Abstract

There is an ongoing debate about the role of controlled environment agriculture and containerized food production in local food systems in Northern North American communities. Some critics dismiss these applications as ineffective, arguing that because they marginalize certain populations they do not have a place in northern food systems. However, such critiques are premature and undermine what may prove to be an important and complementary component of local and regional food systems in the north, particularly if designed and implemented in a culturally appropriate and place-based context. Containerized food production can offer enhanced food production capabilities for communities through year-round production. While there are still concerns about proper growing protocols, scalability, output, durability, and economics, these can be addressed, modified and improved through research and continued applications. New opportunities requiring further exploration in the application of containerized food production systems include, but are not limited to, integrative systems design, the enhancement of community development initiatives, and the integration of the social networks that are necessary for diversified local food production.

Highlights

There is a growing debate about the potential role of controlled environment agriculture (CEA) and containerized food production systems (CFPS) in local food systems (Pinstrup-Andersen, 2018), and these debates are occurring in the context of northern communities (Kozachenko, 2020)
Recent criticisms of the role of CEA focuses on an Indigenous context claim that CEA is just another form of outside or “top-down” development (Kozachenko, 2020)
While this may be true in some circumstances, we advocate for CEA applications that are relevant for multiple northern rural communities and operations instead, including but not limited to Indigenous communities

Summary

Introduction

There is a growing debate about the potential role of controlled environment agriculture (CEA) and containerized food production systems (CFPS) in local food systems (Pinstrup-Andersen, 2018), and these debates are occurring in the context of northern communities (Kozachenko, 2020). Recent criticisms of the role of CEA focuses on an Indigenous context claim that CEA is just another form of outside or “top-down” development (Kozachenko, 2020) While this may be true in some circumstances, we advocate for CEA applications that are relevant for multiple northern rural communities and operations instead, including but not limited to Indigenous communities. We do suggest that CEA remains a potential contribution to a more food-secure future for northern communities, especially in a context of economic, political, and climatic uncertainty (Pinstrup-Andersen, 2018; Treftz & Omaye, 2016)

Objectives

Methods