by CHERYL FAITH WEE, The Star Online, March 10, 2014

Rooftop farms in Singapore are sprouting greens.

Urban farmers: Three of the four founders of ComCrop (from left) Kuah Zhen Shan, Allan Lim and Keith Loh, with vegetables from the urban farm at *Scape rooftop in Orchard Link, Singapore.
Photo: SPH
Source: www.thestar.com.my

Since the start of the year, Bjorn Low and his team of five have been growing small test batches of organic vegetables that can be used in mixed leaf salads – giant red mustard, mizuna, bok choy – and herbs such as basil and mint.

Like most farmers, they deal with pests such as pigeons nibbling on the plants. Team member Robert Pearce, 37, says jokingly: “I squirt the birds with water whenever I see them doing that.”

But unlike most farmers, the team’s plots are on the roof of People’s Park Complex car park – the latest rooftop farm to sprout in Singapore. Surrounded by high-rise buildings, the vegetables and herbs are a part of an urban farm, about 2,787sq m, slated to open on the sixth floor of the car park this year.

Last year, urban farming consultancy Edible Gardens, which helps restaurants and institutions build gardens, was approached by the car park’s re-development manager, Goldhill Developments, to see what could be done with the under-utilised space.

Low, 33, who co-founded Edible Gardens with Pearce in late 2012, says: “We’ve always been looking for a space like this to set up a commercially viable rooftop urban farm. This is our dream.”

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by KATHERINE WEI, The China Post, March 10, 2014

Vickie C. Yang, Mica Hsiao and Wan Lin Chen on the roof of the university’s Sociology Department
Photo: Daniel Garcia
Source: www.elviajero.elpais.com

TAIPEI, Taiwan — Around 60 ping of lush green covers the rooftop of National Taiwan University’s Sociology Department building, with strawberries predominant among the many rows. The notion of growing your own food in the concrete jungles of the city has long been a fantasy of urban dwellers, many of whom have sworn to devote themselves to a healthier, organic way of living.

Whimsical fantasies, it seemed, as concrete rooftops were less than ideal for growing, as the material absorbs and radiates excess heat in a way unhelpful to gardening. But a group of college students are now proud veterans of the gardening struggle between urban farmer and the limited environment.

The garden sprung from the course “Innovation and Design of Socio-economic Organizations,” in which a group of eight students decided that they were fed up with the money-driven flow that escalated housing prices outrageously in Taiwan, especially in the Wenlin Yuan case. When the Wang family accused the government of confiscating its land unlawfully, the students thought: aside from providing shelter, what else can “home” represent to people?

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