Green revolution a crowning glory for HK skyscrapers
HONG KONG: High above downtown Hong Kong’s bustling, trafficclogged streets, a group of office workers is toiling away – not on a corporate acquisition or a public share offering, but on harvesting a bumper crop of lettuce atop one of the skyscrapers studding the city’s skyline.
It’s rooftop farming taken to the extreme, and more about reaping happiness than providing food.
The volunteers are picking butter lettuce, Indian lettuce and Chinese mustard leaf growing in rows of low black plastic planters on a decommissioned helipad on the 146m-high roof of the 38-storey Bank of America tower. The scenery: a vertiginous panorama of glass office towers framed by lush mountain peaks and Victoria Harbour.
‘‘It’s pretty dirty but still I really enjoy it,’’ said Catherine Ng, one of five volunteers who work for the property company managing the tower.
The farm is run by Rooftop Republic, a three-year-old startup whose founders are tapping the growing interest in organic food and taking advantage of unused roof space in the cramped, high-rent Chinese city.
Hong Kong, with its skinny office blocks and apartment towers and busy, affluent residents, might seem an unlikely place for rooftop farming to catch on. The finance and trading hub has rural suburbs, but farming takes up only 700ha of its land, and agriculture accounts for 0.1 per cent of its economic output.
Rooftop Republic’s founders say the appetite for their services is growing among Hong Kongers seeking a more sustainable lifestyle and concerned about where their food comes from.
‘‘We have been getting more and more interest from people who want to grow their own food,’’ said Michelle Hong, one of the founders. ‘‘A lot of it is triggered by concerns about food safety and the realisation that a lot of the food they consume might be laden with pesticides. I think people want to have more control and also more trust.’’
Hong Kong imports almost all of its food, much of it from mainland China. Public awareness about food safety in the former British colony has risen after countless food contamination scandals on the mainland.
Rooftop Republic has set up on average one farm a month since its founding, and now manages 36 farms covering 2800 square metres, including one in mainland China. It also provides workshops for companies, building owners, schools, and community groups.
Plenty of other groups or individuals had started cultivating their own rooftop vegetable gardens, said Matthew Pryor, a Hong Kong University architecture professor who has counted at least 60 and thinks there are a lot more he doesn’t know about.
Pryor’s research found approximately 1500 rooftop farmers in the city, cultivating a total area of about 1ha. He thinks there is potential for that to easily grow to 50,000 people working on a suitable rooftop area of 600ha. –AP