Via smartercities:

surp:

Urban Farms Sprouting on New York City Rooftop

Huffington Post describes the video above:

… Reuters takes a look at the initiatives of an ambitious organic farming business, Brooklyn Grange, looking to transform NYC’s vast expanse of empty rooftops into lush forests of food.

Brooklyn Grange’s first farm is a 40,000-square-foot warehouse rooftop that grows hundreds of thousands of plants without the use of pesticides or other chemicals. According to its website, tomatoes are one of its biggest crops with over 40 varietals planted.

Head Farmer Ben Flanner is no stranger to the task; after quitting his finance job, he founded Eagle Street Rooftop Farm in 2009 — a 6,000-square-foot farm in Brooklyn that was the first rooftop soil farm in New York.

Flanner tells Reuters that the farm is not only a way to provide fresh and healthy food directly to the local community, but does its part in greening the city by absorbing storm-water runoff and also cooling the building underneath.