Technology:

Aquaponic greenhouses on city rooftops that help grow organic greens, mushrooms, herbs and other plants with the help of waste from fish and prawns that also grow in mini-farms.

Article: https://techcrunch.com/2015/09/01/edenworks-is-building-the-future-of-food-on-urban-rooftops/?utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitterfeed
and http://www.techinsider.io/edenworks-brooklyn-vertical-farm-2016-5

Sustainability challenge:

It doesn’t always take a major natural disaster for us to notice the urban food scarcity around us. With the growth of cities, comes the additional challenge of feeding the growing urban populations. The same old farming practices in the same old places are not sufficient anymore to cater to the increasing food demand within cities, let alone withstanding the looming threat of climate change. Reducing the distance (and cost and emissions) of food from farm to plate, and revamping our existing farming practices is crucial to tackle the urban food scarcity problem.

Stakeholders:

• Urban dwellers
• Urban farmers + companies
• Urban ecosystems
• Grocery stores/ Supermarkets/ Restaurants
• Bioengineers (and people with the technology knowledge)

Process of implementation:

I am using the example of a successful urban farming company, Edenworks, mentioned in the above mentioned articles. This company has implemented an aquaponics system in a greenhouse on rooftops in Brooklyn, New York. This company produces organic vegetable and fish using the technology (an image explain the tech is available below). They sell this to supermarkets, restaurants and other food vendors that want locally produced organic food. They brought together the bioengineers to increase the efficiency of the process (using the right bacteria, vertical structures, environment controlled greenhouses, sensors and apps).