GoodLeaf Farms, Canada’s first and largest commercial indoor vertical farm operation, has closed a successful financing round that will fuel expansion of its technology-driven, innovative indoor vertical farms into Eastern and Western Canada.
The CDN$150-million capital raise includes a further investment from McCain Foods and a new partnership with Power Sustainable Lios — a specialized agri-food investor that supports operators across the food value chain in accelerating growth initiatives that foster a more sustainable and resilient food system.
With this financing in place, GoodLeaf will establish a national footprint with new farms in Calgary, Alta., and in the Montreal, Que. area alongside its existing fully automated, 50,000-square-foot farm in Guelph, Ont.
According to Barry Murchie, chief executive officer of GoodLeaf Farms, the company is driving sustainable and innovative agriculture technology that is revolutionizing the way food is grown in Canada. “Farming indoors frees us from the limitations of Canadian seasons and supports the harvesting of a superior product all year long that tastes garden fresh,” he noted.
As much as 90 per cent of the leafy greens consumed by Canadians are imported from the southwestern United States; thus, GoodLeaf provides a local source of nutrient-dense, garden-fresh microgreens and baby greens for Canadian consumers year-round.
GoodLeaf’s new farms in Calgary and Montreal will be highly automated and outfitted with the most advanced technology available in controlled-environment agriculture. Together, these two farms will add 200,000 square feet of production space to GoodLeaf’s capacity, and each will be able to produce approximately two million pounds of locally grown, fresh leafy greens each year. They are also expandable, with the capability to double that capacity quickly as Canadians transition to a domestic source of leafy greens.
Both farms will begin producing microgreens and baby greens in late Q2 and early Q3 of 2023, with national coverage to support consumers from Atlantic Canada to British Columbia.
Read how investment is growing in the vertical farming sector, in New AG International’s Nov-Dec 2022 issue, here.
Read the entire NOV/DEC 2022 issue of New AG International, free to view here.
Read the SEP/OCT 2022 issue of New AG International, free to view here.