Minnesota Grown member, Urban Organics has received a Sustainable Saint Paul Award! The Sustainable Saint Paul Awards recognize community members and organizations for making a commitment to creating a more sustainable Saint Paul. By sponsoring these awards, the City of Saint Paul hopes to encourage all residents, businesses, community groups and non-profits in Saint Paul to implement similar projects. Urban Organics has received the Local, Healthy Food Award – honoring individuals, organizations or others that demonstrate outstanding commitment to promoting local, healthy food.
After two and a half years of development Urban Organics began its farming production of herbs and fish in July of 2014 in the old Hamm’s warehouse. This farm relies on state-of-the-art aquaponics technology provided through a partnership with Pentair Aquatic Eco Systems.
Aquaponics, an indoor farming strategy, creates an ecosystem where plant production can be maximized using natural effluent produced by the fish. The effluent is rich in essential nutrients and production yields exceed those from typical farming practices. Plants are produced using 98 percent less water when compared to typical outdoor farms. The site is a certified organic and the greens and vegetables are currently sold in local stores including Lunds and Byerly’s.