A few months ago, Amazon (AMZN) bought Whole Foods at a whopping $13.4 billion, with a promise to bring cheap, organic, nutritious, low carbon*, and pesticide-free food to the masses. Soon after the acquisition, Whole Foods cut prices by as much as 43%, bringing prices of organic food at or below non-organic food.
Currently, Amazon is well established in 13 countries. With this new acquisition, Amazon gained access to 460 Whole Foods stores scattered across the US, Britain, and Canada. A plan to extend further to be within 30 to 60 minutes away from as many people as possible is underway.
After the Whole Foods acquisition, a natural next step for Amazon in order to have a complete ecosystem of organic food production, distribution, and sales would be to acquire local and/or international vertical farm startups, which are popping up all over the world at an ever-increasing rate.
For those who are not familiar with vertical farming, here are some advantages:
- Consumes 95% less water that traditional farming methods, by some estimates
- Eliminates the need for pesticides
- Year-round crop production
- Eliminates agricultural runoff
- High yield/acre
- Reduces use of fossil fuels from farm machinery and transport of food
- No weather-related crop failures
- Creates new urban employment opportunities
- Reduces the risk of infection from agents transmitted at the agricultural interface
- Returns farmland to nature, helping to restore ecosystem functions and services
Soon, you will be able to order a fresh salad, or any organic food, from your phone on Amazon, perhaps even automatically schedule delivery every day at a desired time and have it delivered by a drone or small robot directly to your door within 30 minutes.
