Agriculture always require space to grow plants, live stocks, fish etc. Historically, rural area owns food production for urban citizens due to the restriction; however, can we find nearby space for food production? You may find that some rooms in apartments, houses and shops are left vacant. In Japan, vacant house (Akiya) rate is rapidlly increase due to aging society and estimated to be reached around 30 % in 2033. Why not leverage the vacant for self food production by citizens? We found that utilizing home equipments through smart home and IoT solutions enables effortless and efficient food production with low-cost.
What if you can make vegitables without much effort and budget in a vacant room in your home? Of course, you can consume by yourself first but the production easily overcome your demands. How do you handle leftover vegie? Sharing it to your friends will stimulate interaction in the community. Saling it to earn a bit money may turn to a sideline business. We believe that the concept "Akiyagri" can be grow to community-based food production, deliverly and sharing system operated by urban citizens.
Our prototype is composed by off-the-shelf products which are available in DIY shop and appliance store. It has 2 planters, a metal rack, LED lights, smart power plug, web camera and a used laptop. It can be fabricated just by assembling these components; therefore, no special skills and tools are required. The total cost is estimated to be 200 to 300 USD.
Program Manager at Google. Recieved Ph.D. in 2018 through research about agricultural IoT system. Ex-Microsoft employee.
Ph.D. student at the University of Tokyo. Working on machine learning algorithms for soft robots.