| dc.description.abstract | Pressure on farmlands due to increasing population is compelling maximization of agricultural practices per unit acreage of food production. The urban population is rapidly increasing, forcing city-dwellers to consider urban farming as a means of cultivation of lettuce and other food crops. This paper compares two modern agricultural practices: greenhouse and vertical farming. The purpose of the paper is to determine a more effective economic and physical space feasibility technique to grow asparagus lettuce in southern Norway towns such as Kristiansand, Lillesand, Setesdal, Arendal Grimstad and Østre Agder. The research methodology entailed the synthesis of secondary sources, including academic journals, textbooks, and scientific articles. The paper presents the available literature on greenhouse and vertical farms. Also, it provides an economical and physical analysis of cultivating lettuce on both farms. In the end, the study concludes that vertical farming is more feasible than greenhouse farming. Notably, vertical farming is more economical and provides greater lettuce yield per unit of farmland, and it is a better approach to enhance lettuce production in Metropolitan Southern Norway. The research conducted in this paper reveals that vertical farming is indeed economically viable in Norway, from a national viewpoint on sustainability. The results shows that vertical farming is in many aspects more profitable than traditional greenhouse farming. With the same requirements for production, the vertical farms resulted in a 11.8% increase in profit in relation to the greenhouse approach. | |