Emely Mendoza - Scholarship Winner - Essay Submission

Jordan Freytag

Sep 28

4 min read

What are Hydroponics?

The word “Hydroponic” is used different now in the year 2021 than it was back in the early 1900’s. Hydroponic was first used in the year of 1937, coined by Dr. William Frederick Gericke. Dr William was known as “father of hydroponics”, he grew tomato vines more than meters long just using mineral nutrients solutions right in his backyard. The word is a combination of a Greek word, “hydro” meaning water and “ponos” meaning labour. Over the years hydroponic farming practices have picked up all around the world. Most farmers around the U.S tend to do traditional farming where during off season they are not capable of supplying people to feed them all year round. Hydroponic farming on the other hands has proven to supply the U.S even in off season. With the world’s population growing, its essential for farmers to supply crops and feed the world all year long.

Going from traditional farming to hydroponic farming would be a solution to keep feeding the world year-round, many farmers that grow crops hydroponically have noticed how their farming practice seems to be very effective in keeping everyone is the U.S fed during off season. Carl Gabrielson who is a farmer of Gabrielson Farms in Riverhead believes hydroponic farming is more effective and keep feeding people even in offseason despite the weather. Gabrielson commented on a video that was made of his farm in the year of 2015, “15 million people within 40-50 miles radius and we can’t feed them, we can’t feed ourselves anymore.” (Gabrieson,2015,2015, 3:20) he made this statement based on traditional farming compared to hydroponic farming. After starting his farming practice of hydroponic farming, Gabrielson committed his time at his farm to continue to grow all his crops hydroponically to be able to supply the U.S with food all year-round. A professor of public health at Columbia University mentioned in the video of the Gabrielson Farm, “Growing hydroponically allows farmers to cheat the seasons, but it is also brought fresh produce to places where there’s no room to grow the traditional way.” (Despommier, 2015, 2:27). From the video many viewpoints can come off it but overall, it shows the audience how effective hydroponic farming can be compared to the traditional way.

Overall hydroponic farming had been underestimated for a while over several of years all around the world. Now that in the U.S a few farmers are growing their crops hydroponically, this farm practice is seemed to get more of a notice, it is crucial that more traditional farmers change or adjust their farming practice. With the Gabrielson Farm in Riverhead, the video showed various points as to why hydroponic is more effective than traditional farming in many ways. Off season hydroponic farmers can supply the U.S despite the weather. With traditional farming in the off season, not many crops can be grown to feed the U.S due to various components one main component being the weather and how it affects so many farmers around the world. The worlds population is increasing yearly, it is essential for farmers to do their best and produce all crops possible all year-round for people to get fed. The hydroponic farming is not used by most farmers but seems to be more effective to feed all year long especially offseason, while traditional farming does not produce all year long because the weather in the winter does not allow the crops to produce to be able to feed everyone. Hydroponic farming needs to be used more by farmers especially with our population growing yearly.