Signify has teamed up with Russian innovative farming company RIAT to pioneer the growing of tomatoes and cucumbers in a vertical farm without daylight. During the research phase in 2019, RIAT achieved a yield comparable to advanced traditional greenhouses using Philips GreenPower LED grow lights.

To cultivate tomatoes and cucumbers that require intensive lighting vertically without the exposure of daylight, sufficient lighting system is critical. Signify supplied its LED grow lights to the Russian company to help it achieving a yield performance comparable to traditional greenhouse operations.

(Image: Signify)

RIAT’s indoor farm is located in the center of the Ivanovo region, enabling the company to distribute its tomatoes, cucumbers and 19 types of green crops to its own RIAT stores within an hour after harvesting. RIAT has a special technique to fold the long stems, allowing it to grow the 3.5 meters high plants indoors.

RIAT has chosen a combination of different kinds of Philips GreenPower LED toplighting and interlighting to mimic nature light as much as possible. The combination of red and blue with the addition of white and other colors in Philips LED grow lights creates lighting conditions that are as close to natural daylight. Additionally, RIAT is using bumblebees for pollination, as in traditional greenhouses. The bees don’t experience difficulties due to the absence of natural light.

(Image: Signify)

Vladimir Bukharev, Director at RIAT, addressed that the lighting system has led to high quality product as 99% of the crop are sold. With Signify’s grow lights, RIAT also achieved maximum stability and a light output of 18 g/mol. The area equipped with LED lamps is currently 3,800 square meters and the company will launch a new area of 700 square meters for lettuce cultivation based on LED lighting.