The Future of Agriculture: Vertical Inhouse Farming as a High-Potential Market for the Textile Industry

As the glob­al pop­u­la­tion is expec­ted to approach 10 bil­lion by 2050, ensur­ing food secur­ity in an envir­on­ment­ally respons­ible and resource-effi­cient man­ner has become a crit­ic­al glob­al chal­lenge. One of the most prom­ising solu­tions is Ver­tic­al Inhouse Farm­ing (VIF)—a form of con­trolled envir­on­ment agri­cul­ture (CEA) where crops are cul­tiv­ated in ver­tic­ally stacked lay­ers, often in urb­an set­tings, using advanced cli­mate, irrig­a­tion, and light­ing tech­no­lo­gies.

Accord­ing to NN the glob­al ver­tic­al farm­ing mar­ket is pro­jec­ted to grow from USD 5.6 bil­lion in 2020 to USD 19.86 bil­lion by 2026, with a com­pound annu­al growth rate (CAGR) of 24.8%. Europe alone is expec­ted to account for a sub­stan­tial share, driv­en by sus­tain­ab­il­ity reg­u­la­tions and increas­ing demand for loc­al, pesti­cide-free pro­duce.

Textiles: A Critical but Overlooked Enabler

While much atten­tion in ver­tic­al farm­ing focuses on auto­ma­tion and LED tech­no­logy, tex­tile-based mater­i­als are an essential—and often overlooked—component of the sys­tem archi­tec­ture. These tex­tiles per­form crit­ic­al struc­tur­al and bio­lo­gic­al roles:

• Bio­de­grad­able grow­ing mats for ger­min­a­tion and root sup­port
• Non­woven and woven car­ri­er fab­rics to facil­it­ate ver­tic­al cul­tiv­a­tion
• Tex­tile-based sup­port cords for climb­ing plants (e.g., toma­toes, cucum­bers)
• Com­postable wrap­ping and pack­aging solu­tions for post-har­vest hand­ling

The demand for sus­tain­able, com­postable, and plastic-free mater­i­als in agri­cul­ture is increas­ing rap­idly. Tra­di­tion­al plastic-based grow­ing aids and pack­aging are being phased out in favor of bio­de­grad­able altern­at­ives, cre­at­ing a grow­ing niche for tex­tile innov­a­tion.

Natural Fibers as a Strategic Advantage

This shift presents a sig­ni­fic­ant oppor­tun­ity for the tex­tile industry, par­tic­u­larly in yarn pro­duc­tion, tech­nic­al tex­tiles, and non­woven fab­ric devel­op­ment. Nat­ur­al fibers such as wool, hemp, flax, and cel­lu­lose-based fibers (e.g., vis­cose, lyo­cell) are par­tic­u­larly well suited due to their:

• Full bio­de­grad­ab­il­ity and com­posta­bil­ity
• High mois­ture reten­tion and breath­ab­il­ity
• Com­pat­ib­il­ity with organ­ic and regen­er­at­ive farm­ing prin­ciples

Wool, in par­tic­u­lar, stands out as a func­tion­al and eco­lo­gic­al raw mater­i­al for agri­cul­tur­al tex­tiles. It nat­ur­ally decom­poses in soil, con­trib­utes nitro­gen and organ­ic mat­ter, and has excel­lent water-absorb­ing properties—making it ideal for grow mats and sup­port sub­strates.

A Market Opening for European Textile Producers

European man­u­fac­tur­ers, such as NN with its core expert­ise in wool pro­cessing, and spin­ning mills in East­ern Ger­many, are well-posi­tioned to enter this grow­ing seg­ment. The region­al tex­tile infra­struc­ture, tech­nic­al know-how, and emer­ging value chains in sus­tain­able agri­cul­ture offer strong found­a­tions for innov­a­tion.

Already, early movers like Bächi-Cord AG and Com­pack Swiss have demon­strated the com­mer­cial feas­ib­il­ity of bio­de­grad­able cords and eco-friendly pack­aging made from nat­ur­al fibers. Their suc­cess con­firms that there is a clear and grow­ing demand for sus­tain­able agri­cul­tur­al mater­i­als, espe­cially in indoor and ver­tic­al farm­ing envir­on­ments.

The Need for Clarity, Standards, and Partnerships

What the mar­ket demands now are clearly defined, cer­ti­fied product solu­tions that are:

• Free from micro­plastics and syn­thet­ic coat­ings
• Com­pat­ible with com­post­ing and cir­cu­lar sys­tems
• Scal­able and cus­tom­iz­able for indus­tri­al farm­ing pro­cesses

To address this oppor­tun­ity, tex­tile com­pan­ies must:

1. Con­duct tar­geted mar­ket research into VIF use cases and required tex­tile prop­er­ties
2. Identi­fy key industry part­ners in agri­cul­ture and urb­an farm­ing
3. Col­lab­or­ate with agri­cul­tur­al research cen­ters and sus­tain­ab­il­ity cer­ti­fic­a­tion bod­ies
4. Explore pub­lic fund­ing and EU innov­a­tion pro­grams sup­port­ing the green trans­ition

Conclusion

Ver­tic­al Inhouse Farm­ing is no longer a futur­ist­ic niche—it is becom­ing a cent­ral pil­lar of glob­al food pro­duc­tion. In this trans­form­a­tion, the tex­tile industry has a unique chance to con­trib­ute essen­tial mater­i­als while diver­si­fy­ing its mar­kets and enhan­cing sus­tain­ab­il­ity per­form­ance.

By invest­ing now in bio­de­grad­able agri­cul­tur­al tex­tiles, com­pan­ies can pos­i­tion them­selves as tech­no­logy lead­ers in one of the most dynam­ic and eco­lo­gic­ally rel­ev­ant growth mar­kets of the next dec­ades.

Gherzi Germany as a Strategic Partner

Gherzi Ger­many can sup­port tex­tile firms by provid­ing tech­nic­al con­sult­ing, mar­ket intel­li­gence, and innov­a­tion strategy devel­op­ment in this space. From fiber selec­tion and value stream design to inter­na­tion­al bench­mark­ing and go-to-mar­ket plan­ning, Gherzi helps com­pan­ies align their cap­ab­il­it­ies with the needs of emer­ging agri­cul­tur­al sec­tors.

Dis­claim­er

This inform­a­tion bul­let­in has been pre­pared by Gherzi Ger­many to the best of our know­ledge and pro­fes­sion­al judg­ment. It is inten­ded to provide gen­er­al stra­tegic guid­ance for the tex­tile industry dur­ing the ongo­ing PFAS trans­ition.

How­ever, Gherzi Ger­many assumes no liab­il­ity for busi­ness, com­mer­cial, or stra­tegic decisions made solely based on this doc­u­ment. All guid­ance provided herein should be viewed as dir­ec­tion­al sup­port and does not sub­sti­tute for a detailed, com­pany-spe­cif­ic eval­u­ation.

More detailed assess­ments, includ­ing oper­a­tion­al feas­ib­il­ity, fin­an­cial implic­a­tions, and tech­nic­al imple­ment­a­tion, can be developed with­in the frame­work of a joint pro­ject tailored to the respect­ive stakeholder’s role in the tex­tile sup­ply chain.

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