94% of researchers rate our articles as excellent or good
Learn more about the work of our research integrity team to safeguard the quality of each article we publish.
Find out more
ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Sustain. Food Syst.
Sec. Climate-Smart Food Systems
Volume 9 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fsufs.2025.1584778
This article is part of the Research TopicVertical Farming: New Trends, Products, and Production ApproachesView all 11 articles
From Seed to Profit: A Comparative Economic Study of Two Italian Vertical Farms
Provisionally accepted
Alessandro Sebastian AmiciDiego Appicciutoli
Deborah Bentivoglio*Giacomo StaffolaniGiulia ChiaraluceMattia MogettaAdele Finco- Department of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Sciences, Marche Polytechnic University, Ancona, Italy
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Objective: This paper assesses the economic profitability of vertical farms producing microgreens. The study aims to estimate the financial sustainability of this class of farming systems, by classifying the most impacting costs for this sector, and if they are suitable in the Italian territory. Methods: The study is performed by comparing key performance indicators of two vertical farms in the North of Italy. Data was obtained through semi structured interviews. Key factors considered included variable costs such as energy consumption, raw materials and labour cost, and fixed costs such as amortisation and initial investment. The adopted indicators were the operational margin and the cost revenue ratio. Results and discussion: Findings indicate that, under current conditions in Italy, microgreens vertical farming systems are economically profitable. From the results, it emerges that the real energy consumption is not an impacting factor as stated in literature, along with the important water efficiency of the systems and the capability to digitalise the workflow, supporting the need for technical experts to manage efficiently all procedures. The economic outcome shows a positive operational margin for both companies. The low-cost revenue ratio confirms the financial feasibility of the systems. The framework provides valuable guidance for future research and investment strategies, emphasising the importance of fundings for agronomic strategies suited to combine profitability and sustainability.
Keywords: Soilless agriculture, hydroponic, sustainability, Economic profitability, Microgreens, cost analysis, Italy
Received: 28 Feb 2025; Accepted: 14 Apr 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Amici, Appicciutoli, Bentivoglio, Staffolani, Chiaraluce, Mogetta and Finco. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Deborah Bentivoglio, Department of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Sciences, Marche Polytechnic University, Ancona, Italy
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.