Hungry EcoCities Takes the Stage at GreenTech Amsterdam: Showcasing Innovations in Urban Farming and AI

As GreenTech Amsterdam 2025 approaches (June 10-12 at RAI Amsterdam), Hungry EcoCities project is set to share its learnigns and insights with three dynamic presentations across different stages. The project, which has been pioneering solutions at the intersection of urban farming, technology, and sustainable food systems, will offer attendees valuable insights and interactive experiences.

GreenTech Amsterdam, recognized as the premier global horticulture technology event, brings together over 10,000 industry professionals and features more than 530 innovators showcasing cutting-edge solutions for sustainable agriculture and food production.

Sharing Urban Farming Innovations Across Three Sessions

■ On Wednesday, June 11, visitors can join the “Designing Prototypes for Urban Farming” session (13:45-14:15, Crops/VF Stage), where Monika Love from Carlo Ratti Associati (CRA) will explore how innovative urban farming prototypes can enhance sustainability and address food security in growing urban populations. This session will showcase three SME challenges tackled through the design process before their real-life demonstrations.

■ The following day, June 12, offers two complementary sessions. First, “An AI Species Expedition” (12:45-13:15, Data & Tech Stage) will provide a crash course on the latest AI developments and their applications in horticulture. Presented by Rodolfo Groenewoud van Vliet from In4Art, this session will demystify AI technologies and demonstrate their practical relevance to the agri-food sector.

■ The journey culminates with “The Council of Foods” deep-dive workshop (14:15-14:45, Deep Dive Stage), where participants can directly engage with an AI-driven platform developed during the Hungry EcoCities project. This interactive experience features AI food characters (including a newly added kale representative for vertical farming) that articulate various perspectives on controlled environment agriculture.

On Thursday, June 12th at GreenTech Amsterdam 2025, the Kale joined the Council of Foods for the first time. It was born fom the colabroaiton between Nonhuman Nonsense and Logiqs, as part of Logiqs Path-to-Progress experiment in Hungry EcoCities, where he was asked to test and apply one of the Humanizing Technology Experiments. Logiqs selected the Kale to give a character to crops from vertical farming. With that, it also suported a new topic development on how different production models shape nutritional value, ecology, and access to honest food. Interested in testing this new council? Please contact Hungry EcoCities to join the test panel.

From Prototype to Progress

The Hungry EcoCities project has evolved from its first residency phase, where artists collaborated with mentoring design studios to create Humanizing Technology Experiments (HTEs), to the current “Paths to Progress” phase, where these prototypes are being tested and implemented by SMEs like Logiqs.

“The Council of Foods,” developed by the artist collective Nonhuman Nonsense, exemplifies this evolution, now enhanced by them with new topics on vertical farming and expanded with additional AI characters to represent diverse perspectives in food production.

Additionally, at the booth of Logiqs, also the collaboration with Georg Kettele as part of the Paths-to-Progress experiment “Harvesting Community” was showed. A first prototype of the OPENCEM – an open-source controlled environment growing module – was showcased and heavily discussed to get insight in improvements and next steps.

These sessions at GreenTech Amsterdam 2025 offer a unique opportunity for horticulture professionals to engage with innovative approaches that bridge technology, design, and sustainable food systems – all aimed at creating more resilient urban food networks.

Updated version: June 20th, 2025

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