AS rainfall volatility and farmland affordability pressures make traditional broadacre agriculture more challenging by the year, one of farming's biggest growth sectors in 2015 will be hydroponics.
Although the capital investment required in greenhouse technology is considerable, market research specialist IBISWorld tips hydroponic revenue growth will rise more than seven per cent this year to $816.6 million.
Industry profit (from legal crop activities) is currently estimated at about $130m annually.
Rising local and overseas vegetable consumption, plus supermarket demand for "aesthetically pleasing" fruit and vegetable lines are set to drive annualised revenue growth of almost five per cent to break $1 billion in 2020.
Much of the industry is focused on specific vegetable crops which have fast growth and harvest times, including tomatoes, lettuce and cucumbers, but hydroponic production also forms basis for a new high technology system being developed for herb production in Australia and overseas.
An $8m capital raising by horticulture venture E-Agri Company has recently attracted considerable investment from North America and Europe as well as locally.
The proposed six-layer high crop production system is being designed in a partnership which has brought together two large-scale herb producers, a water tank manufacturer in China and the horticultural engineering skills of Melbourne's Chisholm Institute of TAFE.
Chisholm is also using its involvment in the project to expand research into hydroponic agriculture.
The venture was largely initiated by fast expanding herb business Australian Fresh Leaf, which has hydroponic and conventional horticulture operations on Melbourne's south eastern outskirts.
"We've tried farming traditionally, but we learnt hydroponics is generally a lot more efficient way to use land and water resources and control the growing environment," said AFL joint director, Jan Vydra.
"Outdoor cropping really is a bit of struggle - rain, mud, dust and wind can make it pretty hard to produce a consistent and clean product."
AFL started in 2008 after Mr Vydra and former banker and tomato grower William Pham pooled their skills and ideas to establish a basil farming and distribution business, initially sourcing much of their product from other nearby growers.
The two identified "a fairly fragmented industry", but herb usage was rising as much as 30pc annually thanks to a wave of consumer interest fuelled by television programs like Masterchef.
"We knew there was plenty of potential to consistently supply restaurants and supermarkets with really good quality product lines," Mr Vydra said.
Their boutique business began harvesting 2000 bunches a week and swiftly expanded.
Today it produces up to 120,000 units weekly, mostly from 400,000 plants (and almost 40 herb varieties) in its own 4.2 hectare area of greenhouses and shade cloth covered plots.
AFL is on track to exceed $5.8 million in sales in 2014-15, supplying about 4.5 million herb units to restaurants, grocers and supermarket chains Australia-wide.
The range includes intensely flavoured, freshly germinated micro herbs and culinary flavours newly released from the Netherlands.
AFL's computerised hydroponic and climate controlled management system has lifted labour efficiency, standardised and cleaned up product appearance, lifted yields and slashed water waste by almost 80pc.
"To grow the same amount of product on five acres of open paddock we'd need five times as much water," Mr Vydra said.
But even bigger water and energy efficiencies were set to be achieved in E-Agri's new vertical production system inside a six- to eight-metre-high glasshouse.
Moving plant growth gutters, a bare minimum of human interaction with crops and underground energy storage systems (similar to a modern heat exchange heating technology) which releases warm air during cooler weather are features of the design, which draws many characteristics from Dutch greenhouse technology.