China’s skyscraping pig farms are high on the hog, and their advanced tech feeds into food-security drive

High-rise structures such as one in Ezhou, Hubei province, are becoming increasingly common across China and utilise the most advanced smart-farming technologies

Beijing has been ramping up efforts to increase food production in the face of climate change, supply-chain upheavals and turbulent geopolitical tensions

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These two high-rise buildings in Ezhou, Hubei province, will be able to produce 1.2 million fully grown pigs a year when fully operational. Photo: Xinhua

Published: 9:00pm, 21 Oct 2023

A 26-storey skyscraper in central China’s Hubei province, towering over every building nearby, could easily be mistaken for a typical residential complex. The imposing structure indeed features air-conditioned rooms, an area for exercise, and windows with a sweeping view of the streets far below.

But the residents are not affluent white-collar workers, nor are they local families who got a good deal on rent – they are pigs.

Towering pig farms have been popping up around the country in recent years, highlighting China’s ambitions in smart farming – an increasingly essential undertaking in central leadership’s food-security drive.

Smart-farming technologies are being integrated into all sorts of agricultural practices across China to ensure a stable food supply for 1.4 billion people. The utilised tools include artificial intelligence, the Internet of Things, big data, cloud computing, and other types of digital technology.

Beijing has vowed to do all it can to ensure that farmers have adequate agricultural supplies, and policymakers encouraged the use of intensive and industrialised farming in the government’s “No 1 central document”, which was released in February and focuses on rural development.

A joint announcement by the Ministry of Natural Resources and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs in 2019 also allowed for multistorey buildings to be used as farming facilities.

Fuelled by favourable policies and technological advancements, the value of China’s smart-livestock-farming market is projected to reach 47.7 billion yuan (US$6.52 billion) by 2026, according to a report published last year by LeadLeo, a market research institution.