Nemo's Garden | Underwater Cultivation

The start-up company is technifying its crops with underwater 'greenhouses'.

The scenario in which humans will no longer have fertile and uncontaminated soils is unfortunately becoming more real every day. Soil contamination as a result of poor and unsustainable agricultural practices has been reducing soil organic matter. It also compromises the capacity to degrade organic contaminants and increases the risk of contaminants being released into the environment.

Fortunately the good news is that a few years ago, the wonderful idea of taking the agricultural revolution to the deep ocean was born. Giving us the opportunity to create a sustainable underwater farming system and yet another reason to protect our oceans.

How was Nemo's Garden born?

Nemo's Garden was born in 2012 in the Bay of Noli, on the Italian Riviera. When Sergio Gamberini, founder of Ocean Reef Group, came up with the original idea of: Why not grow basil underwater?

As strange as underwater cultivation might seem, the idea made perfect sense coming from a diving enthusiast and entrepreneur with a constantly innovative mindset like Gamberini. Not to mention that it would allow him to unite two of his passions: diving and gardening.

Without hesitation, he made a couple of phone calls, and with the help of his team at Ocean Reef Group began experimenting, sinking transparent biospheres 20 feet below the sea surface and filling them with air.