Susan Chong, the founder of agritech startup Greenphyto, had never planned to become a vegetable farmer. After all, she already had a multimillion-dollar business designing environmentally friendly packaging for companies.

But it was a “simple community project” with that company, Greenpac, that introduced her to growing vegetables. Sometime around 2011, Greenpac engaged senior citizens and secondary school students in Taman Jurong – where the company is located – to grow vegetables using hydroponics systems.

“We just wanted to have an edible garden, so that we could start growing some vegetables to donate to the neighboring community,” said Chong. A chance meeting with Jurong GRC’s anchor minister at the time, Tharman Shanmugaratnam, seeded the idea for a new venture: Greenphyto.

“Instead of donating vegetables, he said, ‘Why don’t you donate the (hydroponic) system?’” she recalled. To make vegetable growing accessible to the community, Chong simplified the hydroponic process and formalized it into a set of standard operating procedures.

Read more at The Business Times