Ford Heights, a Cook County food desert, gets a high-tech hydroponic farm

South suburban Ford Heights, one of Cook County's food deserts, is now home to a high-tech farm thanks to funding from the county and United Way.

The town will now be able to grow fresh produce from a shipping container.

Ford Heights native Derek Drake runs a hydroponic farm company called Ditto Foods. He can make a 320 square foot trailer as productive as a three-acre farm.

"When nerds become farmers, this is what you get!" he said. "In this one tower, I can grow 45 full heads of lettuce."

And the shipping container is filled with those towers. The food, grown without soil under red and blue lights, is all for Ford Heights.

"We were able to secure funding from United Way and Cook County for a hydroponic farm where you grow produce in a shipping container and utilize only five gallons of water per day," said Angela Smith, executive director of the nonprofit Cornerstone Community Development Corporation.

And she said they've already been able to harvest from the container farm. Salads made from those vegetables were served at the official grand opening Thursday. And food pantries in Ford Heights will reap the benefits.

"All of this stuff that's going in here is going to go right back to the community that it grows in, which is a beautiful part about it," Drake said.

So let the harvest begin in Ford Heights.