Recognizing Penang’s Vision 2030 of making Penang a “Family-Focused, Green and Smart State that Inspires the Nation” - FARM FOR IMPACT is a collaborative effort between Kairos Agriculture and PWD Smart Farmability to drive ethical farming models that positively impact the environment and communities in sustainable ways. 

As the world finds ways to mitigate the consequences of COVID-19, the marginalized and indigent communities are struggling with food and nutrition insecurity in the midst of the pandemic, being unable to compete with the rest of society for access to nutritious food that is affordable.

Meanwhile, sitting on the border of Penanti Penang and Lunas Kedah, Kairos Agriculture is erecting a total of 14 rain shelters for farming across 4 acres of land, leased from Chief Minister Incorporated (“CMI”). The vanilla farm also teamed up with social enterprise PWD Smart Farmability to introduce the World’s First Organic Vegetable Terrarium to the Northern region. 

This groundbreaking innovation is designed to make fresh, organic, nutritious, and live, unrefrigerated vegetables available for all economic backgrounds, while raising awareness and conversations surrounding personal carbon footprint at household levels. 

“With the sudden halt of the global food chain, a global urgency to decentralize food production, bringing food production as close to homes as possible, is more crucial than ever,” explains Dr. Billy Tang, founder and CEO of PWD Smart Farmability, “We are talking about raising food & nutrition security and carbon sequestration at home, at all times, in urban areas where there is a scarcity of space.”

“Thus, the only way forward is regenerative agriculture that renews soil ecosystems and combat climate change - and we are thrilled to share many similarities of these same values with Kairos Agriculture.” Dr. Billy Tang adds.

In line with Kairos Agriculture’s vision to be a leading chemical-free integrated farm in Asia and its mission to encourage youths to participate in agriculture, Kairos Agriculture is dedicating 2000 sqft. of its farmland to scale up the production of these terrariums, through PWD Smart Farmability’s proprietary aquaponics and soil technology. 

“With this new facility, we aim to scale up the production to 500 terrariums per month to benefit communities with low food budgets,” says Ezra Tan, Managing Director of Kairos Agriculture, “this terrarium production hub will employ people with disabilities as an effort to demonstrate that anyone can contribute to nation building if given a chance.”

The FARM FOR IMPACT project will also provide an excellent leverage for the development of social entrepreneurship programs for people with disabilities, and provide a hands-on learning environment for children and youths in school to inculcate in them food literacy and interest in growing food ethically.

The Memorandum Of Agreement signing ceremony between Kairos Agriculture and PWD Smart Farmability was officiated by Majlis Bandaraya Seberang Perai (MBSP) and to be witnessed by T.Y.T. Tun Dato’ Seri Utama (Dr.) Haji Abdul Rahman bin Haji Abbas. 

During the auspicious ceremony, Kairos Agriculture was also awarded ‘The Malaysia Book of Records’ Certificate in recognition as the First Smart Vanilla Farm in Malaysia. 

Currently, Kairos Agriculture and PWD Smart Farmability are working together to roll out the terrariums to the marginalized beneficiaries surrounding Penang and Kedah area. Check out our past Facebook posts detailing the progress of our project with Kairos Agriculture as follows: