Capable of growing 4.5 million pounds of leafy green vegetables per year, a new indoor vertical farm is getting its ribbon cut in the city of Compton.

Built and managed by the firm Plenty, one of the US' leading indoor farming companies, it aims to be a nourishing flood for food deserts.

Indoor farms use ultraviolet light arrays to mimic the sun, and hydroponic growing apparatus stacked on vertical towers. Hydroponics use liquid fertilizer and mist to grow crops without soil. The number of fruits and vegetables capable of being grown this way is limited, but can be done in the middle of a city, and with other advantages such as an absence of pests.

"Plenty is an indoor growing company so we grow plants inside without the sun in controlled environments," said Plenty CEO Arama Kukutai. "We are producing leafy greens and we also produce tomatoes, in the future, we'll be producing strawberries and other fruit and produce."

Plenty also say their Compton location is the West Coast's only commercial-scale vertical farm, and one of the most advanced in the world.

To wit, robots do a lot of the work inside, carting around trays of lettuce, kale, and spinach, and moving the towers around the facility. Other than the robots, many of the other employees come from Compton itself.

"They were very committed to making sure that the people that they hired actually came from the city, came from this community, and this is what they've done," said Compton Mayor Emma Sharif. "They've kept the community and to the city and 30% of the people that are hired comes from the community."

The products grown there are available now in Compton's stores like Whole Foods Market, Walmart, and Bristol Farms.

WATCH the story here from ABC 7 Compton… 

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