Virginia Economic Review

This issue of Virginia Economic Review takes a deep dive into the controlled environment agriculture industry’s past, present, and future, while highlighting traditional agricultural operations in Virginia.

When The Turman Group began focusing on exporting nearly 20 years ago, company executives had goals and anxieties that are likely familiar to businesses that have taken similar steps.

Controlled environment agriculture (CEA) describes a variety of systems that use technology to provide optimal growing conditions for crops, from simple hoop houses and traditional greenhouses to fully indoor vertical farms.

In 2001, when cousins Ryan and Travis Croxton took over their family’s 100-year-old oyster bed leases on Virginia’s Middle Peninsula, the Commonwealth’s oyster industry was on life support.

Consider the strawberry. Its skin, slightly glossy in a deep crimson hue, warmed by gentle light. A burst of sweet juice when first pierced by the teeth, giving way to tart flavors and a subtly gritty texture from dozens of tiny seeds.

Labor shortages have long been a challenge in agricultural operations, spurring innovative new ways of operating. Today’s farms rely as much on GPS-guided technology and artificial intelligence-driven automation as they do on manual labor.

Any discussion about Virginia peanuts needs to start with a clarification between Virginia peanuts and Virginia Peanuts. The lowercase former refers to peanuts grown in the Commonwealth; the capitalized latter is one of four peanut cultivars grown in the United States.

Agriculture is Virginia's oldest, largest private industry.

Just outside the city of Danville, Virginia, sits a farm unlike any of its neighbors. Tucked into the tree line, it stands 50 feet high, sleek, and solid white, standing out from the long, thin rows of tilled fields that surround it.

This issue of Virginia Economic Review details the things that represent Virginia and its influence on America’s governance, economy, culture, and norms. Highlights include an A to Z listing of those items and illustrative compendiums of famous Virginians and companies located in the Commonwealth.

Jonathan Zur is president and CEO of the Virginia Center for Inclusive Communities (VCIC), a nonprofit organization based in the Richmond area that works with schools, businesses, and communities to promote inclusion.

Virginia has been indispensable since the beginning of its existence. In addition to eight U.S. presidents, the Commonwealth was home to numerous Founding Fathers who helped shape the direction of the country and many civil rights leaders who believed it was capable of more.

Maj. Gen. Ted Mercer is the new CEO and executive director of Virginia Space, the owner and operator of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS), collocated at the NASA Wallops Flight Facility on Virginia’s Eastern Shore.

COVID-19 has underscored the value of businesses embracing digital technologies in the healthcare space — from telehealth and remote patient monitoring to artificial intelligence (AI) for predictive analytics and diagnostic insights.

In recent years, the increased amount of available data — 64.2 zettabytes (equal to 1 trillion gigabytes) were created globally in 2020, compared to 2 zettabytes in 2010, according to Statista — and ways to analyze and use it have escalated the demand for data science professionals to fill data analyst, business intelligence engineer, and other roles.

E-commerce became the lifeblood of retailers and business-to-business (B2B) suppliers in 2020, yet the innovation that grew out of this need has disrupted industry norms forever. Research from the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA) and McKinsey & Co.

After a year of focusing on operations during the COVID-19 pandemic, data center investments are on the rise, with an eye on expanding capacity to meet pandemic-influenced changes in consumer behavior.

Consumers’ increasing demand for safe, sustainable, locally grown food is driving interest and investment in controlled-environment agriculture (CEA).