The European Commission has approved €26.5 million in Polish state aid to help build an urban agriculture hub in Żory in the Silesia region, supporting activities such as vertical farming and aquaculture.
The project will be in Żory, in the Silesian Voivodeship, in a sub-region that previously hosted the Żory hard coal mine and is now facing socio-economic and spatial problems, the Commission reported on Thursday.
It will be co-financed by the EU’s Just Transition Fund, a programme that supports areas affected by the shift away from fossil fuels.
The funding will be provided as a direct grant to the municipality of Żory.
The plan includes renovating a former mine building and constructing a new main building to create a multifunctional hub focused on urban agriculture technologies, including vertical farming and systems such as hydroponics and aquaponics.
Hydroponics grows plants in nutrient-rich water without soil, while aquaponics combines plant cultivation with fish or other aquatic animals in a shared water system.
The hub is expected to include office and conference facilities for businesses working in innovative urban agriculture and dedicated spaces for research in the same field.
EU rules and next steps
The Commission assessed the measure under EU state aid rules and approved it under Article 107(3)(c) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, which allows member states to support certain economic activities under conditions designed to limit impacts on competition and trade.
A non-confidential version of the decision will be published in the Commission’s state aid register under case number SA.119773 once confidentiality issues have been resolved.
