Agronomic and organizational aspects of Barcelona's community gardens
Authors not recorded
Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems
Urban Farm DB summary
A study analysing both the agronomic and the organisational dimensions of Barcelona's community gardens, examining empirically how citizen-led urban gardens are managed and run.
Key points
- 1Barcelona's community gardens cultivate 10 out of the 22 most consumed vegetables in the city, demonstrating high agrobiodiversity.
- 2The study investigated the agronomic practices and organizational aspects of Barcelona's community gardens through surveys of members and visual inspections.
- 3Based on observed crop yields, if monoculture for each crop produced in the community gardens were practiced across all available urban areas, Barcelona could achieve significant self-sufficiency in those crops.
- 4To realize this potential, urban horticulture would need to be professionalized, and the city’s municipal authorities would have to play a coordinating role.
Extracted facts
1 factOnly numbers and their conditions are stored, as structured data — never the source's own sentences. Metric and condition names stay in English, as coded.
- 10 count
most consumed vegetables grown count(community garden)
Crop- region
- ES-BCN
- setting
- urban
- denominator
- 22 most consumed vegetables in Barcelona
- method
- member surveys and visual inspections
Direction of conclusions
Each author conclusion is recorded only as a coded direction per topic. Read the original for the conclusion itself.
- Food securityMixedWith caveats
- BiodiversitySupports
Abstract and stored text
OpenAlexAs food security becomes a growing concern in urban areas worldwide, municipal authorities are actively seeking ways to enhance and complement the food systems of their respective cities. Integrating a food system’s productive components within city limits has emerged as a promising strategy to achieve these goals. However, it is impractical to undertake urban agriculture to the extent of rural agriculture, such as livestock rearing and large-scale field crop production, due to insufficient and inadequate space within cities. Producing high-value crops, however, is feasible and already practiced in many urban areas around the world within community gardens. This study investigates the agronomic practices and organizational aspects of community gardens within Barcelona’s municipal boundaries. It does so through surveys of community garden members and visual inspections of the gardens. The results show that 10 of the 22 most consumed vegetables in Barcelona are harvested within the city’s community gardens, highlighting their agrobiodiversity. Based on observed crop yields, if monoculture for each crop produced in the community gardens were practiced across all available urban areas in Barcelona, the city could achieve significant self-sufficiency in those crops. However, to realize this potential, urban horticulture would need to be professionalized, and the city’s municipal authorities would have to play a coordinating role.
Why it matters for urban farming
This study highlights the significant potential of urban community gardens to contribute to local food security and agrobiodiversity, even in densely populated cities like Barcelona. For citizen-driven urban farms, it underscores that while current efforts are valuable for diversity, achieving substantial self-sufficiency requires a shift towards more professionalized practices and, crucially, active coordination and support from local authorities. This means urban farmers might consider specializing in high-value crops and advocating for municipal involvement to scale up their impact.