Research & reports

Ophélie Véron · Antipode · Germany (Berlin)

This paper, based on activist ethnography in Berlin's community gardens, people's kitchens, and co-operative projects, explores how community food spaces reproduce, exacerbate, or dismantle power relations and socio-environmental injustices. It systematically examines exclusion and inclusion dynamics, arguing that diversity alone is not a sufficient indicator of social equity and can overshadow forms of injustice. The study exposes the complex, dual nature of Berlin's food activist landscape, where privilege and power contribute to social inequities.

Mitchell McLarnon · Canadian Journal for the Study of Adult Education · Canada

This paper described and analyzed the social relations emerging from an adult education internship and community-based garden project in Montreal, Canada. Using institutional ethnography, it uncovered how adult education internships in community gardens and gardening programming can produce disproportionate outcomes for adult learners, community workers, and community members. It elucidated that specific institutional contrivances, such as funding, policy, work processes, and discourse, structure and define who experiences access to gardens, gardening, its ostensible health and well-being benefits, and adult education.

Domenic Vitiello · Urban agriculture · United States

US cities have developed urban agriculture support systems reflecting competing values, with some prioritizing public good and others economic gains. A chapter reflecting on urban agriculture planning in Chicago and Philadelphia notes that institutional structures significantly impact equity and justice. The study indicates that the existing urban agriculture support systems in these cities may not adequately promote equity and justice.

Efadul Huq · International Journal of Urban and Regional Research · Bangladesh (Dhaka)

This article argues that in the global South, ecological infrastructure often displaces marginalized urban dwellers by erasing existing informal agricultural practices, or "green informalities." Based on research with urban farmers facing eviction in Dhaka, Bangladesh, it highlights that these green informalities are crucial for understanding grassroots practices and collective power-building. The study advocates for recognizing the political and affective dimensions of informal urban agriculture as a socially just ecological infrastructure that prioritizes justice and dweller agency.

Faiza Darkhani · Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems · Germany (Berlin)

A qualitative content analysis of interviews with active female respondents in community-supported agriculture, food cooperatives, and self-harvest gardens in Berlin Brandenburg revealed challenges faced by women in alternative food networks. Interviewees expressed optimism but emphasized the need for increased governmental support and community engagement, and the data highlighted demands for gender equality improvements and support mechanisms.

Silvia Gullino, Heidi Seetzen · · United Kingdom (London)

This ethnographic research in a former Victorian square in South London examined how residents transformed derelict spaces, including creating two community gardens, over three decades. The study found that while informal, bottom-up practices shaped a vibrant urban culture, the neighborhood is now undergoing progressive gentrification. This gentrification reflects trends in other London neighborhoods, posing challenges to community initiatives.

Belinda Li, Tammara Soma, Raghava Payment, Srishti Kumar, Nicole Anderson, Flora Xu, Phonpoom Piensatienkul · Canadian Food Studies / La Revue canadienne des études sur l alimentation · Canada

This study reviewed and categorized 73 food asset maps in Canada based on their included food assets and design characteristics. Most maps included built environment assets like grocery stores and food banks, as well as agriculture-based natural food assets such as farms, community gardens, and orchards. However, representations of Indigenous-focused food assets and non-agriculture-based natural food assets like forests, water bodies, and foraging areas were generally lacking. This lack of Indigenous perspectives reinforces the values of a settler-colonial food system within food asset maps.

Huq, Efadul · Smith ScholarWorks (Smith College) · Bangladesh (Dhaka)

Research in Dhaka, Bangladesh, indicates that ecological infrastructure often erases existing informal agricultural practices, leading to the displacement of marginalized urban dwellers. Based on engaged research with a collective of urban farmers facing eviction, this paper argues that green informalities are crucial for understanding grassroots practices and can be appreciated as socially just ecological infrastructure.

Nevin Cohen, Michael H. Stein, Annie Hancock, Alfonso Morales · Urban agriculture · United States

This paper examined two housing authority-led urban agriculture projects in New York City and Denver, Colorado, highlighting their multidimensional benefits such as skill-building and community cohesion. While these projects improved residents' daily experiences, the study noted that social problems persist despite new interactions. The analysis emphasized the need to consider both stated and implicit goals in urban agriculture ethics, acknowledging that attempts to harmonize competing claims are at the root of urban agriculture practices.

Constantine Manolchev, David Watson, Laura A. Colombo, Patrick Elf, James Scott Vandeventer · · United Kingdom

A chapter examines the role of technology across the European 'agrifood' system, an umbrella term for the agriculture, horticulture, food, and drink sectors. Placing the dysfunctional consequences of making economic growth the driver of food-system organization in historical context, it shows through a case study of a daffodil farm in South West England that when technology is deployed as an engine of efficiency, unbridled growth, and profit maximization, it vastly improves productivity through worker quantification—time, motion, and output tracking—while transforming worker-nature relationships in exploitative ways. By contrast, when used to prioritize non-exploitative, collaborative relationships, technology can support sustainable well-being and ecological production, illustrated through three alternative food network cases: a UK community garden, a UK Community Supported Agriculture scheme, and a network of social agricultural cooperatives in Italy.

Iman Mamnoon · GeoFocus Revista Internacional de Ciencia y Tecnología de la Información Geográfica · Global

Using a GIS-based risk assessment methodology, this study develops a quantitative food-insecurity scale for the most vulnerable urban populations, calculating risk as a combination of social vulnerability and hazard (difficulty of access to food distribution), and applying the model to two case studies: southeast Washington, D.C., in the United States and Puente de Vallecas in Madrid, Spain. A Social Vulnerability Index was computed from average income, education level, unemployment rate, and age, while hazard values were derived from proximity to supermarkets. The analysis identified high-risk food-insecurity areas in both neighborhoods requiring urgent intervention measures. In Puente de Vallecas, census tract 07913143 was identified as a high-risk hotspot with a Social Vulnerability Index of 1.646495 (range 0.901–3.223) and a risk value of 3 (range 3–10); in southeast D.C., tracts 7601 and 7605 were selected as high-risk zones for further study, with Social Vulnerability Index values of 2.221 and 1.737 (range 1.040–3.525) and risk values of 2 and 5 (range 0–10), respectively. The study also identifies a general shortage of areas combining residential and commercial use and limits on public transport availability in the food-insecure urban areas studied.

Angela Oulton, Susan Jagger · · North America

A discourse analysis of historical school garden texts in North America reveals that school gardens have not been welcoming or accessible to all children, despite persuasive research on the positive effects of nature-based learning. Historically, school gardens were used to serve adult agendas, including containing urban children, assimilating marginalized groups, and creating laborers, thereby reinforcing patriarchal, colonial, white supremacist, and eugenic aspirations. This study explores how these discourses culturally constructed childhoods and influenced children.

Jessica Quinton, Lorien Nesbitt, James J. Connolly, Elvin Wyly · Urban Geography · Canada

This descriptive analysis identified gentrifying areas in Vancouver, Calgary, and Toronto, Canada, from 1996–2006 and 2006–2016, to determine the prevalence of greening interventions. The study found that greening, including parks, cycle lanes, and community gardens, frequently occurred before, during, and after gentrification. These results indicate that greening is common in gentrifying areas throughout the gentrification process, suggesting a need for a broader understanding of the relationship between urban greening and gentrification.

Austin Thompson‐Spain, Kyle S. Bunds, Lincoln R. Larson, Bethany B. Cutts, J. Aaron Hipp · Sustainable Development · United States

This scoping review examines funding and financing mechanisms for nature-based solutions and their impact on social equity in the United States. It finds that market-driven nature-based solutions can contribute to an inequitable distribution of urban ecosystem services. The distribution of benefits is influenced by local contexts, decision-making inclusion, and payment mechanisms, suggesting disparities in access for diverse and marginalized populations.

Maria Sulimma · Ecozon European Journal of Literature Culture and Environment · Global

This article examines "feminist gentrifier memoirs," specifically Anne Elizabeth Moore’s Gentrifier (2021) and Vikki Warner’s Tenemental (2018), focusing on gardening practices. It explores the writers’ conflicted positions in gentrifying neighborhoods and their complicity in processes of displacement and real estate speculation, despite benefiting from urban sustainability measures like urban farms and gardens. The texts engage with complex emotions arising from their white privilege and homeownership.

R Verissimo, Silvana Aparecida Alves, Adalberto da Silva, Ana Maria Lombardi Daibem · Risco Revista de Pesquisa em Arquitetura e Urbanismo (Online) · Brazil (Bauru)

This research investigates green and gray infrastructure in Bauru/SP, Brazil, comparing controlled access allotments (Pq. Residencial Paineiras and Jardim Shangri-Lá) with favelas (Ferradura Mirim and Jardim Nicéia). It aims to study green infrastructure as an expression of sociospatial inequalities perpetuated by urban planning. Through analyses and cartographies, the study evaluates the current urban panorama and challenges for mitigating social, environmental, and urbanistic inequalities.

Emelie Larsson, Katarina Giritli Nygren · Journal of Risk Research · Global

This study analyzed strategy documents and municipal website information to examine how municipalities frame urban gardening as a risk-reduction strategy, using critical discourse analysis. It identified two discourses: an eco(no)logical risk discourse addressing ecological risks within a capitalist market logic, and a social risk discourse focusing on gardening for work training. The findings reveal that top-down urban garden initiatives highlight contemporary inequalities in urban spaces.

Manoj Misra · Culture Agriculture Food and Environment · Canada

A qualitative study of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) participants in the greater Edmonton region of Canada examined how this local food initiative promotes ecological citizenship. The study concluded that discursive and structural limitations prevent the Edmonton CSA community from achieving meaningful diversity and addressing social justice concerns within its realm.

Amy Russell, Ziqi Li, Mingshu Wang · International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation · United Kingdom (Glasgow)

This study investigated the distribution of urban agriculture in Glasgow, Scotland, UK, finding that existing projects are mostly centrally located, covering 36% of the total population (approximately 635,000) within a 10-minute walk. A positive correlation was found between walking travel time to the nearest urban agriculture project and food desert status, indicating access disparity. Using the Maximal Covering Location Problem model, the research identified that a minimum of 15 new urban agriculture projects on vacant and derelict land could increase population coverage to 49% and equalize access disparity to a statistically non-significant level.

Lukas Egli, Judith Rüschhoff, Joerg A. Priess · Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems · Global

A systematic review of quantitative empirical research on the sustainability effects of community-supported agriculture (CSA) covered 39 studies. Fewer than 30% of the studies assessed ecological sustainability aspects, but where CSA farms were compared to reference systems, they mostly performed better on resource use efficiency and greenhouse gas emissions. Most studies assessed social aspects; many showed that CSA still fails to reach low-income households, so members do not represent the average population, while CSA membership was associated with improved health and sustainability behavior. Economic variables were assessed in more than half of the studies, but knowledge of CSA's relative economic performance remains scarce, though early studies indicate high economic viability. The review calls for more research on ecological aspects specifically, comparisons across farming and marketing systems, and integration of knowledge from theses and practical sources in multiple languages.

Lorien Nesbitt, Daniel L. Sax, Jessica Quinton, Leila M. Harris, Camilo Ordóñez Barona, Cecil Konijnendijk · Ecology and Society 28(4): art29 · Canada (Metro Vancouver, Greater Toronto Area)

An online survey of 51 urban greening practitioners in Metro Vancouver and the Greater Toronto Area. Most respondents defined green gentrification as the displacement of vulnerable residents caused by new or improved green space that attracts wealthy in-movers and raises property values. The largest group identified greening itself as the main driver of green gentrification, while a minority saw greening as a secondary factor alongside other systemic drivers. Practitioners cited multiple barriers to addressing it - limited institutional capacity, limited access to data and information, policy or mandate restrictions, and a lack of engagement tools - showing a gap between practitioners' concern and what they can act on in their day-to-day work.

Jordan Ashby, Clarissa Libertelli · Institute for Local Self-Reliance (ILSR) · United States

Just after NYC announced expansion of mandatory residential organics collection by 2024, the mayor's office eliminated funding for the city's community composting program. The article identifies three failures reflecting national trends: government 'composting' programs that actually rely on anaerobic digestion, centralized processing that concentrates environmental burdens in vulnerable neighborhoods, and mandatory government programs undercutting community composters' viability.

Jena Brooker · Planet Detroit (via BridgeDetroit) · United States

Hantz Woodlands, a large-scale tree farm on Detroit's east side, acquired roughly 2,600 parcels and still holds about 2,000. It bought an initial 1,550 parcels for $540,000 and later resold about 10% of its holdings for $9.5 million — nearly nine times its original cost — while paying only $7,035 of the $33,110 it owes in blight-violation fines. Critics note the Detroit Land Bank Authority never reclaimed a single Hantz property despite missed deadlines, even as it repossessed land from ordinary residents who fell behind.

Graham Slater, Robert G. Unzueta, Clayton Pierce · · Global

This chapter argues that much scholarly literature on school gardens is based on problematic assumptions or ignores histories of violence and dispossession. Without an ecocritical approach, school gardens risk replicating systems of domination, extraction, exploitation, and human supremacy. The authors propose integrating theoretical reflection into emancipatory action within a historical materialist framework to address colonization, land dispossession, labor exploitation, and anthropocentrism.

Melissa Anna Murphy, Peter E. Parker, Margot Hermus · Local Environment · Global

This article aims to unpack how urban settings, organizational forms, and municipal enabling affect urban gardening (UG) practices towards inclusion in public space. It draws on urban commons theory and research on inclusion in public space to understand multi-faceted UG governance and its exclusionary aspects. A comparative analysis of UG initiatives in three Northern European municipalities explores both municipal enabling and the co-production of inclusive public space.