Research & reports

Brian Elliott · Environmental Ethics · United States

This paper argues that Portland, Oregon's thriving urban agriculture scene, despite its reputation for sustainability, should be viewed as an adjunct to advanced neoliberal urban governance rather than a resistance movement against it. It critiques recent case studies that suggest the social sustainability of urban agriculture remains an open question, asserting that this view lacks a critical urban geography perspective. The study concludes that urban agriculture in Portland, on the whole, contributes to uneven development and gentrification.

Irene Håkansson · Journal of Cleaner Production · United Kingdom (London)

A quantitative study using data from nearly two thousand urban agriculture projects across metropolitan London investigated the geographically uneven distribution of urban sustainability experiments. Spatial statistical analyses indicated that gentrifying and income-deprived neighborhoods disproportionately often provide distinct urban milieux for initiatives to emerge, while already gentrified or otherwise advantaged urban neighborhoods have a disproportionately low number of projects.

Jendayi Jones · Knowledge@UChicago (University of Chicago) · United States (Chicago)

This project uses interviews and literature research to examine the state of urban agriculture in Chicago and its potential to address nutritional inequity, unemployment, and community building. By analyzing two policy initiatives, two land management organizations, and three interviews, the study aims to identify effective aspects and areas needing improvement in Chicago's urban agriculture setup.

Kwaku Obosu-Mensah · · Ghana (Accra)

This study examines the influence of social inequality on urban agriculture in Accra, Ghana, focusing on land ownership and cultivation practices. It found that urban residents born or raised in other regions of Ghana are more likely to be middle/upper class, own urban land, and engage in enclosed cultivation. A disadvantage of enclosed cultivation is associated with water supply.

Elizabeth W. Cotter, Carla Teixeira, Annessa Bontrager, Kasharena Horton, Deyanira Soriano · Public Health Nutrition · United States (Washington, DC)

This study conducted focus groups with 28 adults in three affordable housing communities in Washington, D.C., USA, to understand low-income adults' attitudes towards participating in farmers' markets, community-supported agriculture (CSA), and nutrition education programming. The results revealed that adults living in urban, affordable housing communities desire access to healthy foods but are limited by cost. Programs could have a higher likelihood of success if they accept benefits like SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), are heavily marketed, and incorporate culturally relevant nutrition education components.

Paulos Lukas · Journals & Books Hosting (International Knowledge Sharing Platform) · Ethiopia

This study investigated the effects of urban expansion on the livelihood of 100 dislocated farming households in Wolaita Sodo, Southern Ethiopia, using household surveys, group discussions, and interviews. The findings indicate that the implemented expansion program was not participatory, marginalized the farming community, and excluded youth and women from compensation schemes. The dislocation program was not rehabilitative and negatively affected the livelihood of the dislocated farming community.

· Policy Press eBooks · United States (Detroit)

Dan Carmody, President of Detroit's Eastern Market Corporation, discussed the market's history and its importance for food access in Detroit. He addressed the role of urban agriculture and the new wave of gentrification, which has the potential to significantly impact the Market.

Pascale Joassart‐Marcelli, Fernando J. Bosco · · United States (San Diego)

The alternative food movement (farmers' markets, community gardens) in San Diego, United States, was investigated in relation to gentrification. Uneven urban food landscapes were shown to be intimately connected to gentrification processes, shaped by race, class, political decisions, and capital flows. Farmers' markets and community gardens are primarily located in affluent and gentrifying areas, providing evidence of a growing appropriation of alternative food spaces by urban developers and cultural elites.

Georgia Pollard, Philip Roetman, James Ward · Kobra (Universitätsbibliothek Kassel) · Australia (South Australia)

While urban agriculture is seen as a sustainable approach to improving food security, there is a significant knowledge gap regarding the financial accessibility of urban food production for all households. If urban agriculture remains primarily a middle-class discretionary activity, its role in city-wide food security improvement will be limited. This paper demonstrates that citizen science offers an effective approach to investigate the inputs (labor, costs, water use) and outputs (produce yields, value) of urban food gardens, using the Edible Gardens project in South Australia as an example.

Joshua Sbicca · Digital Collections of Colorado (Colorado State University) · Global

An article examining food as an entry point into the politics and processes of gentrification, discussed with reference to cities globally rather than a single case. Where traditional explanations of gentrification hinge on either political-economy or cultural drivers, the article shows the relationship between the two to argue that food gentrification is multifaceted, changing a neighborhood's class and ethnoracial demographics, foodscapes and foodways, and housing. It states that poor communities in cities around the world can experience harmful effects of food-driven gentrification, such as developers using urban agriculture to attract new residents and increase property values. It also describes food itself as being gentrified in two ways: for communities marginalized by race or ethnicity, culturally important foods become "cool," unaffordable and dispossessed from them, while the upscaling of food retail displaces former bars, cafes, restaurants, grocery stores and gardens. The article closes with a brief discussion of social movement strategies and policy approaches to prevent these harmful effects.

Jennifer L. Barron · Local Environment · Global

This paper explored how neoliberal processes of privatization, state entrepreneurialism, and devolution intersect with community gardens. It argued that certain characteristics and orientations of gardens are more conducive to resisting neoliberalism. These include cultivating producer, citizen, and activist subjectivities, elevating the use value of shared lived space, advancing spatial justice through community access to non-privatized space, and promoting food justice through non-commodified means of obtaining food.

Alesia Montgomery · International Journal of Urban and Regional Research · United States (Detroit)

A case study of downtown Detroit theorizes that the history of clashes between racial capitalism and social movements in public space reappears in the contradictory design of market-driven placemaking. This placemaking subordinates the black urban poor, even while incorporating black entrepreneurs and culture. Consequently, it suppresses the ability of African Americans to shape public space, despite the return of the white middle class to central cities.

Lal, Prita · Academic Commons (Stony Brook University) · United States (New York City)

This dissertation studies the relationship between community gardens and gentrification in New York City. It argues that low-income people's efforts in revitalizing their blighted neighborhoods by building community gardens in the 1970s and 1980s contributed to gentrification in the 1990s and beyond. The research points out that real estate developers preyed on people's efforts, and the people subsidized the city's revitalization. It concludes that while gardeners did not cause gentrification, their efforts played a significant role in the process, and stronger policy protections for gardens are needed as city policies permitted gentrification.

Efrat Eizenberg, Simone Tappert, Nicola Thomas, Andis Zīlāns, Kristine Abolina, Theodosia Anthopoulou, Jevgenijs Duboks · · Europe

A book chapter examines the changes and challenges facing allotment gardens in European cities from the perspective of urban political economy, reading these new urban configurations within the macro-framework of capitalism and governability. It traces past and current processes of urban change through the economic, political and spatial lens of the "entrepreneurial city," discusses the impact of urban restructuring on allotment gardens' structure, operation and meaning, and states that political and spatial restructuring in the entrepreneurial city has been accompanied by a sharpening of social and economic inequalities within cities.

Margaret Ellen Kubek · UWM Digital Commons (University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee) · United States (Wisconsin)

This thesis explored the food provisioning strategies of year-round and seasonal residents of Phelps, WI. Ethnographic data gathered in the summer and fall of 2011 found that Phelps, WI, is classified as food insecure, leading residents to modify routines for lengthy drives to purchase food, while year-round residents utilized self-provisioning strategies. Newly initiated farmers' market and community supported agriculture projects increased overall food availability, but these efforts were mostly utilized by seasonal residents, with year-round residents finding these options unaffordable and inconveniently scheduled.

Benno Gammerl, Rainer Herrn · sub\urban zeitschrift für kritische stadtforschung · Global

This article outlines the theoretical, empirical, and political potential of the tension between affective disruptions of ordered structures and the emotional processing of power-infused spatial relations. It uses urban gardening practices and gentrification debates as examples to demonstrate how analyzing dynamic interactions between spaces and feelings can foster a critical perspective on urbanity, particularly regarding issues of equity. The study focuses on the ambivalent dynamics and effects of emotional-spatial processes.

Ryan E. Galt, Katharine A. Bradley, Libby Christensen, Julia Van Soelen Kim, Ramiro Lobo · Sociologia Ruralis · United States (California)

A study of 111 CSA farms in California examined the effects of competition within alternative food networks. Analysis showed that perceived competition is negatively correlated with CSA farms' profitability, farmer satisfaction, various indicators of CSA's social embeddedness, and two community food security strategies. Competition was found to undermine some commonly held CSA values, specifically fair farmer compensation and strong member-farmer relationships.

Kristina Satterlee · Digital Commons @ Connecticut College (Connecticut College) · India (Mumbai); United States (New York City)

This comparative study of urban agriculture in Mumbai, India, and New York City, USA, utilized in-depth interviews with urban farmers and secondary research. The research revealed that farms and gardens in lower-income areas in both cities had access to significantly fewer resources than their counterparts in wealthier areas. Additionally, both movements struggled to form networks across socioeconomic divides.

Sabine Lefkowitz · · United States (Portland)

This thesis examined the relationship between socioeconomic status (SES) and outdoor time in Portland, Oregon public elementary schools. The study found that higher SES elementary schools spend more time outdoors than low SES schools. This disparity amplifies existing disadvantages for children in high-poverty schools, suggesting an inequity in outdoor time provision.

Margot J. Pollans · Pace Digital Repository (Pace University) · United States

This article examines the various roles law plays in the cultivation of urban agriculture. It argues that despite growing enthusiasm for urban agriculture, serious equity and ecological concerns exist within the forms of modern urban agriculture, recommending that careful strategic planning should align the implementation of available legal tools to address these concerns.

Andrew Zitcer · Antipode · United States (Philadelphia)

This article explored the paradox of exclusivity in consumer food cooperatives in the United States, focusing on two food co-ops in Philadelphia, PA. The study found that exclusivity manifests in the co-ops' sales, business practices, and marketing, inadvertently excluding certain practices and people. This paradox hinders co-ops from fully realizing their transformative social and economic potential.

LaShonda M. Stewart, Steven A. Miller, R. W. Hildreth, Maja V. Wright-Phillips · New Political Science · United States (Chicago)

A preliminary analysis of Chicago's 49th Ward, the first participatory budgeting experiment in the United States, examined whether it resulted in different budgetary priorities and met social justice outcomes. Citizens chose projects classified as low priority by research literature, and while there was no clear pattern of projects only in affluent areas, geographic clustering was evident. Select areas received projects like community gardens, while others were limited to infrastructure repairs, indicating mixed social justice outcomes.

Pierrette Hondagneu‐Sotelo · Boom · United States (Los Angeles)

This article recounts the history of a central Los Angeles community garden, primarily used by women from Southern Mexico and Central America, which served as an informal support network and a place to grow culturally significant plants. The essay then details the significant upheaval that occurred after a local nonprofit took over and invested in the garden, implying a negative impact on the existing community.

Kylie Markow, Sue Booth, Stephanie Savio, John Coveney · Nutrition & Dietetics · Global

This study compared perspectives of low socioeconomic individuals and food system representatives regarding access to community-based food systems. Focus groups with low socioeconomic individuals and interviews with food system representatives revealed that affordability, convenience, and knowledge were barriers. While representatives acknowledged these barriers, their understanding of importance differed, and views were divided on strategies, especially concerning affordability. A disconnect exists between the two groups' views on improving access for disadvantaged groups.

Pascale Joassart‐Marcelli, Fernando J. Bosco · Métropoles · United States (California)

This article explores the growth of local food practices in urban southern California, focusing on farmers' markets. While alternative food initiatives like farmers' markets are often seen as resistance to capitalist pressures, this research provides evidence that they have become increasingly popular among affluent and white urban residents. This finding challenges the claim that local food fosters democracy and justice, indicating that these initiatives can reproduce neoliberal urban agendas and reshape cities along lines of race and class.