Research & reports

Luis Enrique Serrano Ayasta, Josiane Stoessel-Ritz · Anales Científicos · Peru (Lima)

A doctoral research study in three low-income neighborhoods in South Lima, Peru, analyzed power relations within urban agriculture projects. The findings indicate that these projects, despite aiming for empowerment, often mask asymmetric power relations and reinforce preexisting inequalities, particularly for women gardeners. This perpetuates gender hierarchies and limits their participation and agency, reflecting paternalism from promoting organizations and community leaders.

Rita Regina Marques Costa, Denes Dantas Vieira, Vivianni Marques Leite dos Santos, Deise Cristiane do Nascimento · · Brazil (Juazeiro)

This qualitative and quantitative field study analyzed the interaction between university extension and community-based family agriculture at the Povo Unido Community Garden in Juazeiro, Brazil. Conducted between March and May 2025, the research involved semi-structured questionnaires and dialogues with 47 farming families to understand their perceptions of knowledge exchange and interaction with educational institutions. Results showed consensus on the importance of university extension, but farmers pointed out challenges such as limited time for discussion and effective inclusion of participants with lower educational attainment.

Sabounchi, Saina, Saheb, Anahita Javanmardi, Adhami, Sadaf, Minouei, Alan · Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) · United States (Cambridge)

A study using 2020 U.S. Census data across 87 block groups in Cambridge, Massachusetts, found that higher social vulnerability was positively associated with greater sidewalk presence. However, social vulnerability showed no significant associations with open space acreage, pedestrian ramps, community gardens, or public art landmarks.

Moses Wanyakha, Nancy Grudens‐Schuck · International Journal of Agriculture Extension and Social Development · United States

This qualitative study reviewed data from 32 counties in Iowa over five years to assess stakeholder participation in Master Gardener community garden donation programs. The analysis found that while these programs engage many stakeholders, the involvement of food pantry patrons in the planning process was low. This low patron involvement limits the programs' ability to effectively serve the community and achieve sustainability and efficacy in providing fresh produce.

Kelsey Ryan-Simkins · Local Environment · United States (Ohio)

This study used multilevel negative binomial regression to examine the relationship between urban agriculture site locations and sociodemographic and neighbourhood environmental characteristics at the census tract level in Ohio, USA. Findings challenge the idea that urban agriculture is placed in areas with low food access, raising questions about the food-access rhetoric used to promote urban agriculture, a movement critiqued for often being led by upper-class, urban elites, and contribute to debates about the roles of race and gentrification in urban agriculture.

Pierric Calenge, Maie Gérardot · Métropolitiques · United States (Cleveland)

The work by Max Rousseau and Vincent Béal illuminates the ambiguities of a policy that organizes urban decline and racial segregation in Cleveland. This policy promotes urban degrowth and racial segregation, balancing algorithmic management and urban greening. The study focuses on the Rust Belt region, which experiences de-urbanization marked by the subprime crisis, racism, and segregation.

Shawn A. Trivette, Shannon McCarragher · Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems · United States (New England)

This paper examined three types of locally oriented Short Food Supply Chains (SFSCs) in southern New England and their spatial alignment with demographic factors. The findings indicate that pay-as-you-go operations are more prevalent in predominantly White areas and, to some extent, higher-income areas. Box share arrangements (community-supported agricultures) showed stronger associations with educational attainment. The study concludes that local food availability is a systematically uneven phenomenon, varying with both outlet type and social characteristics.

Karla L. Hanson, Claire Concepcion, Leah C. Volpe · Nutrients · United States

This scoping review explored factors associated with Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) participation among low-income households in the United States. Analyzing 18 articles, findings suggested that women may be more likely than men to enroll in CSA. A lack of familiarity with CSA may hinder enrollment, whereas more education and self-efficacy for food preparation may facilitate participation.

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.

Natalie Call, Elizabeth Silber, E. Binney Girdler · Journal of Agriculture Food Systems and Community Development · United States

This GIS-based study of Kalamazoo, Michigan, analyzed how accessibility to different types of food access points — full-service grocery stores, farmers markets, community gardens, food pantries, and convenience stores — differed between low-income and higher-income census tracts. All full-service grocery stores were accessible via bus routes, but 11% of residents in low-income areas lacked adequate access, living beyond the 0.25-mile walkable distance to bus routes. "Positive" access points such as community gardens, food pantries, and farmers markets were found to be concentrated in areas that already had grocery store access, whereas "negative" access points — convenience and dollar stores, which provide lower-quality, highly processed food — filled the access gap in lower-income areas instead. More than twice as many low-income residents had walkable access to convenience stores as higher-income residents, with 81% of those convenience stores located within low-income tracts.

Larissa Siqueira Chaves, Giovanna Simokado Magalhães, Soraya Nór · LA Referencia (Red Federada de Repositorios Institucionales de Publicaciones Científicas) · Brazil

This article reflected on the potential of feminism in urban development as a practice of counter-hegemonic architectures. Through a cartography of central Florianópolis, it was shown that only ten streets in the city center were named after women, revealing that patriarchal patterns are fixed in the territory. Women in urban agriculture are presented as individual and collective body-territories that construct a counter-hegemonic praxis in urban spaces and social movements, politically building alternatives that foster care, reproduction of life, reconnection with nature, protection of popular traditions, as well as gender issues and the right to the city.

Contingent Horizons · Contingent Horizons The York University Student Journal of Anthropology · Canada (Winnipeg)

This paper uses the Rainbow Community Garden in Winnipeg as a case study to discuss the benefits and challenges of community gardening for new immigrant and refugee families. Through a literature review and interviews with gardeners, the study emphasizes the role of food and community gardens in facilitating cross-cultural interactions, providing culturally appropriate food, and expressing cultural identity. The main conclusion is that for new immigrant and refugee participation, a garden is not only physical soil but also an important place for practicing culture and engaging in meaningful cross-cultural interaction beneficial for adjusting to a new life in Canada.

Cecilia M. Tsu · Amerasia Journal · United States

This article examines community gardens established for refugees from Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos in the United States during the 1980s. It argues that refugee gardeners perceived a significant disconnect between their rural lives in Southeast Asia and the role of vegetable growing in the U.S., despite advocates emphasizing continuity with their past. The gardens provided a measure of economic empowerment, but highlighted the disjuncture in their resettlement experience.

Christy Gene Somsen · Digital Commons - USU (Utah State University) · United States (Utah)

Farmers’ markets, Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) programs, and community gardens, while aiming to help low-income families access fresh produce, often assist more middle-class families. In Utah, these programs could be improved, as the state does not utilize the WIC Farmers’ Market Nutrition Program or accept WIC Cash Value Vouchers, and has few Farm to School Programs.

James J. Connolly · · United States (California)

This case study examines the leading edge of gentrification along San Francisco's Third Street T streetcar line. Bayview-Hunters Point (B.V.H.P.), the end of the streetcar line's first phase, is an ethnically mixed, working-class neighborhood and the last historic concentration of African American residents in San Francisco. While gentrification-driven change is already visible further up the line, its presence in B.V.H.P. remains comparatively shallow so far. Nonetheless, many residents and community activists perceive that a fast-moving gentrification frontier leaves them with a conundrum: remain in a contaminated, post-industrial, climate-exposed environment, or advocate for their health while risking displacement. The neighborhood has seen greening such as community gardens and a waterfront promenade, alongside inequalities including enduring racial segregation, environmental privilege, green gentrification, luxury development, climate-related health risks, and continued exposure to contamination.

Jennifer Jettner, Mary Secret · International Journal of Social Welfare · United States

This study examined the relationship between race and racial diversity on social capital in community gardens located in food deserts in the southeastern USA. Cross-level regression models were performed on a sample of 52 gardeners from 10 community gardens, analyzing their “sense of community” and the “number of resources” obtainable from fellow gardeners. Results indicated that community gardens are excellent vehicles for promoting one’s sense of community regardless of race or garden’s racial composition, but they were less likely to increase the number of resources. Accessing a greater number of resources took longer and more effort, and increased perceptions of racial diversity had a negative relationship with the number of resources.

Miho Lowan‐Trudeau, Noel Keough, Joshua Wong, Sara Haidey · Canadian Geographies / Géographies canadiennes · Canada (Calgary)

This study, examining community gardens in Calgary, aimed to determine the socio-economic demographics of neighborhoods supporting community gardens and their proximity to active transportation and public transit. GIS visualization and quantitative analyses were used to investigate relationships between demographic variables and transportation accessibility. Findings showed that community garden neighborhoods are located in areas with significantly fewer visible minorities, higher levels of educational attainment, and more attached dwellings like apartments and townhomes. This study suggests potential inequities in the proliferation of public community gardens based on socio-economic factors beyond economic capital.

Katie L. Butterfield, A. Susana Ramírez · Health Education & Behavior · United States (Minnesota)

A quantitative content analysis was conducted on descriptions, missions, and goals provided by 411 community garden managers across Minnesota. Six frames were consistently present, including "greater good" and "community orientation," which were the most common. The findings suggest that the prevalent "greater good" frame may inadvertently reproduce inequality by alienating food-insecure populations, similar to other alternative food programs.

C. K. Cartagena · Southeastern geographer · United States

This paper reviews "Farming While Black: Soul Fire Farms Practical Guide To Liberation on the Land" by Leah Penniman and Karen Washington. The book serves as a step-by-step guide for Black farmers, detailing historical struggles and solutions against oppression and racial discrimination in the farming sector, including cases like Pigford v. Glickman and the over-policing of Ron Finley's property. It offers instruction on obtaining land and resources, farm business plans, land restoration, crop planning, preserving harvests, raising animals, urban farming, and movement building. The book acknowledges obstacles faced by Black farmers and aims to provide a reference for sustaining productive farmland and activism to achieve land autonomy.

Olivia Lee · Johns Hopkins University eBooks · United States (Chicago)

This study, drawing on affect theory, examines community gardens in Chicago's low-income, primarily Black South Side neighborhoods. It argues that while these gardens offer a spatial break from violence, they appear unable to fully counteract the ongoing marginalization by race and socioeconomic status. The gardens represent a quiet, nascent resistance against neoliberal injustices through intimate human-nature interaction.

Lisa Berglund · · United States (Detroit)

This paper analyzes media coverage of informal practices like street vending, murals, and urban agriculture in Detroit's redeveloping neighborhoods. It reveals that while these practices are appropriated by developers and new, affluent arrivals as entrepreneurial and necessary for redevelopment, they are treated fundamentally differently from the informal practices of long-standing, marginalized residents, which are often condemned as illegal. This inconsistency highlights how legal frameworks are manipulated to exclude long-standing residents from the city's "renaissance."

Carrie Chennault · Iowa State University Digital Repository (Iowa State University) · United States

This three-year feminist ethnographic study examined the Growing Together Iowa community donation gardening and food rescue program, focusing on its institutional and community partners. The research aimed to understand how solutions to food insecurity emerge from social relations and socio-historical contexts. Findings demonstrated that uneven power relations permeate even well-intended efforts to address food insecurity within such initiatives.

Micajah Daniels, Courtney Coughenour · Digital Scholarship - UNLV (University of Nevada Reno) · United States

This project uses Black Feminist Health Studies as an interdisciplinary approach to analyze the holistic impacts of community gardens on nutrition behaviors. It demonstrates, through a Socio-Ecological Wellness Wheel, that the implementation of green spaces such as community gardens correlates with both benefits and unintended negative consequences, including green gentrification, and proposes this audit tool as a way to empirically measure garden quality and the nutrition environment affecting fruit and vegetable consumption among food-insecure populations.

Juliana Maantay, Andrew Maroko · International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health · United States (New York City)

This study examined whether proximity to community gardens in less affluent neighborhoods is associated with an increased likelihood of gentrification, using Brooklyn, New York as a case study. Employing GIS and spatial analysis, the results suggest that proximity to community gardens is associated with significant increases in per capita income over a five-year period. This indicates that environmental improvements, such as community gardens, may paradoxically spur gentrification and the displacement of existing lower-income residents, raising concerns for environmental justice.

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.