Research & reports
Peer-reviewed research and reports on community urban agriculture, food education, composting, welfare and more.
Theme
Critical findings
322 results(11 / 13)
Initiating and sustaining community gardens and community kitchens: A preliminary study in Nova Scotia
2014Tim Cashion, I. Forbes, Irena Knežević · · Canada
This preliminary study in Nova Scotia, Canada, explored the initiation and sustainability of community food initiatives through in-depth interviews with coordinators. The research identified that these initiatives are in a precarious state due to reliance on volunteers, land ownership issues, and a lack of consistent funding. Despite these challenges, they persist through community support and coordinator dedication.
Governance failureCommunityEconomicsWelfarePolicyParadise Transplanted
2014Pierrette 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.
Equity & displacementCommunityWelfareEconomics“It’s a Little Piece of My Country”
2014Pierrette Hondagneu‐Sotelo · · United States (Los Angeles)
This chapter focuses on life in urban community gardens in Los Angeles, United States. Here, the poorest and most marginalized newcomer immigrants, including undocumented immigrants, gather to grow homeland vegetables, share community ties, and build new places of belonging. They transform discarded urban patches into oases of freedom, belonging, and homeland connection, producing bountiful vegetables and vibrant community connections.
CommunityFood sovereignty & justiceWelfareExamining the Underlying Values of Food Security Programming: Implications for the Social Work Profession
2014Sarah Himmelheber · Journal of Progressive Human Services · United States
This study discusses incongruities between social work's professional values and dominant public and private responses to food insecurity. Empowerment theory is positioned as an evaluative lens to examine food assistance, and dominant forms of food assistance are scrutinized using its basic tenets. Innovative programs, including community gardens, community kitchens, and D.C. Central Kitchen, are highlighted for their potential to yield empowering outcomes.
CommunityWelfareFood sovereignty & justiceLet it grow: urban gardens and food access in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
2014Katherine Luke · D-Scholarship@Pitt (University of Pittsburgh) · United States (Pittsburgh)
This study used a door-to-door survey in six Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania neighborhoods to measure the impact of community gardens on residents' perceptions of food access. It found that many gardeners do not consider gardening to improve their personal food security, and despite geographic proximity and expressed interest, community garden participation rates were low. Social and emotional barriers, including lack of gardening knowledge and racial prejudice, appeared to prevent residents from becoming active participants.
Limited or null effectCommunityFood sovereignty & justiceHealthWelfareGrow Some!: Building Strong Communities through Community Gardens
2013Naomi Hill · Illinois Digital Environment for Access to Learning and Scholarship (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) · United States (Chicago)
This study investigated the effects of community gardens in impoverished inner-city African-American neighborhoods in Chicago. The research focused on five themes: how community gardens are created, their mission, motivations for involvement, contributions to individuals and the overall community, and envisioned futures. Results indicated that community gardens are established through collective efforts by community members and maintained through active participation and ongoing recruitment.
CommunityWelfareHealthFood educationRefugee Farmers and the Social Enterprise Model in the American Southwest
2013Vanna Gonzales, Nigel Forrest, Noreen Balos · Journal of Community Positive Practices · United States (Arizona)
This paper presents the first known case study of Gila Farm Cooperative (GFC), a U.S.-based marketing cooperative formed by refugees from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds. Founded in 2011 by the Phoenix International Refugee Committee, GFC has 22 members supporting Community Supported Agriculture in central Arizona. This three-month study, conducted in spring 2012, provided a descriptive analysis of GFC's structure and operational processes through participatory observation and in-depth interviews.
CommunityCSA & TeikeiWelfareEconomicsGrowing Healthy Kids
2013Dina C. Castro, Margaret Samuels, Ann E. Harman · American Journal of Preventive Medicine · United States
A pilot study evaluated the "Growing Healthy Kids Program" (GHK) in a Southern US state from 2008-2010 to prevent childhood obesity among low-income families. Among 95 children aged 2-15, 17% of obese or overweight participants improved their BMI classification, and 100% of normal BMI children maintained their classification. Parental reports indicated a 146% increase in fruit and vegetable availability and increased consumption of fruits (28%) and vegetables (33%) among participating children.
HealthFood educationCommunityWelfareGrowing a just garden: environmental justice and the development of a community garden policy for Hamilton, Ontario
2013Erika S. Jermé, Sarah Wakefield · Planning Theory & Practice · Canada (Hamilton)
This paper uses the process of drafting a community garden policy in Hamilton, Canada, as a case study. It illustrates how an environmental justice framework could inform effective and inclusive policy creation, while noting that barriers within the policy process could mitigate against the meaningful incorporation of environmental justice concerns. It concludes that greater inter-departmental and community collaboration, along with the routine application of an environmental justice lens, could mitigate the ill effects of inequitable resource distribution.
Governance failureCommunityPolicyWelfareAlternative Food s ystems at g round Level: The Fairbanks Community g arden
2013Alison M. Meadow · Digital Commons - University of South Florida (University of South Florida) · United States (Fairbanks)
This paper presents data on the Fairbanks Community Garden, an alternative food system initiative, focusing on its current and potential contributions to food security and social integration. The most successful aspects of the community garden include providing space and equipment to those lacking resources and creating opportunities for diverse community members to develop personal relationships.
CommunityFood sovereignty & justiceWelfareLa agricultura urbana como proceso de desarrollo a escala humana. Los huertos urbanos en zonas degradadas de São Paulo
2013Glenda Dimuro, Esteban de Manuel Jeréz · POLI-RED (Revistas Digitales Politécnicas) (La Universidad Politécnica de Madrid) · Brazil (São Paulo)
This paper presents the 'Cidades sem fome' project, a citizen initiative in São Paulo's degraded areas. Through urban agriculture, this project enables residents to satisfy basic needs, regain control over their lives, and challenge market-driven growth processes. It aims to reduce hunger and unemployment, foster social mobilization, and rehabilitate degraded urban areas, offering an alternative to current urban production and management models.
CommunityFood sovereignty & justiceWelfareEconomicsWest End Community Gardens
2013Stephanie Larson · Open Scholarship Institutional Repository (Washington University in St. Louis) · United States
This project located West End community gardens in relation to select social determinants, including income level, occupier's ownership status, ethnic diversity, and population density.
CommunityWelfareFeasibility of Using a Community-Supported Agriculture Program to Improve Fruit and Vegetable Inventories and Consumption in an Underresourced Urban Community
2013Sara A. Quandt, Janae Dupuis, Caitlin A. Fish, Ralph B. D’Agostino · Preventing Chronic Disease · United States
This randomized, controlled feasibility study evaluated the feasibility of a Community-Supported Agriculture (CSA) intervention in an underresourced urban community in the United States. Fifty low-income women with children participated, with the intervention group (25 participants) receiving fresh produce and educational sessions for 16 weeks. A significant increase in household fruit and vegetable inventory was observed in the intervention group, but increases in consumption were not significant. Challenges included transportation and work schedules, yet most participants expressed interest in continued participation.
CSA & TeikeiHealthCommunityWelfareJust green enough: contesting environmental gentrification in Greenpoint, Brooklyn
2012Winifred Curran, Trina Hamilton · Local Environment · USA (Brooklyn, NYC)
Coins 'just green enough' by showing how conventional green-amenity planning triggers environmental gentrification and displacement of working-class residents; argues greening policy must be deliberately constrained to avoid the speculative development it otherwise unleashes.
PolicyCommunityWelfareUrban farming nel food desert
2012Redazione · TERRITORIO · United States
This paper presents the basic features of two urban farming projects in Milwaukee and Philadelphia aimed at solving the problem of food deserts in declining inner cities of the US rustbelt. It discusses the forms and relevance of convergences between food culture and food justice, relating them to the debate on the future of urban forms in these inner cities.
Food sovereignty & justiceHealthCommunityWelfareSupporting the Micmac Farms Through Ethnographic Communication Research
2012Anthony Sutton · DigitalCommons (California Polytechnic State University) · United States (Maine)
This ethnographic communication research supported the Micmac Farms in Presque Isle, Maine, which were established to address food security and community health issues like obesity and diabetes. The study, conducted over three months in summer 2011, identified that administrative power structures, economic constraints, and operational planning issues threatened the farm's efforts to achieve greater economic and food security. The analysis revealed that economic behaviors dominated the data, with grants for the farm centering on economics due to historical farming discourse and business focus.
CommunityHealthFood sovereignty & justiceWelfareProducing for the Future: A Collaboration between Low-Income Youth, Congregations, and Researchers - Youth Impact Evaluation
2012Lacy Weinblatt, Sarah Najdek · · United States (Oregon)
The Oregon State University research project "Producing for the Future" involved low-income youth, adult partners, and researchers collaborating to design and plant a community garden and develop a microenterprise to market produce. The project aimed to compare participants' knowledge and attitudes regarding local food resources, gardening, organic eating, and healthy lifestyles before and after their involvement. This study used data to analyze changes among participants pre and post-experience, but specific findings are not reported.
CommunityFood educationHealthWelfareSlum politics
2012Martijn Koster, Pieter A. de Vries · Focaal · Brazil (Recife)
This article examined slum dwellers' politics in Recife, Brazil, as a realm of possibility where care and recognition are central. A community leader's urban agriculture project, which from an outsider's perspective might be considered non-viable, provided slum dwellers with possibilities to strive for community solidarity and personal recognition. The article concludes that slum politics is about claiming the right to be counted and recognized, and about the care for the other.
Economic viabilityCommunityWelfareFood sovereignty & justiceBirch Tree Apartment Complex rehabilitation project
2012· · United States
The Birch Tree Project is a rehabilitation initiative for a 56-unit apartment complex designed to house low-to moderate-income families and offer supportive services. These services include a Head Start facility, Life Skills classes, Case Management, Asset Building and Credit Repair, the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program, a Community Garden, and a Summer Feeding site. Given Farmington City's growth in minimum-wage service industry jobs, which leads many families to spend a disproportionate amount of income on housing, this project aims to create safe, affordable housing opportunities for marginalized families.
CommunityWelfareCharacterization of Urban Agricultural Practices and Gardeners' Perspective in Bronx Community Gardens, New York City.
2012Michelle Melissa Althaus Ottmann, Juliana Maantay, Kristen Grady, Nilce Nazareno da Fonte · Cities and the Environment · United States (New York City)
This study investigated urban agricultural practices and gardeners' perceptions in community gardens in the Bronx, New York City, United States, using semi-structured interviews, garden observations, and GIS spatial analysis of socio-demographic characteristics. GIS analysis revealed a significantly higher rate of poverty and Hispanic population in block groups within a quarter mile of the community gardens. The gardens were characterized as places for socialization, fresh produce, neighborhood beautification, and education, and gardeners valued family/community time, nature, and therapeutic benefits, but expressed fears of losing the gardens due to lack of city protection and developer take-over.
CommunityFood educationHealthWelfareSustainable School Gardens and Green Education: Familiar Lessons through a New Lens
2012Arvazena E. Clardy, Brian R. Copeland · The Agricultural education magazine · United States (Nashville)
This article advocates for implementing sustainable school gardens in agriscience education programs, drawing on the author's experience as a former educator and current work with middle and secondary schools in Nashville, Tennessee. It suggests that school gardens can cement learning for students and address issues like food deserts and childhood obesity in inner-city areas.
Food educationCommunityHealthWelfareMassachusetts Avenue Project: Urban Farming and Job Skills for Youth
2012Rebecca Mize · eCommons (Cornell University) · United States
The Massachusetts Avenue Project (MAP) aims to create a more local and inclusive food system by growing fresh produce on its urban farm on the West Side of Buffalo. Annually, MAP employs approximately 50 at-risk youth to support the transformation of the community's food system.
CommunityFood educationWelfareEconomicsUrban Livelihoods under a Changing Climate*: Perspectives on Urban Agriculture and Planning in Lusaka, Zambia
2012Danny Simatele, Tony Binns, Munacinga Simatele · Journal of Human Development and Capabilities · Zambia (Lusaka)
This field-based research in Lusaka, Zambia, examines the impact of climate change and urban governance on urban agriculture, which serves as a source of food and income for poor households amidst deteriorating economies. The study finds that urban agriculture is often excluded from urban development and planning policy, posing significant challenges for small-scale farmers to achieve food security. A lack of policies supporting the urban poor, combined with climatic changes like drought and flooding, makes it difficult for households to adapt to the changing urban environment.
Governance failureClimate changePolicyFood sovereignty & justiceWelfareViolence prevention, health promotion coming together: Projects creating healthier neighborhoods
2012Teddi Dineley Johnson · The Nation's health · United States (Denver)
This abstract describes various projects aimed at creating healthier neighborhoods in the United States. Examples include liquor retailers in Louisville, Kentucky, removing alcohol ads, utility boxes in Chula Vista, California, being transformed into art, and youths at risk for gang violence in a Denver neighborhood participating in a community garden. These initiatives focus on violence prevention and health promotion.
CommunityWelfareHealthFood educationHealthy Workplaces: The Effects of Nature Contact at Work on Employee Stress and Health
2011Largo-Wight E., Chen W. W., Dodd V., Weiler R. · Public Health Reports · United States
Survey of 503 university office staff finding that as workday nature contact (gardens, plants, greenery) increases, perceived stress and general health complaints decrease, providing evidence for workplace greening and garden programs.
HealthWelfare