Research & reports

Yadira Méndez–Lemus, António Vieyra, Lorena Poncela, Beatriz de la Tejera, Cinthia Ruiz-López · Frontiers in Sustainable Cities · Mexico

A paper examining the interactions between peripheralization, vulnerabilities of agricultural livelihoods, and local collective agency in creating new capabilities in intermediate Mexican cities, based on a study in Tarímbaro municipality, part of the intermediate city of Morelia. The unit of analysis was the ejido, a form of social land tenure granted to landless peasants in 1917 after the Mexican Revolution and one of the most important forms of social organization in rural Mexico; about half of Mexican territory comprises more than 30,000 community-based land tenures, mainly ejidos, and a high proportion of land now occupied by urban centres was formerly ejido land. The study used the example of 15 ejidos notably affected by the expansion of Morelia, conducting semi-structured interviews with each ejido's president in 2015, followed by a survey of 61 individuals from 11 of the 15 ejidos. The peripheralization of Morelia was found to have produced inequalities in the adjacent municipality of Tarímbaro, with differential vulnerabilities in peri-urban agricultural livelihoods found among the participating ejidos; not all ejidos succeeded in addressing vulnerabilities linked to the urbanization of agricultural land, but those that achieved some success shared characteristics that reinforced common values and motivations toward shared goals for sustaining local livelihoods. The paper highlights the importance of functional rural organizations in regulating access to, and distribution of, resources in the peripheries of intermediate cities.

Parman Sukarno, Rio Guntur Utomo, Rahmat Yasirandi, Novian Anggis Suwastika · JURNAL INFOTEL · Indonesia

This study evaluated a customer satisfaction model for "e-Buruan Sae," a Web 2.0-based application used by the government of Bandung City, Indonesia, to manage urban farming activities. Using a quantitative correlational approach based on Design Research Methodology, it measured satisfaction across six variables: ease of use, service quality, interactivity, trust, customer satisfaction, and IT development. Empirical testing showed that the ease-of-use and IT-development variables did not affect customer satisfaction, while the remaining variables (service quality, interactivity, and trust) had a positive effect on it.

Yoon Sup Cheong · Journal of Cultural Product & Design · South Korea

Against the backdrop of limited land for greening in cities, this paper proposes the design of a multifunctional garden box capable of both soil-based and hydroponic cultivation, providing sufficient soil depth and sustained water supply for container planting. It describes mold design and injection-molding production for mass manufacture, along with various sales and distribution methods. The conclusion raises the issues of coexistence with existing farmers and the safety of edible plant production under urban air pollution.

Jaquair L. Gillette · Educational Media Reviews Online · Global

This is a review of a 2020 documentary film (83 minutes) directed by Caroline Cox. The film presents four stories in a three-act structure: an Indigenous-owned youth organic farm in Hawaii (Ma'O Organic Farm), an African American urban farmer in Kansas City who runs Kansas City Aquaponics (Eric Person), a woman of Mexican and Jewish heritage practicing Kosher butchering, and an Inuit elder in an Arctic community (Marjorie Ovauyak) who uses greenhouse gardening.

Mateusz Salwa · Aisthesis Pratiche linguaggi e saperi dell’estetico · Global

This article aims to discuss community gardens as works of public art. While the artistic status of gardens has generally been recognized mainly in relation to historic gardens and parks or the work of contemporary landscape architects, the article argues the same approach can apply to community gardens. First, it argues that aligning community gardens with contemporary art is honorific, showing they can be viewed as more than vernacular art, given their social and political dimension. Second, despite their seemingly idyllic character, community gardens are often contested spaces, with conflict sparked in part by community garden aesthetics. It argues that recognizing community gardens as art is best done by referring to the framework of "new genre public art" rather than to "paradigmatic arts" such as architecture or painting.

Hetty Maria, Luthfi Fattah, Yusuf Azis · European Journal of Agriculture and Food Sciences · Indonesia

This qualitative study aimed to determine the level of community participation in urban agricultural development in Banjarbaru City, Indonesia, and the factors influencing it, using purposively selected locations and proportional random sampling. Data were analyzed using a scoring method and logistic regression to assess the effect of independent variables on participation. Results showed most participants had a high level of education and most had incomes above 3 million to 5 million rupiah, and that a two-way method was used in implementing urban agriculture. Overall community participation was high; the decision-making, implementation, and evaluation stages were high, while the enjoyment stage was low. Age, education level, income level, and access and control were not significantly related to participation level, but the group leader's leadership style and the influence of driving factors were significantly related to it.

André Ferreira, Wanderley José Deina · Revista NEP - Núcleo de Estudos Paranaenses da UFPR · Brazil

This study examines the activities of MOB-PR (Movimento de Organização de Base do Paraná, founded in 2014), a grassroots organizing movement in Comunidade Portelinha, an urban occupation in Curitiba, Brazil formed 13 years earlier. It focuses on two of the movement's working groups: "Ciranda," popular education activities for children and adolescents, and the "Horta Comunitária Eduardo Felipe" community garden. Fieldwork combined audio-recorded interviews, field diaries, children's drawings and photographs. The article concludes that grassroots work is itself applied popular education, which should not be reduced to simple didactics but should remain in constant relation with other political work. Since its founding, the occupation has demanded basic public services such as water and electricity and land tenure regularization.

Barbora Duží, David Fanfani, Stanislav Martinát · Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems · Europe (Italy)

A case study of Prato Province (Tuscany, Italy) analyzing how urban and peri-urban farming is embedded in local community life. Methods combined spatial analysis, semi-structured interviews with local stakeholders (N=9), field observations and discussions with local farmers (N=17). The study identified a diversity of locally rooted agrifood initiatives and food networks connecting individual farmers with local residents, with farms varying in how re-embedded they were in the urban space of Prato and its inhabitants. Cooperation among local agrifood initiatives was found to contribute to a more sustainable territorial agrifood system, and a tendency toward more sustainable land management was observed in the region. The authors argue that coordinated local food governance and innovative territorial planning instruments could contribute to sustainable agrifood systems elsewhere.

Denis Martouzet · Nouvelles perspectives en sciences sociales · Global

A book-review notice for Glen Albrecht's "Les émotions de la terre" (French translation by Corinne Smith of the English original, published by Les liens qui libèrent, Paris, 2020 [2019], 370 pages). It appeared in the journal Nouvelles perspectives en sciences sociales, in an issue themed "Urban agriculture: toward a reconfiguration of social and territorial ties," distributed via the Érudit platform. The abstract does not describe the book's arguments.

Fajar Sidiq Muttaqin, Endang Danial, Prayoga Bestari · JURNAL CIVICUS · Indonesia

A qualitative case study examining citizen participation in Bandung city's "Urban Farming" program in Pajajaran Village, Indonesia, as a form of "economy civics" implementation. The program was created by the Bandung city government in response to the city's dependence on food from surrounding areas, with data collected through interviews, observations and documentation studies involving the city's Food and Agriculture Office, Pajajaran Village officials, and the community. The results indicate that citizen participation in the Urban Farming program constitutes a form of economy civics implemented through produce with market value, affecting both the local economy and food security.

Adam D. Kay, Eric J. Chapman, Jelagat D. Cheruiyot, Sue Lowery, Susan R. Singer, Gaston E. Small, Anne M. Stone, Ray Warthen, Wendy Westbroek · Ecology and Evolution · United States

Reviewing major U.S. undergraduate biology programs, reports on campus garden use, and case studies from five higher-education institutions, this paper assessed how much urban agriculture is incorporated into undergraduate biology education. It found that while field experiences are fairly common in biology programs, community engagement opportunities are rare and urban agriculture is almost absent from course descriptions, and that although many U.S. institutions have campus gardens, evidence indicates they are rarely used in biology courses.

Tiong Ann Goh, Sorain J. Ramchunder, Alan D. Ziegler · CABI Agriculture and Bioscience · Global

Researchers assessed pseudo-total concentrations of cadmium, copper, lead and zinc in soils from community gardens, public parks and woodlands across Singapore, comparing them to risk guidelines and using lead isotope analysis to trace contamination sources. All measured concentrations were below thresholds considered to represent substantial risk, garden soils were largely equivalent in concentration to parks and woodlands though geographic distribution varied, lead sources were both anthropogenic and natural with spatial variability inconsistent with a single point source, and a correlation between copper and zinc suggested a shared source such as road traffic or atmospheric deposition; the study did not assess bioavailability or bioaccessibility of these elements, which it noted would be needed for a fuller risk assessment at sites with higher contamination.

Sara Rawal, Sandesh Thapa · Scientifica · Global

A survey of 116 randomly selected respondents conducted from February 3 to April 6, 2021 in Morang and Sunsari districts, Nepal, assessed rooftop garden (RTG) status, plant diversity and adoption determinants, finding that 30.5% of roofs in Morang and 33.2% in Sunsari were under rooftop farming and that adopters' roof size was significantly larger than non-adopters'. A binary logit model showed age, gender, schooling year, training and farming experience significantly affected RTG adoption; 50 nutritionally important species were reported, ornamental plants showed greater diversity than vegetables, and adopters reported that a lack of proper policy and ineffective management makes it difficult to sustain their rooftop gardens.

Dwi Haryanta, Tatuk Tojibatus Sa’adah, Rudianto Rudianto · Jurnal Agroteknologi Merdeka Pasuruan · Indonesia

A 2022 factorial experiment in Indonesia examines the use of urban sediment/sludge and urban organic waste compost as growing media for mustard greens (Brassica rapa var. parachinensis) in an urban farming system. With sediment source (river, reservoir, roadside gutter, versus a garden-soil control) as one factor and urban compost concentration (10%, 20%, 30%, versus no compost) as the other, the experiment found no interaction between the two factors, but sediment source had a significant effect on growth and yield, with roadside-gutter sediment performing best, and compost addition also had a significant effect, with 20% (v/v) being the optimal ratio.

Reni Nurjasmi, Maria Aditia Wahyuningrum · Jurnal Ilmiah Respati · Indonesia

A 2022 experiment at the Faculty of Agriculture, Universitas Respati Indonesia, conducted from September 2021 to February 2022, examines which organic growing medium produces the best chlorophyll and carotene content in broccoli microgreens. Using a completely randomized design with four treatments — soil, onion skin, rabbit manure, and quail manure — each with five replications, organic growing media significantly affected germination rate, height, wet weight, and chlorophyll content; quail manure waste produced the highest chlorophyll content (1.47 mg/g), not significantly different from rabbit manure (1.33 mg/g), but significantly different from onion skin waste (0.63 mg/g) and the untreated control (0.21 mg/g).

Jaime Pizarro‐Araya, Fermín M. Alfaro, Francisco Gómez, Roberto Villablanca · Anthropocene Coasts · Chile

A 2022 study characterized the taxonomic richness and abundance of terrestrial arthropod fauna at the Aguada de La Chimba urban coastal wetland in the Antofagasta Region, Chile, using multiple survey methods. From a total of 1,874 specimens, it identified 109 terrestrial arthropod species, with Insecta the most represented taxon (85 species, 47 families, 15 orders); by origin, communities included 24% native, 22% naturalized, and a smaller proportion of endemic species. The study reports that urban coastal wetlands are fragile ecosystems subject to serious disturbance in structure, function, and diversity from advancing urban, agricultural, foraging, and drainage activities, including displacement of endemic species by invasive ones, and discusses the major threats to this wetland alongside the importance of public-private partnerships with the local community for biodiversity conservation.

Kelly Donati, Nick Rose · · Australia

A 2022 report presents findings from a survey of urban agriculture practitioners in greater Melbourne (including green wedge areas), Bendigo, Ballarat, and Geelong, Australia. It provides baseline data on the composition, activities, market channels, challenges, needs, and aspirations of the urban agriculture sector, and, informed by the survey findings and the academic literature, sets out a roadmap for addressing the sector's key challenges and building on its existing social and environmental commitments.

Naomi Shimpo · Toshi keikaku hokokushu/Toshi keikaku houkokushuu · Japan

This case study reports how Toyama City, Japan, launched a municipally led community garden program using neighborhood block parks (gaiku koen), the smallest category of urban park in Japan. Growing and harvesting vegetables and fruit in urban parks had generally been regarded as inappropriate on public-interest grounds, but the city persuaded the responsible ministry that community gardens benefit urban residents, particularly older adults, and meet existing needs of these parks. As a result, management of the community gardens was transferred, through official procedures, to resident-run park stewardship associations (koen aigokai).

Shahin Keynoush, Ehsan Daneshyar · Sustainability · Global

This research defines a pedagogical framework for an architecture Graduate Design Studio, pursuing three objectives: connecting buildings and landscapes to facilitate walkability, incorporating green elements into buildings and landscapes to increase available green space in cities, and envisioning built environments where fresh local food can be cultivated, processed, and distributed by incorporating urban agriculture into buildings and landscapes. These objectives align with the core concept of social sustainability, including improving residents' well-being and quality of life. The framework was implemented in the Graduate Studio, with four design project samples presented as outcomes.

Dushyant Singh, Rajeev Sobti, Anuj Kumar Jain, Praveen Kumar Malik, Dac‐Nhuong Le · IET Communications · Global

Against a backdrop of urbanization expected to account for about 50% of the world population by 2050 and projected freshwater shortages in India by the same year, this article examines the potential of IoT (Internet of Things) and machine learning (ML) to support urban and precision agriculture in smart cities, including irrigation, rainfall, and drought condition monitoring to assist farmer decision-making. It presents the design of an intelligent irrigation system based on soil and weather conditions, with parameters selected from prior Agriculture 4.0 and ML research, and compares the developed weather station against existing patented technologies, stating that the resulting system provides a cost-effective solution for local weather monitoring.

Silvia Silvia, Fermanto Lianto · Jurnal Sains Teknologi Urban Perancangan Arsitektur (Stupa) · Indonesia

This study proposes a redesign of the aging Kebon Kacang public housing complex in Indonesia based on a self-sufficient design concept developed during the Covid-19 pandemic, using descriptive-analytical research, literature study, and case study methods. The redesign incorporates rainwater harvesting, food production, green roof, and green balcony elements aimed at making the building and its occupants mutually productive, and presents a mixed program including residential and commercial functions such as food markets, food courts, cafes, and kiosks, alongside children's education facilities, hydroponics, gyms, and playgrounds.

Dorceta E. Taylor, Ki’Amber Thompson, Dominique Abednour-Brown, Ember McCoy, Socorro Martha Meg-ay V. Daupan, Clarice Hollenquest · American Behavioral Scientist · United States

This 2022 study analyzed 53 community gardens in Michigan, United States, surveyed from summer 2020 through winter 2021, examining how garden managers' race/ethnicity and sex, along with neighborhood characteristics, relate to garden activities. White managers ran 66% (35) of the gardens and people of color ran 34% (18); roughly half the gardens were managed by men and the remainder by women. None of the gardens had paid staff and all relied on volunteers. About 53% were located in low-income census tracts with a median household income of $40,000 or less. During the COVID-19 pandemic, 31% of gardens reduced staff, 51.4% had fewer volunteers than before the pandemic, and 51.9% saw increased numbers of people seeking food.

Nur Shuhamin Nazuri, Mohd Roslan Rosnon, Nobaya Ahmad, Siti Shazwani Ahmad Suhaimi, Juwaidah Sharifuddin, Rusitha Wijekoon · Sustainability · Malaysia

This 2022 study surveyed 180 participants of urban agriculture (UA) community programs authorized by the Department of Agriculture in the Klang Valley, Malaysia, using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to analyze how UA participation generates value contributing to community social empowerment. The findings showed that participation in the planning, implementation, and evaluation stages plays an important role in program success, and that such participation should be understood through the roles of government agencies, NGOs, and communities in building the strong networks needed to enhance participants' social empowerment.

Imas Wildan Rafiqah, Fetty Dwi Rahmayanti · MIMBAR AGRIBISNIS Jurnal Pemikiran Masyarakat Ilmiah Berwawasan Agribisnis · Indonesia

A survey of 109 urban Indonesian respondents familiar with microgreens found that 98.2% were interested in cultivating them and 1.8% were not, citing ease of cultivation and health-conscious quality vegetables as reasons for interest. Microgreens were reported to command prices much higher than conventional vegetables, positioning them as a business opportunity targeting middle-to-upper-market restaurants and supermarkets.

Paloma Cariñanos, S. Borelli, Michela Conigliaro, Alessio Fini · Urban Planning · Global

This review traces urban food forests (UFFs) from ancient practices of incorporating edible species into wild forests to their spread into ornamental urban landscapes since the mid-20th century. It argues UFFs face the same challenges as urban forests generally — land tenure, governance, technical capacity, pollution and global change — which must be addressed to balance their productive, environmental and socio-economic functions.