Research & reports
Peer-reviewed research and reports on community urban agriculture, food education, composting, welfare and more.
Theme
Critical findings
7626 results(116 / 306)
Ludwig B. · Sustainability (MDPI) · Germany
Analyzes the significance of green-space design in early modernist housing estates (1919–1927) in then-German Lower Silesia, addressing urban layout, public/private greenery systems including gardens, and protection of valued trees from natural, landscape, and social perspectives.
BiodiversityCommunityHealthStörtkuhl B. · Architectus, No. 3(67), pp. 25–37 · Germany
Studies how the self-build Reichsheimstätten, originating as a late-Weimar crisis measure, became central to Nazi housing policy aimed at 're-rooting' the population in German soil, using Breslau as a case study.
PolicyCommunityMolenveld A., Voorberg W., Van Buuren A., Hagen L. · Public Management Review · Netherlands
Fuzzy-set QCA of 14 Dutch urban gardens with partnerships among citizens, public authorities, and private actors, identifying financial independence, institutionalization, and a small core volunteer group as key to garden durability.
PolicyCommunity千葉 舞優, 西村 亮彦 · 景観・デザイン研究講演集 No.17 · Japan
Using Odakyu's regenerated Hoshinotani Danchi as a case study, this research examines the planning and operation of community spaces including the Hatamusubi rental farm, Kissaten Laundry café, and childcare support facilities, showing how movement between facilities generates small-scale exchange including the surrounding area.
CommunityPolicyHealth農地保全等にかかる検討報告書
2021世田谷区 · 世田谷区 検討報告書 · Japan
Setagaya's review report from its urban-agriculture and farmland-conservation PT after the 2022 productive-green-area issue, outlining the current state and future direction of publicly supported urban farmland use including buy-out conservation, agriculture-welfare collaboration, ward allotments and community farms such as Tamaribatake.
PolicyCommunityWelfareFood educationKondo C. · Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development, 10(4):103-121 · Japan
A case study of generational handover in two Kansai teikei groups, analyzing how the transition to a successor generation re-energizes the groups as 'diverse economies'.
CommunityApostolopoulou E., Kotsila P. · Urban Geography, 43(2), 293–319 · Greece (Athens)
Examining the Hellinikon self-organized guerrilla garden that emerged as resistance to real estate redevelopment of the former Athens international airport, the paper argues that community gardening can embed grassroots opposition to neoliberal urban transformation and assert the right to urban space.
CommunityPolicyWelfareEconomicsHammelman C., Shoffner E., Cruzat M., Lee S. · Agriculture and Human Values · Argentina (Rosario)
Drawing on interviews with 30 stakeholders in Rosario, the study applies assemblage and urban political ecology frameworks to reveal how institutionalized agroecology constructs valued socio-natures amid land pressure and economic marginalization.
CommunityPolicyEconomicsRendón Schneir E. · e-Agronegocios, Vol. 7, No. 2 · Peru (Lima)
Analyzes short horticultural value chains (cadenas cortas) in Lima, showing that removing intermediaries improves farmer incomes and strengthens urban food security, particularly in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.
EconomicsCommunityPolicyAli M.S., Arifin H.S., Nurhayati N. · Biodiversitas Journal of Biological Diversity · Indonesia (West Java)
This study finds that increasing urbanisation across West Java significantly reduces the area, species diversity, and ecological functions of traditional pekarangan homegardens, threatening both biodiversity and the cultural practice of subsistence home gardening. Sites across Bogor District, Bogor City, and Cianjur District were compared along an urban–rural gradient.
BiodiversityCommunityHeirloom & landraceHutton G.B., Brugulat-Panés A., Bhagtani D., Maadjhou Mba C., Birch J.M., Shih H., Okop K., Muti M., Wadende P., Tatah L., Mogo E., Guariguata L., Unwin N. · Journal of Global Health Reports · Cameroon
This systematic scoping review synthesized 118 studies (from 4,828 screened) on community food production initiatives across Kenya, Cameroon, and South Africa, finding that economic and environmental impacts dominated the literature while health and social dimensions were understudied; Cameroon-specific studies (10 papers) primarily addressed economic impacts.
CommunityHealthEconomicsFood educationCarola Grebitus · PLOS ONE · United States (Detroit)
Using an online survey of 420 residents in Detroit, Michigan, this study analyzed behavioral and socio-demographic drivers of growing produce at home and in community gardens. It found that trust, attitude, and knowledge affect home growing, while involvement and personality drive community gardening; household size affects home growing, and gender, age, and income affect community gardening. The findings offer implications for fostering small-scale urban agriculture through city planning and nutrition education.
CommunityDIYFood educationBhuwan Thapa, Aniruddha Banerjee, Jeffrey Wilson, Samantha Hamlin · Urban Agriculture & Regional Food Systems · United States (Indianapolis)
The study developed a p-median spatial optimization model to identify new urban agriculture sites in Indianapolis, Marion County, Indiana, weighting block groups by food access and obesity prevalence. Optimally selected locations were 52% more efficient than randomly chosen ones in average distance traveled, with no significant difference among the three policy scenarios.
PolicyHealthCommunityBeyond ‘food apartheid’: Civil society and the politicization of hunger in New Haven, Connecticut
2021Mary P. Corcoran · Urban Agriculture & Regional Food Systems · United States (New Haven)
Based on 28 in-depth interviews and participant observation in New Haven, CT (Fall 2018), this article examines community-based food-justice activism across the urban agriculture and food-policy sectors. It finds that grassroots civil society groups largely set a broad and contradictory hunger agenda, that their work is structurally constrained by dependence on philanthropic funding and a fiscally weak municipality, and that a tension persists between depoliticizing and repoliticizing hunger—tensions sharpened by COVID-19 and the 2020 BLM mobilization.
PolicyCommunityCatherine Sanders, Casandra Cox, Leslie Edgar, Donna Graham, Amanda Philyaw Perez · Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development · United States (Arkansas)
This qualitative study conducted in-depth interviews with 16 urban farmers in Northwest and Central Arkansas to assess their needs and their interactions with the University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service. Needs were highly individualized by operation size, years in operation, and mission, but common needs included market pricing, co-ops, and equipment access; participants viewed Extension positively but noted it lacked resources specific to small-scale, sustainable farming.
EconomicsCommunityPolicyMarilyn Sitaker, Mackenzie McCall, Weiwei Wang, Mia Vaccaro, Jane Kolodinsky, Alice Ammerman, Stephanie Jilcott Pitts, Karla Hanson, Diane Smith, Rebecca Seguin-Fowler · Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development · United States
Using a qualitative approach, this study describes the organizational models and best practices of five well-established nonprofit cost-offset community-supported agriculture (CO-CSA) programs in the US, which aim to increase low-income households' access to fresh produce while helping CSA farms grow. Administration took several forms—direct subsidies to member farms, acting as an aggregator/packer/distributor, or sourcing from an in-house incubator or food hub—funded through government grants, donations, and fundraising, with dedicated staff and community partnerships identified as key success factors.
EconomicsWelfareCommunity· Urban Agriculture & Regional Food Systems · China (Nanjing)
Analyzes the spatial-planning dimensions of urban informal food systems in Nanjing's Qinhuai District, China.
PolicyCommunity· International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health · China (Shanghai)
Participatory action research on a community gardening 'seeding plan' in Shanghai during the COVID-19 pandemic. Reports that gardening participants showed better mental health than non-participants.
HealthCommunity· Sustainability Science · Germany (Munich)
A Munich case study exploring how urban vegetable gardening fosters an embodied human–food connection and pro-environmental behaviour.
HealthFood educationCommunity· Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems · Africa
A review of aquaponics as a means to improve food security in Africa, discussing small-scale pilots such as the SANFU project in Lagos, Nigeria.
DIYCommunityRussomanno J., Jabson Tree J. · Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development · USA
A PRISMA-guided systematic review of how sense of community (belonging) at farmers markets shapes customer engagement, and how markets relate to food access for low-income shoppers.
CommunityEconomicsWelfare· Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems · USA
A scoping review of how urban agriculture education programs foster youth civic engagement, leadership, and understanding of social justice in the United States.
Food educationCommunityPolicy· Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems · USA
A study of how agency and sociality within gardens designed for health and healing cultivate participant wellbeing and community resilience.
HealthCommunityWelfareGlover T. · International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health · USA
A qualitative study of a Midwestern U.S. community garden, examining stories of social connectedness produced through shared garden participation and their public-health significance.
CommunityHealth· Scientific Reports · Guelph, Canada
Analyzing heavy metals in urban garden soils in Guelph, the study examines links between contamination and vulnerable populations, raising environmental-justice concerns that soil contamination in urban gardens may impose unequal health risks.
HealthCommunity