Research & reports

朱林耀, 宋朝阳, 易建平, 叶晓佑 · Acta Scientiarum Naturalium Universitatis Sunyatseni · China

Hongshan caitai (also called purple caitai), a local specialty of Wuhan, China, is regarded alongside Wuchang fish as one of the two great dishes of Chutian (2007). Following direction from the Wuhan municipal government, the Wuhan Municipal Bureau of Agriculture decided in 2005 to spend about three years organizing personnel from multiple fields to jointly develop six major vegetable varieties, including Hongshan caitai, according to industrialization requirements, with the aim of forming distinct regional industry characteristics. Based on years of production practice, the Hongshan Caitai Industrialization Technical Guidance Group compiled key cultivation techniques for growers' reference.

Food Systems Planning and Healthy Communities Lab, University at Buffalo · Food Systems Planning and Healthy Communities Lab, University at Buffalo · South Africa

A database entry from the University at Buffalo's Food Systems Planning and Healthy Communities Lab describing Cape Town's Urban Agriculture Policy, adopted 7 December 2006, aimed at food security and economic development for poor and disadvantaged residents, and noting the city's population as 433,688 (population range 250,000-999,999).

Urban Harvest / Centro Internacional de la Papa (CIP) · Urban Harvest, Centro Internacional de la Papa (CIP) · Peru

Urban Harvest, the global urban and peri-urban agriculture initiative coordinated by the International Potato Center (CIP), published in 2007 the proceedings and declaration of its Third Inter-institutional Meeting held in Lima on 25-26 August 2006. The report notes that Lima Metropolitana spans the lower basins of the Chillón, Rímac and Lurín rivers, with the Rímac's average flow of 29 m3/s far exceeding the Chillón (5 m3/s) and Lurín (0.41 m3/s), while bacterial contamination in all three rivers exceeds the vegetable-irrigation limit of 1,000 fecal coliforms per 100ml. In Villa María del Triunfo, a municipal urban agriculture program began in 2001, and by 2006 the municipality had identified 1,926 people engaged in productive urban agriculture.

R. van Veenhuizen · Issue Lab (Candid) · Global

This publication defines urban agriculture as growing plants and raising animals for food within and around cities, along with related processing and marketing. It notes increased attention from development organizations and authorities in developing countries due to urban agriculture's role in poverty alleviation, food security, waste management, and greening. The work presents the "state of the art" of sustainable urban agriculture development, indicating progress since earlier major publications.

Alice J. Hovorka · Gender Place & Culture · Botswana

This research draws on a feminist political ecology perspective to demonstrate that agrarian restructuring and rural-urban transformation in Botswana offer women opportunities to renegotiate their marginalized positionality within the commercial urban agricultural sector in Greater Gaborone. Men and women participate in equal numbers, and both perceive this sector as offering new and accessible avenues for economic and social advancement. Although there is continuity of women's social and economic disadvantage relative to men from rural to urban contexts, women are actively making claims on land and capitalizing on their traditional roles and responsibilities associated with poultry production.

Ángela Borroto, Águeda C. Arencibia, J.L. López, Liliam J. Leyva, Carlos Mazorra, Gladys E. Dopico, R. Maurelo, A. Caraballoso · Pastos y forrajes · Cuba (Florencia)

This two-year study characterized animal production in urban agriculture in Florencia municipality, Cuba, by examining 32 randomly selected household backyards across two popular councils. Findings showed that 85% of households involved family members of all ages, with backyard animal rearing serving as a supplementary activity rather than a primary livelihood. Traditional management methods and local resources predominated in feeding practices, contributing 18% to the municipal family basket's protein needs and over 1 kg of protein per capita annually, thus potentially enhancing food security.

Alice J. Hovorka, Damell Smith, R. van Veenhuizen · · Global

This article argues that a gendered perspective on urban food security is essential to understand dynamics shaping food production and marketing in urban centers. It highlights that failing to explore women's distinct roles risks leaving gender inequities and food supply hindrances unaddressed, countering the invisibility of women's work often assumed as automatic domestic duties. The article emphasizes women's significant role in domestic food supply, even in societies with minimal household food production, citing examples like Latin American women organizing to address urban hunger.

Lisa Patterson · Scholarly Commons (University of Pennsylvania) · United States

This comparative case study uses ethnographic fieldwork to analyze the Urban Nutrition Initiative and a community-supported agricultural garden in the United States. It describes the organizational foundations of development agencies within a public policy framework and discusses power relationships between advocates and clientele in social service networks. The study demonstrates that power transitions in development schemes indicate social movements, which are defined as markers of successful strategies through a community empowerment model.

Loracnis Hernández · Cultivos Tropicales · Cuba

This study reviews the emergence and development of urban agriculture worldwide and in Cuba, aiming to solve problems related to increasing quality of life and food security in growing cities. It also delves into participatory methodologies to characterize and train rural communities on topics related to the technological management of their productive systems and how to enhance the use of agricultural biodiversity.

Kevin Lombard, Sue Forster-Cox, Dan Smeal, M. K. O’Neill · Rural and Remote Health · United States

This article reviews the development of diabetes on the Navajo Nation, a serious health problem correlated with income, poor diet, and limited physical exercise. It explores the potential role of home and community gardening in diabetes reduction, building on the Navajo tradition of farming. The benefits identified include locally grown nutritious food, physical activity from gardening, income savings or sales, and positive mental outlook. The article proposes a multidisciplinary approach involving public health officials, nutritionists, and horticultural extension agents.

Eleanor Gordon · · United States (Eugene)

This abstract poetically describes the Willamette River as central to the community of Eugene, defining its development and serving as a place for people to gather, reflect, and connect with nature. It emphasizes the importance of oral history and community engagement, including working in community gardens, as a common good. The river is portrayed as a collective memory, reflecting its historical and current significance to people.

Carol Posthumus · SA Irrigation = SA Besproeiing · South Africa

An Agricultural Research Council (ARC) project focuses on bringing lower cost and water-saving alternative irrigation technologies to smallholder farmers and community gardens. The initiative aims to establish and describe best management and operation practices for these technologies to reduce costs and conserve water. This research targets areas with water scarcity but existing irrigation access.

Loracnis Hernández · DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) · Global

This work examines how urban agriculture emerged and developed globally and in Cuba, and how it can be a primary means to solve problems related to increasing quality of life and food security in cities. It also aims to deepen participatory methods as tools to characterize and train rural communities on the technological management of their productive systems and how to enhance agricultural biodiversity utilization.

Nyumbaiza Tambwe · African and Asian Studies · Democratic Republic of Congo (Lubumbashi)

Based on semi-structured interviews conducted in Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of Congo, from November 2004 to March 2005, and documentary sources, factors driving engagement in urban agriculture were identified. Structural adjustment programs, declining world prices of primary commodities, economic crisis, low wages, unemployment, rapid population growth, war, and poverty push urban dwellers into agricultural activities, while urban agriculture also serves as a source of food, income, and employment.

Sidivan Aparecido Resende, João Cleps · Caminhos de Geografia · Brazil

This research examines agricultural activities in the urban area of Uberlândia (MG), Brazil, aiming to understand their role and importance in development, specifically in local supply and food security. Defining urban agriculture as rural activities occurring near or within cities, the study seeks to recognize the reality and importance of these activities in Uberlândia's urban environment by comprehending rural-urban interactions.

Christine King · Proceedings of the 50th Annual Meeting of the ISSS - 2006, Sonoma, CA, USA · Global

This paper reports on research exploring how alternative agricultural approaches, such as Organic Agriculture, Biodynamics, Permaculture, CSAs, Farmers Markets, and Community Gardens, contribute to more resilient agri-ecological systems and communities. These systems are reviewed in relation to key concepts from ecological systems thinking, including ecological resilience, biodiversity, and holism. The paper discusses how these systems contribute to more sustainable and resilient communities through community development processes like relationship building, genuine participation, inclusiveness, resource mobilization, and creating space for knowledge sharing.

Julie Guthman, Amy Wilson Morris, Patricia Allen · Rural Sociology · United States (California)

Survey and interview research conducted in California during 2004–2005 examined the extent to which CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture) and farmers' markets address food security. Managers of these institutions generally supported the idea of improving food affordability and most made efforts to do so, though these efforts varied with institutional capacity. Some managers tempered their interest in supporting food security goals with concerns such as the primary need to support farmers.

André Mfoukou-Ntsakala, Michel Bitémo, Niko Speybroeck, Guido Van Huylenbroeck, É. Thys · Ghent University Academic Bibliography (Ghent University) · Congo (Brazzaville)

This study analyzed the technical and socio-economic specificities of urban agriculture and its role in household subsistence in a post-conflict region in Central Africa. It was based on a 2002 survey of 710 randomly selected households in Brazzaville, Congo. About one-third of Brazzaville households engage in urban agriculture, with 29.5% in crop production and 8.8% in animal production, predominantly aviculture. The 1997 conflict negatively impacted urban agricultural production, especially animal production, and urban agriculture is dominated by subsistence and poor households. While crop production is mainly for subsistence, animal production is more income-driven, and constraints like input provision, theft, and soil degradation limit productivity.

Caryn Abrahams · ERA · South Africa

This paper reviews existing literature on Alternative Food Networks (AFN), discussing their multifaceted foci. AFNs have been presented as a response to conventional agribusiness or a transition towards an alternative era, encompassing short food supply chains, local food supply systems, direct farm retail, and community-supported agriculture. Defining characteristics of AFNs include "fresh," "diverse," "organic," "small-scale," "local," and "sustainable," which contrast with the "processed," "mass production," and "long food supply chains" of conventional systems.

Y. Arocha, B. Piñol, B. Picornell, R. Almeida, P. Jones, E. Boa · Plant Pathology · Cuba

A 2005 survey in the 'Alamar' organoponic in Havana province, Cuba, observed typical phytoplasma-symptoms of little leaf and witches' broom in all basil (Ocimum basilicum) plants. DNA analysis of leaf samples from 27 symptomatic plants confirmed an association with a 16SrI group phytoplasma (Aster Yellows; 'Candidatus Phytoplasma asteris'). This report from Cuba is the first record of this new disease, for which the name basil little leaf is proposed.

Thomas Cousins · The International Journal of African Historical Studies · Tanzania (Mwanza)

Karen Coen Flynn's ethnography of Mwanza, Tanzania, explores experiences of deprivation and survival strategies, including urban farming, in this rapidly expanding city. Using a large number of qualitative interviews, the study examines changing consumption patterns, household organization of labor and kinship regarding food, and the gendered character of household labor. It also considers how street children and adults secure survival, presenting a typology of survival strategies.

Tatsurô Suehara · Institutional Repositories DataBase (IRDB) · Japan (Kyoto)

This article discusses the historical role of urban agriculture in Kyoto, an ancient Japanese city. It points out that Kyoto, being a city without ramparts, allowed urban areas to be easily converted into agricultural fields during the medieval period, suggesting it may have been the birthplace of Japanese urban agriculture. Over its 1200-year history, urban agriculture in Kyoto flexibly changed its form according to residents' needs, and agricultural fields played a significant role in the city's history.

Patricia Allen, Julie Guthman, Amy Wilson Morris · eScholarship (California Digital Library) · United States (California)

A research brief examining whether alternative food initiatives (AFIs) such as community supported agriculture (CSA) and farmers' markets can meet the food security needs of low-income consumers, based on interviews and surveys of farmers' market and CSA managers throughout California. The authors conclude that AFIs are not, and cannot be, substitutes for state entitlements in meeting the food security needs of low-income people.

Cristiane Cardoso Pessôa, Marcelino de Souza, Ilaine Schuch · Segurança Alimentar e Nutricional · Brazil

This study interviewed 38 and later 20 families in five neighborhoods of Santa Maria, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, on the contribution of urban agriculture to household income and diet. Results showed that the activity does not necessarily provide additional income but does produce meaningful savings, since certain foods no longer need to be purchased; the food produced supplies important nutrients but lacks foods richer in minerals, which the families do not grow themselves, and the activity functions more as subsistence, non-market production that supplements diets with fresh food relatively free of industrial contaminants.

Heather Mair · Leisure/Loisir · Global

This theoretical paper examines the potential for community development to serve as a vehicle for politics, resistance, and social change, arguing that change-oriented efforts — from community-led initiatives limiting "big box store" encroachment to community-supported agriculture and new forms of media — create important opportunities for public dialogue about, and expression of, power, equality, and democracy. It explores reconsidering the spaces where politically oriented leisure activities occur through the concepts of deep democracy, social learning, empowerment, and resistance. Drawing on Shaw (2000), the author argues that examining these community-led struggles counters the view of leisure as increasingly bound up in individualized, consumption-oriented activity, and can deepen leisure studies by recognizing, understanding, and validating its political nature.