Research & reports
Peer-reviewed research and reports on community urban agriculture, food education, composting, welfare and more.
Theme
Critical findings
7626 results(129 / 306)
Incorporating user preferences in rooftop food-energy-water production through integrated sustainability assessment *
2021Susana Toboso‐Chavero, Cristina Madrid‐López, Xavier Gabarrell, Gara Villalba · Environmental Research Communications · Spain (Barcelona)
Implementation strategies for food-energy-water production systems on urban rooftops were evaluated in a typical housing estate in the Metropolitan Area of Barcelona, comprising 201 buildings and 13,466 inhabitants. Residents tended to choose strategies providing energy and water over the food production potential of rooftops. However, environmental assessment indicated that vegetable production alternatives were the least impactful, meeting 42-56% of residents' fresh produce demand and reducing environmental impacts by 24-37 kg CO2 eq m-2 per rooftop per year. This suggests residents were primarily concerned with energy expenses rather than food insecurity or social cohesion.
Limited or null effectDIYCommunityClimate changeEconomicsKomunikasi Pemberdayaan Komunikasi Pemberdayaan dalam Program Urban Farming di Kampung Lukis Ramanuju Kecamatan Citangkil Kota Cilegon Banten
2021Rahmi Winangsih, Rahmi Mulyasih, Marthalena, Rethorika Berthanilla, Ahmad Sururi · Bantenese - Jurnal Pengabdian Masyarakat · Indonesia (Cilegon)
This paper reports on an empowerment communication program within an urban farming initiative targeting women in Kampung Lukis Ramanuju, Cilegon City, Indonesia. The program aims to empower women to meet family and community food needs by cultivating high-economic-value crops like vegetables and fruits. As a result of the mentorship, the participating group became capable of producing crops for personal consumption.
CommunityWelfareFood educationEconomicsPráticas de economia solidária em iniciativas de agricultura urbana do concelho de Lisboa. Os casos do Vale de Chelas, da Alta de Lisboa e da Horta do Baldio
2021Paizinho, C., Maria de Fátima Ferreiro · Repositório do ISCTE-IUL · Portugal (Lisbon)
This study identified solidarity economy practices in three urban gardens in Lisbon: Vale de Chelas, Alta de Lisboa, and Horta do Baldio. Quantitative and qualitative methods, including surveys of 42 users, semi-directive interviews with 3 stakeholders, and participant observation, were employed. Out of 35 evaluated practices, 31 were identified, with seven deemed "very relevant" and four "relevant." Organic production, contributions to social cohesion and health, knowledge sharing among users, promotion of reciprocal relationships, and democratic decision-making were highlighted. The remaining 20 practices were considered "less relevant."
CommunityEconomicsFood sovereignty & justicePolicyPROJETO DE APOIO AOS SISTEMAS AGROECOLÓGICOS: UNIDADES PRODUTIVAS DA AGRICULTURA URBANA COLETIVA/COMUNITÁRIA (U-AU-CL) DE BELO HORIZONTE
2021Ana Júlia Maia Mairink, Alice Menezes Monteiro, Rejane Magiag Loura, Tiago Almeida Nogueira · · Brazil (Belo Horizonte)
This study provided academic and technical support for designing low-environmental-impact solutions to infrastructure deficiencies at the "Coqueiro Verde" Collective/Community Urban Agriculture Production Unit in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, to develop urban resilience strategies. A participatory diagnosis identified problems such as water scarcity and mismanagement, lack of sanitation, and the need for easy implementation and low cost. Primary solutions selected were the dimensioning of an Evapotranspiration Tank and the modular design of a support point based on soil-cement blocks.
CommunityClimate changePELATIHAN DAN PENYULUHAN MANFAAT CIPLUKAN BAGI KESEHATAN DAN BUDIDAYANYA DI KECAMATAN SUMBERWRINGIN DAN KECAMATAN MAESAN KABUPATEN BONDOWOSO
2021Tuti Kusumaningsih, Rini Devijаnti Ridwаn, Sidarningsih Sidarningsih · Jurnal Layanan Masyarakat (Journal of Public Services) · Indonesia
In the Maesan and Sumberwringin sub-districts of Bondowoso Regency, Indonesia, community groups lacked knowledge and information regarding the health benefits, economic value, and cultivation of ciplukan (Physalis angulata L). To address this, the Community Service Team of the Faculty of Dentistry, Universitas Airlangga, designed an activity to provide counseling and promote ciplukan as a medicinal plant, offer information on its health benefits and cultivation, and distribute ciplukan plants as an initial step. This activity received a very good response from the local community.
Food educationCommunityEconomicsHealthA youth perspective ongreen local urban futures
2021Joshua Amponsem, Nathalie Sänger, Marie-Claire Graf · Edward Elgar Publishing eBooks · Global
This chapter presents youth perspectives on opportunities and barriers for green urban transformation (GUT) in urban centers. It highlights best-practice examples from Germany and Ghana to promote self-sufficient urban food production and zero-waste communities. The discussion focuses on overcoming barriers through youth governance, a post-COVID green recovery pathway, and making GUT knowledge accessible to young people.
CommunityClimate changeFood sovereignty & justiceFood educationHealth
2021Anne Forbes, Vinesh Chandra, Linda Pfeiffer, Rachel Sheffield · Cambridge University Press eBooks · Australia
This textbook, "STEM Education in the Primary School," introduces pre-service teachers to STEM theory, skills, and practice using a project-based learning approach. It integrates STEM elements with the Australian Curriculum through a school garden project case study, exploring topics like health, shelter, and space with age-appropriate examples. The text connects current STEM education research to teaching practice, covering assessment, learning spaces, and community.
Food educationCommunityThe Urban and Peri-Urban Farms (UPFs) Relational Model: The Case of Greater Poland Voivodeship, Poland
2021Joanna Wiśniewska-Paluszak, Grzegorz Paluszak · Agriculture · Poland
This study investigated how nine urban and peri-urban farms (UPFs) in Greater Poland Voivodeship, Poland, formed business relationships in food networks, surveying managers and owners in 2019 and 2020. The research identified UPF business relationships and key features of their networks, leading to the development of a conceptual relational UPF model. This model indicates that diversification of activities, competitiveness of resources, and formality of organizational structures form the basis of farm businesses, while integration of activities, sharing of resources, and collaboration among actors form the basis of relationships.
Peri-urban agricultureEconomicsCommunity12. On Empty Spaces, Silence, and the Pause
2021Rebecca Amato · Amsterdam University Press eBooks · United States (New York City)
This chapter discusses the historical production and perception of "empty space" in New York City, from settler colonialism to gentrification, driven by techniques like filtering and declaring vacancy. It highlights how the acceleration of development to maintain world city status threatens alternative visions like cooperative centers and community gardens. These alternative uses are presented as models for inclusive cities, despite being under threat.
Equity & displacementCommunityPolicyEconomicsBlocking out the rabbit holes: Photovoice and community gardening as a healing space for veterans
2021Karen Besterman‐Dahan, Sarah Bradley, Nora B. Arriola, Kiersten Downs · Wellbeing Space and Society · United States
In collaboration with a local garden, an evaluation explored the perceived benefits of gardening for veterans from two Veterans Affairs (VA) programs in the United States. Using focus groups and photovoice methods, four main benefits of participation were revealed: supporting mental and emotional wellbeing, improving socialization and comradery, nurturing life and identity, and learning new skills.
CommunityHealthWelfareTrend Analysis of Grow-Your-Own Using Social Network Analysis: Focusing on Hashtags on Instagram
2021Yumin Park, Yong-Wook Shin · Journal of people, plants, and environment · Global
A study analyzed the trends and network structure of 'grow-your-own (GYO)' activities by collecting 6,388 Instagram posts containing '#gyo' and '#growyourown' hashtags from June 13, 2020, to April 13, 2021, using social network analysis. The results showed that users expressed preference and interest in GYO through various word combinations, positive emotions and pride through gardening-related hashtags, and participated in urban gardening, indicating trends towards self-sufficiency and sustainable living.
DIYHealthCommunityFood educationDifferences in motivations and social impacts across urban agriculture types: Case studies in Europe and the US
2021Caitlin K. Kirby, Kathrin Specht, Runrid Fox-Kämper, Jason K. Hawes, Nevin Cohen, Silvio Caputo, Rositsa T. Ilieva, Agnès Lelièvre, Lidia Poniży, Victoria Schoen, Chris Blythe · Landscape and Urban Planning · Europe; United States
This study quantitatively assessed motivations and social impacts across different urban agriculture types using survey data from 74 sites in Europe and the US. It identified four scales: general wellbeing, nutritional health, economic interests, and socialization motivations. Multivariate analysis revealed significant differences in motivations and reported impacts across urban agriculture types. Participants with stronger economic interests, socialization motivations, or who were plot owners/operators reported greater general wellbeing impacts.
HealthEconomicsCommunityFood educationMeasuring Community Green Inequity: A Fine-Scale Assessment of Beijing Urban Area
2021Yuyang Zhang, Qilin Wu, Lei Wu, Li Yan · Land · China
A study noting that although exposure to green space benefits residents' physical and mental health, its spatial distribution is inequitable, and that existing green equity studies typically rely on administrative units, a macro-scale approach that overlooks the fine-scale green spaces (such as community gardens and lawns) residents encounter most often, risking biased estimates. Using the community as the unit of analysis, the study drew on three types of green-space data - fine-scale green spaces within communities, surrounding large-scale parks, and streetscape imagery - and applied a proposed set of 11 metrics across morphology, visibility, and accessibility to 4,544 communities in urban Beijing. Through spatial visualization, spatial clustering, radar plots, and correlation analysis, the study found large differences and complementary relationships between metric categories, similarities within the same category, and confirmed inequity in green space across regions of the city as urbanization proceeds.
Equity & displacementCommunityPolicyCircular Approaches in Small-Scale Food Production
2021Petra Schneider, Vincent Rochell, Kay Plat, A. Jaworski · Circular Economy and Sustainability · Global
A chapter starting from the premise that food production is one of the world's major consumers of water and energy, and that greater efficiency in food production is needed given population growth. It states that circular approaches have a long tradition in food production but that industrial farming has interrupted traditional cycle-closed farming approaches, leading to various environmental challenges. The chapter outlines the basics of traditional gardening and farming approaches and describes how their characteristics have been adapted in modern farming systems including aquaponics, permaculture, urban farming, and recovered traditional farming systems.
CommunityOrganic cycleL’engagement militant dans la recherche en agriculture urbaine. Réflexions sur le contexte français au miroir duscholar activismnord-américain
2021Joëlle Salomon Cavin, Valérie Boisvert, Simone Ranocchiari, Quentin Dusserre-Bresson, Monique Poulot · Natures Sciences Sociétés · Global
A collective reflection on militant/activist engagement in urban agriculture research in France and the United States, based on a qualitative literature review complemented by a series of seminars. It finds that US research on urban agriculture, rooted in critical and militant geography, has concentrated on community gardening and promoted food justice, whereas in the French context the spaces and actors studied are far more diverse but critical and political reflexivity is comparatively less developed. The article concludes with a call for greater critical reflexivity in this field.
CommunityPolicyFields, Meadows, and Gardens – an Integral Part of the City
2021Åsa Ahrland · University of Vienna · Europe
A historical study by the University of Vienna focused on Södermalm, a central part of Stockholm, Sweden, that for a long time combined industrial production, trade, craft and cultivation. It shows that agricultural fields there did not disappear until after World War II, challenging the common assumption that nineteenth-century rectilinear town planning was the main factor that ended urban agriculture. The study argues that the view of agriculture as incompatible with modern city life, together with the "green city" concept built on parks and other green spaces, was tied to interpretations of modernity in the Swedish welfare state's emphasis on rationality and efficiency, which produced a dichotomy between urbanity and rurality.
CommunityPolicyUrban–rural linkageExploring the Potential Risk of Heavy Metal Pollution of Edible Cultivated Plants in Urban Gardening Contexts Using a Citizen Science Approach in the Project “Heavy Metal City-Zen”
2021Elisabeth Ziss, Wolfgang Friesl‐Hanl, Sophia Götzinger, Christoph Noller, Markus Puschenreiter, Andrea Watzinger, Rebecca Hood‐Nowotny · Sustainability · Europe
In the "Heavy Metal City-Zen" citizen science project, community members in urban gardens in Vienna, Austria collaborated on collecting soil and plant samples to assess heavy metal contamination risk. Trace metal concentrations were generally below guideline thresholds, but at a few garden sites soil concentrations of lead, cadmium and zinc exceeded Austrian recommended limits, and at two sites plant trace metal concentrations exceeded European food standard limits; the project proposes expanding the citizen-led sampling to all of Vienna so new gardens can assess local soil risk before planting.
Contamination & food safetyCommunityHealthThe Political Ecology of James and Grace Lee Boggs
2021Brian Bartell · Rethinking Marxism · United States
This essay in Rethinking Marxism revisits the writings and Detroit urban agriculture activism of James and Grace Lee Boggs, arguing that their 1960s theorization linked automation, land and racialized dispossession under racial capitalism, and that they called for postgrowth, postscarcity economies built on urban land marked by Fordist-era waste and toxicity.
PolicyCommunityFood sovereignty & justiceUji Produksi 5 Varietas Tanaman Melon (Cucumis melo L) Pada Sistem Pertanian Kota (Urban Farming)
2021Fauzian Gilang Prananda, Sumeru Ashari · Jurnal Produksi Tanaman · Indonesia
A randomized complete block design trial at 550 m elevation on the rooftop of the Central Building, Faculty of Agriculture, Universitas Brawijaya, Indonesia, grown from June to September 2019, compared production of five melon (Cucumis melo) varieties (Melindo-15, Gracia, Madesta, Action, Glamour), measuring female flower count and timing, leaf count, plant length, stem diameter, fruit weight and fruit reduction with ANOVA and 5% BNJ follow-up tests. Growth and fruit yield differed among varieties, with Melindo showing the best production potential.
DIYCommunityFood educationHORTAS URBANAS NO BRASIL: EVOLUÇÃO, DESAFIOS E PERSPECTIVAS
2021Athayde Leite de Sá Filho, Mariana Gomes Kottas, José Edilson dos Santos Júnior, Vivianni Marques Leite dos Santos · Journal on Innovation and Sustainability RISUS · Brazil
This literature-based review of urban gardens (hortas urbanas) in Brazil describes the sector's evolution, challenges and outlook, arguing that Brazil has favorable natural conditions and that urban gardens are among the fastest-growing components of the country's agroecological sector, while identifying the need for incentive policies, public awareness, farming-space planning and greater research investment as conditions for further consolidation.
CommunityPolicyFood sovereignty & justiceOrganic cycleResidents’ Perceptions of a Community-Led Intervention on Health, Well-Being, and Community Inclusion Through Photovoice
2021Clare Jackson, Sara Ronzi · Health Education & Behavior · United Kingdom
A 2021 study used photovoice methods to explore residents' perceptions and experiences of "The Grange," a community-led, multifaceted intervention incorporating a community hub and garden in a small, high-deprivation, poor-health area of North-West England. Through photographs, semi-structured interviews, a focus group, and a photo exhibition, it engaged intensively with six residents, who identified positive and negative aspects of activities such as the community garden and community shop and communicated recommendations directly to policymakers at the exhibition event. Participants reported valuing the culture of inclusivity and friendship associated with The Grange more than the specific activities themselves.
CommunityHealthWelfareIMPLEMANTATION ENTREPRENEURSHIP EDUCATION ONLINE-LEARNING PROGRAM TO CREATE FARMER ENTREPRENEUR THROUGH URBAN FARMING
2021Harefan Arief, Mochamad Soelton, Eko Tama Putra Saratian, Tafiprios Tafiprios, Astrid Puspaningrum, Mugiono Mugiono · ICCD · Indonesia
A 2021 report on a community service activity in Indonesia during the COVID-19 pandemic delivered one month of online entrepreneurship education and training to a youth organization (Karang Taruna). Focused on marketing organic hydroponic vegetable urban farming products via information-technology-based programs, the training aimed to build participants' entrepreneurial knowledge and skills; the activity reportedly increased the youth group's creativity and motivation and produced a connection model for microenterprise entrepreneurship.
Food educationCommunityEconomicsEnabling Urban Social Farming: the need for radical green infrastructure in the city
2021Louise Mitchell, Lawrence Houston, Michael Hardman, Michelle Howarth, Penny A. Cook · Cogent Social Sciences · Global
Against the backdrop of health services becoming stretched, particularly in ageing populations in the Global North, this paper discusses Green Infrastructure (GI) interventions including the development of social farms in urban areas and deprived communities. Social farms use farming practices as spaces for therapeutic outcomes such as care, rehabilitation, and education, framed within the concept of social prescribing alongside community gardens and urban farms as non-medical approaches. Noting that social farming and social prescribing research is currently concentrated in Scandinavian countries and the USA, the paper focuses on increased UK attention to the concept, including in DEFRA's 25-year Environment Plan. Findings show an agglomeration of social farming sites in rural rather than urban contexts, and the paper discusses tools and barriers for urban development of the practice.
CommunityHealthFood educationPolicyFlaminia Paddeu, Sous les pavés, la terre. Agricultures urbaines et résistances dans les métropoles
2021Ronan Crézé · Lectures · Europe
This is a review of a book by geographer Flaminia Paddeu that presents an immersion into urban agriculture through observation of multiple field experiences, described as contributing to the institutionalization of urban agricultural commons. The book's central subject is the land, understood both as soil (urban and agricultural) and as the site hosting ecosystems. While this subject has already been explored by sociologists, agronomists, and anthropologists, the author develops her own reflection on it.
CommunityPolicyFood sovereignty & justiceThe Perceptions of Home Gardening Zone Program and the Potential Impacts on Household Food Security
2021Sri Adiningsih, Siti Rahayu Nadhiroh, Farapti · Acta Scientifci Nutritional Health · Indonesia
This 2021 study examines Indonesia's Home Gardening Zone (HGZ) program, launched by the Ministry of Agriculture to increase dietary diversity and food security, with the aim of assessing why community gardeners participate in the program and exploring its potential impacts on community and household food security.
CommunityFood sovereignty & justiceWelfare