Research & reports
Peer-reviewed research and reports on community urban agriculture, food education, composting, welfare and more.
Theme
Critical findings
1177 results(19 / 48)
Past, Present and Future of Urban Agriculture in Cameroon: Major Contemporary Challenges (1993-2017)
2022Theodore Ngoufo Sogang, Youssouf Monkouop · Journal of Agricultural Chemistry and Environment · Cameroon
This article proposes a framework for understanding the past, present, and future of urban agriculture in Cameroon, focusing on the period from 1993 to 2017. It examines the subject through five fundamental notions: International Relations and Geopolitical Agriculture, Urban Economic Agriculture, Environmental and Food Climate Stakes, and Science and Culture adapted to agricultural and food mutations. The study aims to provide a comparative review of agriculture in transition by integrating historical, social, economic, and diplomatic perspectives.
Food educationFood sovereignty & justiceHealthEconomicsScaling Local Bottom-Up Innovations through Value Co-Creation
2022Chiara Marradi, Ingrid Mulder · Sustainability · Global
This work addresses the challenge of scaling bottom-up initiatives, such as urban farming, into new local ecosystems, noting that these initiatives often struggle due to socio-cultural challenges. It introduces a three-phased approach to enable knowledge exchange and collaboration across cultures and ecosystems. The approach defines common scalability criteria and frames scaling as a multi-step learning process to bridge cognitive and context gaps, contributing to transferable impact-driven scaling strategies.
CommunityPolicyEconomicsCommunity Gardens in Budapest, Challenges and Opportunities
2022Amine Mseddi, Mariann Simon · European Journal of Architecture and Urban Planning · Hungary (Budapest)
This paper analyzes four community gardens on vacant inner-city plots in Budapest, Hungary, to understand their challenges and opportunities. It found that these gardens face significant obstacles including temporary status, changing political circumstances, and varying local population attitudes. Despite these challenges, NGOs and local communities play a crucial role in sustaining these projects and raising awareness.
Governance failureCommunityPolicyEconomicsEdible City—A New Approach for Upscaling Local Food Supply? The Case of Andernach, Germany
2021Artmann M., Sartison K. · Making Green Cities: Concepts, Challenges and Practice (Springer, Cities and Nature series), 173-194 · Global
A case study analyzing the 'Edible City' of Andernach, Germany, as a multifunctional productive green space where citizens can harvest freely in public areas. Drawing on interviews with key initiators, it shows that the project generates multifunctional social, ecological and economic benefits addressing urban challenges such as food security, biodiversity and social cohesion, and examines its potential for upscaling local food supply.
CommunityFood educationWelfareEconomicsBiodiversityConsumer attitudes to vertical farming (indoor plant factory with artificial lighting) in China, Singapore, UK, and USA: A multi-method study
2021Ares G., Ha B., Jaeger S. R. · Food Research International 150:110811 · Global
Examines consumer attitudes to vertical farming across the USA, UK, Singapore and China using online surveys and a novel text-highlighting method, contrasting perceived benefits like sustainability with concerns over price and naturalness across markets.
EconomicsGrowing-Service Systems: New Business Models for Modular Urban-Vertical Farming
2021Martin M., Bustamante M. J. · Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems 5:787281 · Sweden
Proposes and analyzes 'growing-service systems'—a product-service-system business model for modular urban-vertical farming—exploring how service-oriented value provision beyond product sales can create new commercial opportunities for the sector.
EconomicsThe global rise of urban rooftop agriculture: A review of worldwide cases
2021Appolloni E., Orsini F., Specht K., Thomaier S., Sanyé-Mengual E., Pennisi G., Gianquinto G. · Journal of Cleaner Production 296:126556 · Global
Systematic review of rooftop agriculture cases worldwide, mapping diverse business forms including commercial and social models, and their integration into urban food policy and planning.
EconomicsPolicyFood security: The role of urban and peri-urban agriculture. A case of Dar es Salaam City, Tanzania
2021Malekela A. A., Nyomora A. M. S. · International Journal of Biosciences (INNSPUB) 18(6):204-214 · Tanzania
This case study in Dar es Salaam finds urban and peri-urban agriculture positively contributes to food security: 84% of crop-producing farmers engaged primarily to obtain food and income, underscoring UPA's role for the urban poor.
WelfareEconomicsGlobal mapping of urban-rural catchment areas reveals unequal access to services
2021Cattaneo, A., Nelson, A., McMenomy, T. · PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) 118(2) · Global
The foundational paper on the Urban-Rural Catchment Areas (URCA) typology, mapping the urban-rural continuum worldwide as 30 classes (7 city sizes × 3 travel-time bands) and showing unequal access to services.
PolicyEconomicsEconomic and Social Development along the Urban-Rural Continuum: New Opportunities to Inform Policy
2021Cattaneo A., Adukia A., Brown D.L., Christiaensen L., Evans D.K., Haakenstad A.M., McMenomy T., Partridge M., Vaz S., Weiss D.J. · World Development / World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 9756 · Global
About 25% of the world's people live in the peri-urban areas of small and mid-size cities. Proximity to large cities is strongly correlated with lower poverty, while mid-size-city fringes face a 'peri-urban penalty'. Establishes URCA as a core policy framework.
PolicyEconomicsAs the city grows, what do farmers do? A systematic review of urban and peri-urban agriculture under rapid urban growth across the Global South
2021Follmann, A., Willkomm, M., Dannenberg, P. · Landscape and Urban Planning 215, 104186 · Global
A meta-analysis of 92 studies across 83 Global South cities, showing that peri-urban agriculture under rapid urbanization faces both pressures—displacement/marginalization of farmland and expansion/intensification driven by rising food demand.
EconomicsCommunity gardening in Hellinikon as a resistance struggle against neoliberal urbanism: spatial autogestion and the right to the city in post-crisis Athens, Greece
2021Apostolopoulou 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.
CommunityPolicyWelfareEconomicsAssembling agroecological socio-natures: a political ecology analysis of urban and peri-urban agriculture in Rosario, Argentina
2021Hammelman 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.
CommunityPolicyEconomicsA systematic scoping review of the impacts of community food production initiatives in Kenya, Cameroon, and South Africa
2021Hutton 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 educationLow-Cost Smart Indoor Greenhouse for Urban Farming
2021· Computational Science and Its Applications – ICCSA 2021 (LNCS) · Global
Presents the design of a low-cost smart indoor greenhouse to cultivate herbs and vegetables with minimum human intervention, monitored by a web application. It builds on IoT-based monitoring systems for indoor micro-climate horticulture.
DIYEconomicsDesign and Implementation of an LED Automatic Lighting System for Plant Factories
2021· IEEE Photonics Journal · Global
Design and implementation of an LED automatic lighting system for plant factories that provides automatic dimming and multi-band colour mixing, adjusting light intensity and colour to plant needs to increase crop yield.
DIYEconomicsEvaluation of Lettuce Growth, Yield, and Economic Viability Grown Vertically on Unutilized Building Wall in Dhaka City
2021· Frontiers in Sustainable Cities · Bangladesh (Dhaka)
Evaluates the growth, yield and economic viability of lettuce grown vertically on a building wall in Dhaka, finding a green-leaf cultivar in an organic medium significantly outperformed other treatments.
DIYEconomicsExpanding the Level of Technological Readiness for a Low-Cost Vertical Hydroponic System
2021· Inventions · Global
Presents a design advancing the technological readiness of a low-cost vertical hydroponic system using lighter, cheaper materials such as aluminum and PVC with integrated drip irrigation for resource-limited settings.
DIYEconomicsClosed-Loop Biodigesters on Small-Scale Farms in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: A Review
2021Kulkarni I., Zang J., Leandro W., Parikh P., Adler I., Da Fonseca-Zang W., Campos L. · Water · Low- and middle-income countries (review)
A review of closed-loop biodigesters on small-scale farms in low- and middle-income countries, converting organic waste into energy and nutrient-rich digestate fertilizer integrated with food production.
Organic cycleFood lossEconomicsSearching for the plot: narrative self-making and urban agriculture during the economic crisis in Slovenia
2021Petra Matijevic · Agriculture and Human Values · Slovenia (Ljubljana)
An ethnographic study in Ljubljana, Slovenia, carried out between summer 2014 and autumn 2015: informal conversations with 57 growers across 13 sites, 25 semi-structured life-history interviews, and participant observation on the researcher's own rented plot. Plot-taking surged during the post-2009 debt crisis (an 8% economic contraction; unemployment rising from 7% to 13% by 2013), and one gardening association had roughly 350 member households by 2015, over 40% of whom joined after 2010. The author argues, however, that this surge did not work as household food or income provisioning. Newcomers who took up plots for economic reasons frequently abandoned them within a year; those who did grow food continued to rely on market produce; and people at the very bottom of the economic scale had neither the skills, tools nor time to feed themselves from a plot. Growers were strongly opposed to selling surpluses and gave them away instead. The paper concludes that urban gardening functioned as a narrative practice repairing biographical rupture after unemployment or retirement, not as an informal economy.
EconomicsCommunityWelfareReviewing financing barriers and strategies for urban nature-based solutions
2021Helen Toxopeus, Friedemann Polzin · Journal of Environmental Management · Global
A systematic review of academic literature identified key barriers and strategies for financing urban nature-based solutions (NBS), including urban agriculture. Two overarching barriers were found: a lack of coordination between private and public financiers, and difficulties in integrating NBS benefits into valuation and accounting methods. The review concluded that an integrated accounting and valuation framework for NBS is currently lacking, and strategies often focus on encouraging co-financing from private beneficiaries.
Economic viabilityEconomicsPolicyCommunityUrban Agriculture on the Rooftop
2021Sumita Ghosh · · Global
This research conducted a desktop review and analyzed six international case studies of rooftop urban farms, community gardens, and home gardens. The analysis found that productive landscapes already exist on city rooftops, contributing positively to community, environment, ecology, economy, and society. Planning and designing rooftop gardens in dense urban areas could foster place-making through urban agriculture.
DIYCommunityClimate changeEconomicsBiodiversityPromoting Urban Agriculture and Its Opportunities and Challenges—A Global Review
2021Chethika Gunasiri Wadumestrige Dona, Geetha Mohan, Kensuke Fukushi · Sustainability · Global
This systematic literature review analyzed 54 articles on urban agriculture, examining socio-economic context, agriculture models, opportunities, and challenges. The review found that academic literature favors community gardens in developed countries and gives comparatively less attention to identifying challenges, benefit groups, and government support for urban agriculture.
Governance failureCommunityHealthEconomicsPolicyEnvironmental and social life cycle assessment of growing media for urban rooftop farming
2021Susana Toboso‐Chavero, Cristina Madrid‐López, Gara Villalba, Xavier Gabarrell, Arne Björn Hückstädt, Matthias Finkbeiner, Annekatrin Lehmann · The International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment · Global
A comprehensive environmental and social life cycle assessment of perlite, peat, and coir growing media, imported to Spain from Turkey, Germany, and the Philippines respectively, was conducted for urban rooftop farming. Environmentally, coir had the lowest burden, while perlite had the highest impacts due to mining and transport. Socially, peat performed best, but coir showed the worst scores in community infrastructure and human rights, and perlite performed lowest in health and safety.
Equity & displacementDigital agricultureClimate changeEconomicsFood sovereignty & justiceUrban Oasis
2021Christina Ergas · · Cuba
This chapter examines Cuba's urban agricultural food production, which developed through top-down government initiatives that later decentralized and subsidized local efforts in response to resource scarcity. While Cuban urban farmworkers' cooperatives enable local residents to sell produce at low costs, the program still faces social environmental stumbling blocks despite its successes in achieving high human development with a small ecological footprint.
Governance failureFood sovereignty & justiceCommunityPolicyEconomics