Research & reports

Zhong Xing, Canhui Cheng, Yu Qiao, Junyue Yang, Hao Ma, Jian Yang, Xiaomin Du · International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health · China (Chongqing)

This study investigated informal community growing in Yongchuan, Chongqing, Southwest China, using a field survey and semantic differential questionnaire. It found that growers, mainly vulnerable groups, use traditional methods to cultivate diverse fruits and vegetables on barren slopes, creating a local food supply for economic gain and green food acquisition. Both growers and non-growers expressed satisfaction with food supply and economic benefits, but dissatisfaction with environmental and social benefits and the planting process.

Ibrahima Thiaw, Cheikh Faye, Honoré Dacosta, Diène Dione · International Journal of Environment Agriculture and Biotechnology · Senegal (Dakar)

A study involving 120 market gardening actors in four market gardening production areas of the Dakar region (Ouakam, Parcelles Assainies, Grand-Yoff, and Hann-Bel-Air) revealed that market gardening, mainly carried out by women, is a commercial activity whose monetary income significantly exceeds the minimum wage in Senegal. While this activity helps women cover urban living expenses, market gardeners face problems such as COVID-19, lack of water, land pressure, pest proliferation, and lack of training on cultivation techniques.

S.B. Jilcott Pitts, R.A. Seguin, J. Kolodinsky, E.H. Morgan, M.J. White, M. Sitaker, J.T. McGuirt, W. Wang, K.L. Hanson, A.S. Ammerman · UNC Libraries · United States

This study examined perspectives on food access among 53 low-income families with children participating in a cost-offset community-supported agriculture (CO-CSA) program across nine communities in the US states of New York, North Carolina, Washington, and Vermont. Focus groups revealed that while produce quantity was abundant and affordability was generally good, payment timing was a barrier for some, and unfamiliar foods and quick spoilage hindered acceptability. The study concluded that CO-CSA may facilitate increased access to fruits and vegetables, but perceptions of positive diet change may be limited by challenges in incorporating share pick-up into regular travel patterns and meal planning, with food waste concerns being particularly acute for families with constrained resources.

Ade Astri Muliasari, Hidayati Fatchur R, Faranita Ratih L, Doni Sahat Tua Manalu · Community Development Journal Jurnal Pengabdian Masyarakat · Indonesia (Bogor)

An urban farming program was implemented in Cihideung Ilir Village, Bogor Regency, Indonesia, during the COVID-19 pandemic, aiming for food security. This community service activity targeted female cadres of PKK (Family Welfare Empowerment), providing education on the importance of urban farming and training in cultivation skills. Program evaluation results indicated success, evidenced by the participants' enthusiasm.

Michele Hartmann Feyh · Revista Verde de Agroecologia e Desenvolvimento Sustentável · Brazil

A community garden was implemented in Vila Buritis II, Planaltina, Brasília, Federal District, Brazil, a socially vulnerable urban area with low purchasing power. The garden transformed an idle area into a productive space, planting 27 edible species, and 30 to 40 residents regularly visit to collect food. However, the maintenance and increase of garden productivity still require technical assistance and resources.

Gamuchirai Chakona · · South Africa

A study surveyed 314 randomly selected households in four peri-urban settlements in South Africa to assess dietary diversity and food security. Findings revealed generally low dietary diversity and high levels of food insecurity across all sites, with male-headed households experiencing worse conditions than female-headed households. Food insecurity was linked to high poverty, unemployment, and low education levels.

Contingent Horizons · Contingent Horizons The York University Student Journal of Anthropology · Canada (Winnipeg)

This paper uses the Rainbow Community Garden in Winnipeg as a case study to discuss the benefits and challenges of community gardening for new immigrant and refugee families. Through a literature review and interviews with gardeners, the study emphasizes the role of food and community gardens in facilitating cross-cultural interactions, providing culturally appropriate food, and expressing cultural identity. The main conclusion is that for new immigrant and refugee participation, a garden is not only physical soil but also an important place for practicing culture and engaging in meaningful cross-cultural interaction beneficial for adjusting to a new life in Canada.

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.

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.

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.

F. Becot, K.L. Hanson, R.A. Seguin, A.S. Ammerman, J. Kolodinsky, J.T. McGuirt, S.B. Jilcott Pitts, M. Demarco · Carolina Digital Repository (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) · United States

A modified exploratory choice experiment, embedded within in-depth interviews, examined willingness to participate in a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program under varying price, frequency, food quantity, and accessibility conditions among 42 low-income adults with at least one child in the household in North Carolina, New York, Vermont, and Washington. Comparing summed willingness across conditions, the analysis suggests the ideal CSA would be a full-sized share of eight to nine mixed items, distributed every other week, priced under US$15, no more than 10 minutes farther than the supermarket from home, and preferably cheaper than but no more than 20% pricier than supermarket prices.

Neven Tandarić, Charles Watkins, Christopher D. Ives · Urban forestry & urban greening · Europe

Interviewing users of community and allotment gardens in Zagreb, Croatia, this study explored motivations for gardening and how different forms of garden management shape the generation of cultural ecosystem services (CES), supplementing and contextualizing responses with interviews of urban planners, academics, and gardening activists. Using the Fish et al. (2016) framework to identify CES in interviews, the study grouped gardeners' motivations into six categories: escape, usefulness and tradition, home-grown produce, socializing, wellness, and private oasis. Food production was found to be only of secondary importance as a motivator of urban gardening.

Selly Oktarina, Sumardjo Sumardjo, Ninuk Purnaningsih, Dwi Retno Hapsari · Nyimak Journal of Communication · Indonesia

An explanatory survey study analyzed participatory communication among women farmers in the urban farming program in Bogor City and Bogor Regency, Indonesia, and the factors affecting it. Using a quantitative approach supported by qualitative data, data were collected from 231 women farmer respondents via cluster sampling across urban, semi-urban and rural clusters, and analyzed using scoring, difference tests, and structural equation modelling (SEM). Results show that the level of participatory communication in the urban farming program was medium, as measured by dialogue atmosphere, dialogue participation, and degree of convergence. Factors significantly influencing participatory communication were respondent characteristics, champion/facilitator competence, exposure to media communication, and institutional support.

Yue Jin, Hee Sun Choi, Daniel C. Elkin · · China

A mixed-methods study of three representative communities in Nanjing, China, examining the value of edible community gardens against the backdrop of COVID-19, associated government area controls, restricted access to daily food supplies, and elderly residents' unfamiliarity with online shopping. The study used GIS mapping of Nanjing's food system, site observations, questionnaires and interviews, analyzed with univariate and multivariate methods. It found that most elderly residents want and value edible community gardens, especially during the epidemic; that the gardens offer opportunities for new companionship and leisure; and that edible landscaping increases communities' ornamental value and interactivity. The gardens were also described as beneficial for sustainable food production in terms of ecological environment, economic benefit, social regeneration and local development.

Yuki Kato, Caroline Boules · Journal of Urban Affairs · United States

The disruption of social and food systems during the COVID-19 pandemic presented a distinct set of opportunities and challenges for urban agriculture. Based on 79 in-depth interviews with managers of community gardens, school gardens, and urban farms in the Washington, DC metropolitan area, this study used post-disaster "social recovery" theory to explore how each type of urban agriculture responded differently to the pandemic's social, economic, and personal disruptions. Findings showed significant differences in immediate impacts across the types of urban agriculture, with community gardens being the least affected and urban farms implementing the most variant adaptation strategies. Notable differences also appeared within each type, especially among urban farms. The study attributes these variant adaptation trajectories to pre-disaster conditions, including autonomy over cultivation space, access to resources, and connections with other facets of city life, concluding by underscoring the importance of recognizing the heterogeneity of urban agriculture when assessing its transformational capacity and potential.

Benjamin Hennchen, Martina Schäfer · Frontiers in Sustainability · Global

A comparative study of three food system innovations — citizen shareholder companies, community-supported agriculture, and food co-ops — examining their inclusiveness, degree of member involvement, and quality of experienced connectedness. It draws on quantitative and qualitative data from an online survey, two focus group discussions, and a broad literature search. All three food innovations were found to show a rather low level of inclusiveness, although efforts are being made to overcome barriers to access. The innovations were found to generate social cohesion between different actors along the value-added chain, constituted differently in a more service-oriented versus a community-oriented model. The study concludes these innovations provide momentum toward the dominant food regime by rewarding producers for sustainable practices, establishing stronger producer-consumer relationships, and motivating consumers to assume shared responsibility, and considers the three innovations complementary for food system transitions.

Silvia Septhiani, Diah Oga Nusantari, Ihwan Zulkarnain · PUNDIMAS Publikasi Kegiatan Abdimas · Indonesia

This report describes a community-service activity in Harapan Jaya, Cibinong District, Bogor Regency, Indonesia, aimed at improving residents' productivity and health during the COVID-19 pandemic. With the pandemic producing a lack of productive at-home leisure activity and a sense of stagnation among residents, urban farming is positioned as one pandemic-era activity offering economic, health, and environmental benefits, covering food crops, medicinal plants ("living pharmacy"/apotik hidup), and ornamental plants. The team provided residents of Harapan Jaya with information on family medicinal plants (TOGA). The activity is described as increasing residents' understanding of medicinal plants and fostering productive attitudes and a healthy, green environment.

Muhamad Subhi Apriantoro, Indah Noor Rahayuningsih, Sarwanto Sarwanto · IQTISHODUNA Jurnal Ekonomi Islam · Global

Drawing on descriptive field research, this paper addresses how, amid the coronavirus's impact across economic sectors, many individuals struggled to meet basic needs. Urban farming is positioned as one answer to food availability, with food safety, food pricing, and stimulating the local economy as its main concerns; people cultivated short-cycle crops in small pots or used hydroponic methods in their yards. Integrated urban farming is characterized as a type of green economic activity that adheres to the maslahah (public benefit) aim of maqasid sharia. Green economy activity built around integrated urban farming is described as aiming to improve community economic wellbeing and as able to help mitigate the risk of substantial environmental harm, including the pandemic's detrimental impact on macro and micro food security. The paper observes that the green economy concept can be integrated harmoniously with core maqasid sharia values.

Woro Harkandi Kencana, Meisyanti Meisyanti, Yunita Sari · Warta LPM · Indonesia (Jakarta)

A community service (PKM) program targeted the women farmers group KWT D'Shafa in Duren Sawit, East Jakarta, Indonesia, which faced problems including a small membership, underused urban farming land, limited business management knowledge, manual record-keeping of members, harvests and sales, and limited marketing communication skills. Activities included outreach on the benefits of urban farming, installing hydroponic systems, business management training and assistance, moving member, harvest, and sales records to a web-based system using Google Sites, and digital marketing training covering Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and YouTube. The program report states that these activities contributed to improved welfare for KWT D'Shafa member households.

· 法令（e-Gov法令検索・504AC1000000077） · Japan

The 2022 framework law on children's policy, centred on children's right to be heard and their best interests, obliging the government to adopt the Children's Outline. The parent statute of the children's-places guideline — the institutional starting point for community places, gardens included.

Congreso de la República del Perú · El Peruano, Normas Legales (Diario Oficial del Perú) · Peru

Peru's Congress passed Law No. 31458 on 26 April 2022, published the next day in the official gazette El Peruano (Normas Legales). The law legally recognizes ollas comunes (community soup kitchens) as temporary or permanent grassroots social organizations, guarantees their sustainability and financing during emergencies such as natural disasters or health emergencies, and promotes beneficiaries' productive work and entrepreneurship. It authorizes local governments and the Ministry of Development and Social Inclusion to reallocate budget to fund food procurement and distribution for ollas comunes, and requires the Ministry of Health to approve technical guidance on sanitary and nutritional conditions.

Ministerio de Desarrollo e Inclusión Social (MIDIS) · Ministerio de Desarrollo e Inclusión Social (MIDIS), Plataforma del Estado Peruano · Peru

Peru's Ministry of Development and Social Inclusion (MIDIS) reported on 6 May 2022 that, according to registration data in its Mankachay Perú ("Mi ollita Perú") information system, Lima Metropolitana had registered the most Temporary Citizen Food Support Initiatives (ICAAT, including ollas comunes) at 2,506, followed by Callao (242), La Libertad (101) and Arequipa (98). The system launched on 5 November 2021, with local governments entering data that citizens and officials can view in real time.

Instituto Escolhas · 100 Políticas (Instituto Escolhas) · Brazil

A policy analysis of Rio de Janeiro's Hortas Cariocas program, launched in 2006. It comprises 56 gardens — 27 school-based and 29 community-based — across 25.3 hectares, employing 276 people (191 in schools, 85 in communities). In the first half of 2022 the gardens produced about 35 tons of food; in June alone, 7.2 tons were produced (3.1 tons sold, 4.1 tons donated), with roughly R$150,000 per month paid from the municipal treasury as stipends.

Harada K., Hino K., Iida A., Yamazaki T., Usui H., Asami Y., Yokohari M. · International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (IJERPH), 18(2):542 · Japan

A cross-sectional study comparing 783 urban-farming participants with 1,254 non-participants in Tokyo. Participants in both allotment and experience-farm programs reported significantly better self-rated and mental health, highlighting the health value of regular social interaction in urban farming.