Research & reports

Nelly Niwa, Frédéric Frank · Infoscience (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne) · Switzerland

This record is a reference to an article titled "Vaud 2013, quelle agriculture pour quel territoire?" with keywords including agriculture, urban agriculture, and land use planning. No further abstract content is provided.

Isabel María Madaleno, Gladys Armijo · Investigaciones Geográficas Boletín del Instituto de Geografía · Chile (Santiago de Chile), Portugal (Lisboa)

This study compared intra- and peri-urban agriculture in Santiago de Chile and Lisbon, Portugal, two capitals with similar climates. The research utilized satellite images, statistics, and sampling to analyze public policies that support primary sector activities in these urban environments. The objective was to identify similarities and differences in how urban agriculture contributes to social, economic, and environmental sustainability in these cities.

Yan E Duan · Advanced materials research · Global

This paper explains the concept, model, and architecture of the Internet of Things (IOT) as a network technology enabling object communication via RFID and sensors. It then details the specific application of IOT in urban agriculture, presenting an application framework model for agricultural production and product supply systems.

Christoph Kasper, Undine Giseke, Silvia Martin Han · · Morocco

As part of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research's "Future Megacities" research program, the Urban Agriculture Casablanca (UAC) project investigates the extent to which urban agriculture can contribute to sustainable city design. This project aims to integrate the provision of open space within integrated and sustainable urban growth in Casablanca, Morocco. Based on an action research approach, integrated case studies in peri-urban spaces and four pilot projects were implemented, identifying synergy potentials between the city and agriculture in connection with other relevant sectors of the social and economic system.

Stefan Reuburn · · Global

This introductory note for a special issue provides an overview of urban agriculture initiatives globally. It points out that social science-based research on urban agriculture is currently exploratory and descriptive, and is in its initial stage of development.

Fernando Menendez Cobelo · · Venezuela (Caracas)

This project focuses on Caracas, Venezuela, against the backdrop of global economic transformations and population growth redefining urban boundaries and forms. Caracas faces housing issues and urban spatial imbalances due to rapid urbanization and population influx from past oil industries. The presence of large underutilized spaces, such as the 103-hectare former military airport site "La Cariota" in the city center, is noted as hindering urban improvement.

Alessandra Giannini, Andrea Oldani · TERRITORIO · Global

Micro-agriculture refers to small-scale agriculture, in contrast to intensive agriculture and monoculture. It is a collection of 'small scale' agricultural practices, including horticulture (such as urban vegetable gardens), fruit-growing, or flower-growing. Micro-agriculture is a landscape defined by garden plots and materials, forming a unified yet diversified whole that differs from traditional agricultural landscapes in its reduced scale, biological richness, material variety, and heterogeneous landscape.

Guo Hua, Guozhu Ren · JOURNAL OF ENGINEERING STUDIES · Global

This paper attempts to define the role of urban agriculture in building resilient cities. It also analyzes how urban agriculture can make cities more resilient to potential crises in emergencies or sudden events, as well as under normal circumstances, such as climate change and oil peak.

Katrin Bohn, André Viljoen · · Global

This paper focuses on urban agriculture as a major component of CPUL (Continuous Productive Urban Landscape). The CPUL City concept aims to make urban spaces more productive and desirable for citizens by planfully introducing continuous productive urban landscapes, including urban agriculture, into cities. The CPUL City concept proposes that urban agriculture can contribute to more sustainable and resilient food systems while also adding beneficially to the spatial quality of the urban realm.

José Luis Fernández de Casadevante, Nerea Morán Alonso · · Global

This article reviews the uses of the term resilience in the urban domain and examines methods for applying sustainability to urban environments. It focuses on the role of urban and peri-urban agriculture, arguing that their scope extends beyond mere food production. These practices generate spaces for developing alternative city models, fostering conviviality, and illustrating an alternative to the current agri-food system.

· · Global

This paper proposes Continuous Productive Urban Landscapes (CPULs) as a complement to the compact city model, arguing that urban food production contributes to environmental sustainability. The CPUL model suggests that not all brownfield sites must be built upon, while still maximizing sustainable returns from land use. This combination is envisioned to create a new type of city.

Fritz Hammerling Navas Navarro, Luz Mila Peña Torres · Revista de Investigación Agraria y Ambiental · Global

Urban Vertical Garden Modules (MHUV) are introduced as a hybrid of vertical gardens and urban agriculture. This study presents a "culinary and medicinal module" that can be placed in kitchens, rooftops, or patios, proposing the cultivation of species like thyme, mint, and parsley. The module consists of three recyclable plastic baskets, each with four rows and a capacity for fourteen seedlings, supported vertically by a recycled wooden structure.

Xin Guan · Economic Research Guide · Global

This discussion emphasizes the necessity of village renovation planning in metropolitan rural outskirts, particularly when combined with new land use and urban village layout plans. It outlines five key considerations for such planning: linking with upper-level plans without direct copying, breaking village ownership boundaries to accelerate land transfer, promoting intensive land use and moving away from canal irrigation, planning for agricultural development to lead urban agriculture trends, and coordinating short-term and long-term goals while retaining flexible space.

Rolando León Aguilar, Zemedhun Girma Hailu · Avanzada Científica · Cuba

In Cuba, food production for the population is a state priority, and urban production has achieved rapid development in the last decade. Vegetable production is among the prioritized subprograms, but challenges exist regarding water and organic matter.

Iwona Makuch · Soil Science Annual · Global

This study investigated the influence of intensive horticulture on lead content and its fractions in soil profiles from house gardens, allotment gardens, and arable fields. It was not determined that the manner of usage had any influence on total lead content or its distribution in soil profiles. However, the usage manner did influence the content and distribution of lead fraction III, which is connected with organic matter, with humus horizons of garden soils showing the highest content.

Yang Dan-ni · Journal of Changjiang Vegetables · Global

This paper examines the changing functions of vegetable production in urban agriculture and highlights the significance of promoting ornamental vegetable production and marketing. It proposes that the research and development of ornamental vegetables represents a viable urban agriculture production mode, facilitating cultivation shifts from rural areas to cities, enterprises to families, and fields to balconies. Key development areas include cultivar selection, equipment innovation, cultivation technology, marketing, and service system construction.

Gerald Forkuor, Olufunke Cofie · International Journal of Remote Sensing · Sierra Leone (Freetown)

A land-use and land-cover (LULC) change mapping exercise in Freetown, Sierra Leone, used multi-temporal Landsat data from 1974, 1986, and 2000 to map nine LULC classes. Built-up areas increased by at least 140% between 1974 and 2000, and 882 ha (27%) of agricultural lands in 1986 were converted to residential purposes by 2000. These conversions indicate a strong link between urbanization, agriculture, and deforestation, negatively impacting agricultural land availability.

H. de Zeeuw, R. van Veenhuizen, Marielle Dubbeling · The Journal of Agricultural Science · Global

This paper summarizes the available evidence regarding the potential of urban agriculture to respond to key urban challenges and reviews the perspectives on urban agriculture applied by local and national authorities.

Bethaney Turner · Local Environment · Australia

Based on an ethnographic study of community gardeners in the Australian Capital Territory, this article argues that fostering an embodied form of sustainability, which accounts for individual embodied engagement in these collective spaces, is critical for achieving sustainable urban living outcomes. It suggests that individual embodied engagement in collective spaces like community gardens can contribute to reconnection to the socio-cultural importance of food. This process may offer pathways to developing broader engagement with the food system and a long-term commitment to sustainable living practices.

Christophe Antonio‐Nkondjio, Billy Tene‐Fossog, Cyrille Ndo, Benjamin Menze Djantio, Serge Zebaze Togouet, Parfait Awono‐Ambene, Carlo Costantini, Charles S. Wondji, Hilary Ranson · Malaria Journal · Cameroon

This study assessed the influence of urban pollution and agriculture on malaria vector distribution and insecticide susceptibility in Douala and Yaoundé, Cameroon, from October 2009 to December 2010. Researchers sampled 1,546 anopheline larval breeding sites and analyzed water parameters. Findings showed mosquitoes from cultivated urban areas exhibited the highest insecticide resistance levels, with urban agriculture, rather than pollution, suggested as the major factor driving resistance.

Louiza M. Boukharaeva, Marcel Marloie · Espaces et sociétés · Russia

In Russia, the collective management of urban gardens provides places for relaxation and food production, attracting all population categories. These gardens are considered socially compensatory, stabilizing, and therapeutic, acting as shock absorbers for social, economic, and food crises.

Zhuang Nan · Anhui nongye kexue · Global

This study analyzed the application of information technology in urban agriculture using theoretical and case research methods. It interpreted the connotation of urban agriculture and agricultural information technology, then forecasted the prospect of information technology application in urban agriculture based on new information technology trends.

Michael D. Howard · Design Principles and Practices An International Journal—Annual Review · Australia (Melbourne)

This case study explores potential new land-use patterns in under-utilized spaces within an intensive horticultural region in peri-urban Melbourne, Victoria, where a mismatch between title boundaries and commercial production methods has created redundant land. The project aimed to increase efficiency, introduce cross-programming, and develop a recreation strategy. It offers a design framework for reorienting land use while preserving the unique qualities of such places.

Weiming Liu · Economic Research Guide · Global

This paper discusses how urban agriculture accelerates after industrialization and urbanization reach a certain level, keeping pace with the development of industrialization, urbanization, and the economy. It states the importance of recognizing the need for good city planning with reasonable layout and design for urban agriculture, while also strengthening research and exploitation of urban agricultural technology.

Helena K. Farrell · ScholarWorks@UMassAmherst (University of Massachusetts Amherst) · Global

Modern food systems are vulnerable, necessitating a transition to regenerative agricultural practices. Urban agriculture is expanding globally to meet urban dwellers' needs and mitigate the effects of industrial agriculture. The wide variety of urban agriculture styles, practices, and production modes highlights the need for clearer articulation and more accurate distinctions between actual urban farm systems. An evaluative framework was developed in this research to assess urban farm systems using a current and comprehensive set of criteria and metrics. The long-term role of urban food production in feeding the global population remains unclear.