Research & reports

Shimpo N. · Urban Agriculture & Regional Food Systems (Wiley), 6:e20015 · Japan

A case study of a suburban-Tokyo community garden that collects neighborhood kitchen waste and returns it to the soil as compost, forming a local food cycle. It documents how the bottom-up founder sustained the garden, provided work opportunities for people with disabilities and food-education for children, and built links with welfare facilities, kindergartens, and schools.

Artmann 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.

Malekela 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.

Lange S. J., Calancie L., Onufrak S. J., Reddy K. T., Palmer A., Warnock A. L. · Nutrients 13(2):683 · United States

National survey showing that the presence of food policy councils is associated with local policies supporting healthy food access, including for food-insecure populations, underscoring their role in food system governance.

Blakstad M. M., Mosha D., Bellows A. L., Canavan C. R., Chen J. T., Mlalama K., Kinabo J., Noor R. A., Madzorera I., Sando M. M., Spiegelman D., Masanja H., Fawzi W. W. · Maternal & Child Nutrition 17(2):e13096 · Tanzania

Cluster RCT among 1,006 reproductive-age women in Tanzania. A home gardening intervention improved women's dietary diversity and household food security after one year compared with controls.

世田谷区 · 世田谷区 検討報告書 · Japan

Setagaya's review report from its urban-agriculture and farmland-conservation PT after the 2022 productive-green-area issue, outlining the current state and future direction of publicly supported urban farmland use including buy-out conservation, agriculture-welfare collaboration, ward allotments and community farms such as Tamaribatake.

Apostolopoulou 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.

Bourdon E., Belmin J. · Alzheimer's Research & Therapy, 13:116 · France

A multi-centre pilot controlled trial across four French nursing homes testing 'enriched gardens'—conventional sensory gardens augmented with activity-prompting features. Among 120 residents with dementia, use of enriched gardens improved cognitive function and mobility compared with conventional gardens or no garden. It offers concrete guidance for using gardens in the environmental design of elderly care.

Marilyn Sitaker, Mackenzie McCall, Weiwei Wang, Mia Vaccaro, Jane Kolodinsky, Alice Ammerman, Stephanie Jilcott Pitts, Karla Hanson, Diane Smith, Rebecca Seguin-Fowler · Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development · United States

Using a qualitative approach, this study describes the organizational models and best practices of five well-established nonprofit cost-offset community-supported agriculture (CO-CSA) programs in the US, which aim to increase low-income households' access to fresh produce while helping CSA farms grow. Administration took several forms—direct subsidies to member farms, acting as an aggregator/packer/distributor, or sourcing from an in-house incubator or food hub—funded through government grants, donations, and fundraising, with dedicated staff and community partnerships identified as key success factors.

Russomanno J., Jabson Tree J. · Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development · USA

A PRISMA-guided systematic review of how sense of community (belonging) at farmers markets shapes customer engagement, and how markets relate to food access for low-income shoppers.

· Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems · USA

A study of how agency and sociality within gardens designed for health and healing cultivate participant wellbeing and community resilience.

· Horticulture International Journal · Nepal (Kavrepalanchok)

Evaluates how home garden interventions contributed to household access to vegetables and nutrition security in Nepal's Kavrepalanchok district during the COVID-19 period.

Petra 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.

Riris Lindiawati Puspitasari, Arief Pambudi, Yunus Effendi, Genta Hadela · · Indonesia (Depok)

This community service activity aimed to enhance the skills of street children attending Sekolah Masjid Terminal (Master) in Depok, Indonesia, through simple hydroponics training. The training, initially conducted online due to restrictions, introduced participants to hydroponic techniques using simple equipment. Initial results showed participants gained information on simple hydroponic techniques.

Mariana Portilho, Camila Gonçalves de Oliveira Rodrigues , Annelise Caetano Fraga Fernandez · Portuguese National Funding Agency for Science, Research and Technology (RCAAP Project by FCT) · Brazil (Rio de Janeiro)

This study presents the formation of Arranjo Local da Penha, a community territorial network established in 2016 in the Penha favela complex in Rio de Janeiro. Primarily led by women and focused on promoting urban agriculture based on agroecology, this network fostered women's protagonism and built emotional ties between them and the place, mainly by enabling access to "real food" in the favela.

Jackie Hendrickson · Digital Commons - USU (Utah State University) · United States (Utah)

Utah State University's Food $ense and Master Gardener programs partnered to create the "Create Farm Fresh Gardens" community gardening program, targeting low-income families in Cache Valley, Utah. Piloted during the 2018 growing season, the program aimed to improve food security by increasing access to fresh vegetables and enhancing participants' self-efficacy in gardening and nutrition. Participants provided supportive feedback, and the program was slated for statewide implementation in Utah during the 2019 growing season.

Adhitya Rahmat Taufiq, Deden Mulyana, Mohammad Soleh Soeaidy, Allicia Deana Santosa · ETHOS (Jurnal Penelitian dan Pengabdian) · Indonesia (Tasikmalaya)

This community service program in Gunung Tandala Village, Tasikmalaya City, Indonesia, aimed to provide knowledge and training on alternative resources for food independence to embroidery industry workers who lost jobs during the Covid-19 pandemic. The training included simple urban farming and catfish cultivation in buckets, offering basic knowledge and practical examples. The activity successfully increased participants' literacy regarding food independence stability and their understanding of potential market opportunities.

Mia Arvizu · Ethnic studies review · United States

This paper introduces "Cocoon: a series" by independent artist Mia Arvizu. This initial series challenges white supremacy culture and assimilation, serving as a stepping stone to spark conversations that spread resistance against patriarchy, capitalism, and colonialism. Arvizu is currently working in a fellowship with the National Park Service (NPS) and Groundwork, USA, focusing on communications for community-based projects such as community gardens.

Jennifer Marcela López Ríos Admon, Cristina María Mejía Merino, Carmen Estefanía Frías Epinayú · Revista Espanola De Nutricion Comunitaria-spanish Journal of Community Nutrition · Colombia

This Community Based Participatory Research (CBPR) aimed to publicize and evaluate food security microprojects created with three Wayuu indigenous communities in La Guajira, Colombia, involving 46 families (204 people). Strategies included creating community gardens as a sustainable alternative for autonomy and ancestral practice rescue, intercultural nutritional education, and community strengthening based on life plans.

Marian Simón Rojo · Urban Agriculture & Regional Food Systems · Spain (Madrid)

This study investigated how urban planning can support agroecological and right-to-food movements to create resilient urban food systems, addressing food insecurity. A case study in Madrid, Spain, found that over 14% of the population was food insecure, despite the presence of more than 400 free food distribution nodes. The analysis covered various programs and urban food initiatives, suggesting that urban planning provides tools to apply community-supported agroecological food system qualities to define context-adapted strategies, thereby reducing reliance on the industrial food sector.

Rieska Maharani, Zainal Rusdi, Lynda Yunyver, Reza Mega Novalia, Adiva Salsabila · Jurnal Abdidas · Indonesia (Surabaya)

This activity was conducted in RT 07 RW 03, Kendangsari District, Tenggilis Mejoyo Village, Surabaya City, to enhance food security and resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic. A student team from Muhammadiyah Surabaya University's Accounting Study Program, supported by a grant from the Ministry of Education and Culture's Holistic Village Development and Empowerment Program, provided hydroponic instruction, introduction, practical training, and guidance on selling and diversifying hydroponic products. The program indirectly fostered local food security and resilience and generated new income for residents affected by the pandemic.

Rosa Maria Pereira da Silva · · Global

This qualitative research explored the use of an Inclusive School Garden as a pedagogical intervention for 15 students, including two with multiple disabilities, focusing on science education through tactile perception. The research involved preparing the garden with recyclable materials and creating inclusive pedagogical tools like Braille cells and a tactile map. In the garden environment, students with visual impairments were able to recognize, touch, identify, and compare vegetables and medicinal plants, and write their names in Braille.

Emmanuelle Faure, Corinne Luxembourg, Angélique Dupont · Presses universitaires du Septentrion eBooks · France (Gennevillois)

This chapter proposes understanding urban agriculture, specifically shared gardens in Gennevilliers, as part of a collective project to develop a more environmentally respectful, food-producing city. It also views urban agriculture as a potential lever for women's emancipation. The study will explore how urban agriculture can foster collective responsibility and become a concrete vector for changing relationships within the Gennevilliers context.

Karen Besterman‐Dahan, Nora B. Arriola, Sarah Bradley · Journal of Hunger & Environmental Nutrition · United States (Tampa)

A community garden program for veterans in mental health programs at a Veterans’ Administration Hospital in Tampa, Florida, was implemented to evaluate veteran outcomes including food security and nutrition. Evidence suggests these programs can provide a safe space for veterans and positively impact their food security and fruit and vegetable intake.

Ralitsa Hiteva · · Bulgaria (Sofia)

This chapter examines fuel poverty in Sofia, Bulgaria, as part of the urban nexus of food, water, energy, and environment. It uses urban gardening, making zimnina (preserved food), and domestic heating/energy use as case studies to illustrate how these practices are interdependent and impact energy provisioning. The study focuses on low-technological ways of managing the urban nexus from the perspective of vulnerable users, aiming to address fuel poverty and air pollution.