Research & reports

Carly Wood, Jules Pretty, Murray Griffin · Journal of Public Health · United Kingdom

A UK case-control study measured self-esteem, mood, and general health in 136 allotment gardeners before and after a gardening session, and compared them with 133 non-gardener controls. Paired t-tests showed a significant improvement in self-esteem following an allotment session, and one-way ANCOVA showed allotment gardeners had significantly better self-esteem, total mood disturbance, and general health than controls (P<0.001), with less depression and fatigue and more vigour (P<0.0083).

Benno Gammerl, Rainer Herrn · Goldsmiths (University of London) · Europe

A theoretical essay (in German and English, from a European context) on the tension between affect that disrupts ordered structures and the emotional processing of power-laden spatial relations. It uses practices of urban gardening and debates about gentrification as its examples, arguing that analyzing the dynamic interplay between spaces and emotions is fruitful for a critical view of urbanity - explicitly linking urban gardening practices to gentrification as an exclusionary dynamic.

Rosa Maria Vitrano · Nova Science Publishers (Nova Science Publishers, Inc.) · Europe (Italy)

This study of green-envelope building redevelopment in Palma di Montechiaro, in Italy's Agrigento Province, combined testing of innovative products for realizing vertical gardens with the design of guidelines for the architectural and environmental transformation of the Marina Todaro waterfront promenade. The work was framed as a means of defining prospects for Palma di Montechiaro to be considered a green city of Agrigento Province, exploring scenarios of green urban design and urban agriculture still little practiced in the area. Its originality lay in a participatory approach carried out on-site, positioning residents as the primary agents of the environmental regeneration project.

Karen Hart · Primary Teacher Update · United Kingdom

A short article (2015, United Kingdom) describes the design of a new school in West London — featuring state-of-the-art classrooms, a rooftop garden, and a multi-use sports facility — as aiming to fulfil the borough's holistic vision.

Beatriz Giobellina, Yuliana Céliz · Repositorio Digital de la UNC (National University of Cordoba) · Europe

This paper was presented at the International Seminar on Territorial Development and Innovation Policy, held in Rosario, Santa Fe, Argentina, and Valencia, Spain, in 2015. The available abstract provides only this presentation context, with no further detail on content or findings.

Flavio Lupia, Giuseppe Pulighe · Agriculture and Agricultural Science Procedia · Italy

Using a 2014 Italian Institute of Agricultural Economics (INEA) inventory of roughly 2,700 residential kitchen-garden parcels around Rome, Italy, mapped by photointerpretation of high-resolution Google Earth imagery and field validation, this study estimated irrigation water demand for the April-September growing season under different land uses and two irrigation systems, using average climatic data from 1950-2000, and evaluated a rainwater-harvesting scenario as an alternative or supplement to current water sources, which in Rome include municipal supply as well as legal and illegal well, canal and river abstraction.

Bernd Pölling, Bernd Pölling, Rolf Born, Rolf Born · 0028-0615 · Germany

Urban agriculture is defined here as the market-oriented, professional agricultural and horticultural activities carried out within and at the edges of densely built urban areas. It is characterized by its diversity of business orientations and multifunctionality.

Louiza M. Boukharaeva, Marcel Marloie · Revue d’ethnoécologie · Europe

The Brundtland Report, in its chapter on "The Urban Challenge," recommended developing urban agriculture. Subsequent research has emphasized urban agriculture's contribution to food production, poverty reduction, and improved soil, air and water quality, but it appears as a marginal activity involving only a small fraction of middle- or low-income populations. The experiences of Russia and other European countries reveal a larger-scale phenomenon that can involve most city dwellers. Individual plots of 300 to 1,000 square meters within garden and dacha collectives involve roughly a quarter of Russia's urban population, with smaller proportions in other countries; the right to build a small house for weekend and holiday stays extends their multifunctionality. This non-market, extra-professional activity was a social achievement under the Soviet regime and constitutes an alternative to the polluting, soil-destroying detached-housing model. It cushioned the systemic crisis of the 1990s by helping populations cope with stress and avoid famine. Contrary to the view, dominant since 1929, that individual gardening carries a "petit-bourgeois" spirit, it is described as enabling lifestyles more compatible with people's existential needs, with this family-based urban agriculture serving as a means of building a more autonomous, social and ecological urban society, necessary for the resilience of individuals, families and society.

Dražen Šimleša, Jelena Puđak, Filip Majetić, Anita Bušljeta Tonković · · Europe

This paper sets out a qualitative case-study framework for examining the solidarity economy in Split, Croatia's second-largest city, focused on the association MoST (The Bridge), one of Croatia's designated "Centres of Knowledge" for social development, specializing in social inclusion work with homeless people and at-risk youth. It poses as its research questions the inner potentials, strengths, obstacles, and disadvantages for solidarity economy development in Split at the point when MoST and other local actors were just beginning to promote a "Solidarity City Split" concept; the text as given does not report study findings.

Pernille Malberg Dyg · · Europe

This qualitative, explorative study of four school gardens in Denmark combined garden observations, interviews with teachers and garden educators, and focus group discussions with children conducted two months after the programs ended, to examine pedagogy and learning effects in school garden settings. Preliminary findings show children felt more motivated learning outdoors, were better able to understand complex connections and concepts, and found garden-based learning more exciting, with children's sense of ownership over the garden experience and harvest, and their understanding of the seed-to-table process, pollination, and biodiversity, leaving the strongest impressions.

Tomita H., Ishii M. · Journal of Asian Architecture and Building Engineering · Germany

Analyzes the influence of Bauhaus's second director Hannes Meyer and his Bauhaus Brigade on Soviet urban and architectural planning, examining Meyer's socially-oriented functionalism and planning features including mass demonstration spaces and broad greenery, using unpublished sources.

Bishop P. · Journal of European Studies (SAGE) · Germany

A scholarly review of Henderson's study of Ernst May and the New Frankfurt initiative, critically assessing Weimar modernist social housing, garden and green-space programs, and Existenzminimum dwelling within their historical significance and limitations.

Moulin-Doos C. · Journal of Urban Affairs · Germany

Examines how intercultural gardens in Germany respond to migrants' need for spaces of interaction outside home and work, offering a setting to build social capital and practise the mutual respect essential for integration.

Rina Ghose, Margaret Pettygrove · Antipode · USA (Milwaukee)

Case study of Milwaukee community gardens challenging the assumption that participation is empowering: under neoliberal restructuring, volunteer-dependent garden governance shifts state responsibility onto residents and produces uneven, tension-ridden citizenship outcomes.

Inmaculada Marques-Pérez, Baldomero Segura García del Río, Concepción Maroto · Spanish Journal of Agricultural Research · Spain (Valencia)

This paper presented a descriptive approach to the multifunctionality of agricultural systems and described a methodological approach to evaluate social preferences for multifunctional peri-urban agriculture. This approach is based on a review of scientific literature focused on multifunctionality and the goods and services of agricultural systems. The proposed methodology was applied to the "Huerta de Valencia," a rich peri-urban agricultural system with diverse resources, yielding results useful for enriching the political-institutional debate on defining its protection scheme.

Raúl Puente Asuero · · Spain

This record is a summary of a conference on urban gardens in Andalusia, Spain, delivered by D. Raul Puente Asuero at the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Malaga on April 7, 2014. No specific findings or details about urban gardens are provided in the abstract.

Roberta Pucci · · Italy (Settimo Torinese)

A project for urban transformation in the HT6 Bordina area of Settimo Torinese, Italy, was proposed. This project critiques a previous plan for 15-story buildings as invasive for the surrounding low-rise residential area and presents a more sustainable alternative, including social and production spaces like an urban garden, playground, and commercial square. The proposal aims to connect existing green areas, residential areas, and a historic farmhouse.

Nerea Morán Alonso, José Luis Fernández de Casadevante · Hábitat y Sociedad · Spain

In Spain, urban agriculture is gaining importance, but faces difficulties in municipal regulation, particularly for community gardens. This regulatory challenge perpetuates the insecurity and precariousness of urban agriculture projects.

Jill L. Edmondson, Zoe G. Davies, Kevin J. Gaston, Jonathan R. Leake · Journal of Applied Ecology · United Kingdom

This study compared soil quality indicators (soil organic carbon storage, total nitrogen, C:N ratio, and bulk density) in urban allotments, surrounding agricultural land, and other urban greenspaces in a typical UK city. Allotment soils showed 32% higher soil organic carbon concentrations and 36% higher C:N ratios than pastures and arable fields, and 25% higher total nitrogen and 10% lower bulk density than arable soils. The study reported no significant difference in soil organic carbon concentration between allotments and urban non-domestic greenspaces, but it was higher in domestic gardens beneath woody vegetation.

Yvon Le · · France

This lecture focuses on five geographical questions concerning the rural-urban interface. It was shown that major food industries are not necessarily located in main cities, leading to a frequent disconnection between agricultural and regional centralities, and that the disconnection between cities and agricultural surroundings is challenged by farmers through short food supply chains. Access to the countryside by city dwellers is a major issue for social interaction, and urban agriculture opens new opportunities for urban planning.

Jemma Hawkins, Alexander D. Smith, Karianne Backx, Deborah A. Clayton · Journal of Aging and Physical Activity · United Kingdom (Wales)

To examine the exercise intensity of gardening activity for older adult allotment gardeners in Wales, oxygen consumption and energy expenditure for six gardening tasks were measured via indirect calorimetry. Estimated metabolic equivalent units (METs) were calculated from these measures. The six gardening tasks were classified as low to moderate-high intensity physical activities based on their metabolic values (1.9-5.7 METs).

Mikey Tomkins · Repository hosted by TU Delft Library (TU Delft) · United Kingdom (London)

This research explored reactions to the idea of potential urban agriculture landscapes through 32 participatory walks with 150 local residents around a 25-hectare site in east London. The walks used an "edible map" that suggested food growing in vacant urban areas. The study showed initial engagement with urban agriculture and local food systems, but also produced a strong critique of urban spatial design and a desire for place-making.

Marcin Graban · Pressto (Uniwersytetu Adama Mickiewicza) · Poland (Poznań)

The Polish National General Exhibition in Poznań in 1929 attracted many laborers, who later contributed to the unemployed population during the 1930s economic crisis, exacerbating the housing crisis in Poznań. City authorities initially housed the homeless in former exhibition grounds as an interim measure. For a more permanent solution, the city redeveloped allotments or community gardens by building purpose-built residential garden huts or sheds.

Géraldine Farges · Sociologia Ruralis · France

This one-year ethnographic study analyzed the integration of pro-environmental practices among amateur gardeners in a French urban allotment. Through observations and repeat interviews, it found that while gardeners adopted new techniques, the meanings of their practices and their environmental relationships differed. The diffusion of pro-environmental practices was not systematically linked to shared concerns, and practices were interpreted differently by policymakers and individuals.

E.J. Veen, P.H.M. Derkzen, A.J. de Visser · Food and Foodways · Netherlands

This article compares food acquisition habits among participants in four Dutch urban food-growing initiatives: two allotments and two Alternative Food Networks (AFNs). Allotment gardeners integrate gardening into daily routines and easily use harvests, while AFN members, who primarily engage in shopping, struggle to regularly consume urban-grown food due to competition with supermarkets. The study concludes that involvement in shopping versus growing significantly impacts urban-grown food consumption, indicating a limited effect of motivations to change the food system when confronted with everyday routines.