Research & reports

Johanna Ruh · Open MIND · Global

This study connects Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) with Integrative Garden Therapy (IGT), demonstrating how combining both approaches can deepen and expand ESD. A concept for IGT/ESD units for children aged 6-10 within a Community-Supported Agriculture framework is presented. The concepts of multiple alienation, ecophilia, ecosophy, and integrative cultural work are particularly highlighted.

Abby M. Lohr, Jazlyn Vargas-Robles, Gladys B. Asiedu, Yahye Ahmed, Hana Dirie, Luz Molina, Graciela Porraz Capetillo, Josh Schachter, Mark L. Wieland, Irene G. Sia · Health Promotion Practice · United States (Minnesota)

This Photovoice study in Southeast Minnesota, US, conducted in fall 2023, collaborated with 14 Hispanic/Latino and Somali immigrant health promoters to document their health-related assets and needs. Thematic analysis revealed three themes: healthy choices, inclusion of people and cultural celebrations, and access to opportunity. Participants desired expanded community garden programming, environmental protection, accessible healthy options, access to culturally appropriate foods, and increased access to jobs, affordable housing, and healthcare.

Giovane Sampaio dos Santos, Yuri César Miranda Soares, Guilherme Alves Barroso Araújo, Lorena Oliveira Pereira, Daniel Viana Ferreira, Mariana Aragão Machado Santos Neves, Vanilson Furtado Pereira, Sandra Regina Cardoso Vitorino · Revista Tópicos. · Global

This integrative literature review analyzed recent scientific evidence on community gardens as a tool for promoting basic health, focusing on articles published in Portuguese over the last five years. The review found that community gardens offer benefits related to physical and mental health, food security, strengthened social relations, environmental preservation, income generation, and urban space revitalization.

Sugeng Harianto, Refti Handini Listyani, Dewien Nabielah Agustin, Rizky Trisna Putri, Ahmad Farhan Ridwan · Multidisciplinary Reviews · Indonesia (Surabaya)

A six-month mixed-methods study in Surabaya, Indonesia, involving 150 low-income households (75 urban farming, 75 non-farming), found that urban farming enhances dietary quality, stabilizes food availability, and reduces vulnerability during economic stress, while also strengthening neighborhood ties and improving mental well-being. However, its adoption is constrained by spatial limitations, financial barriers, inadequate technical knowledge, and sociocultural stigma, limiting participation among vulnerable groups.

Hoyoon Jung · The International Journal of Social Sustainability in Economic Social and Cultural Context · Brazil (Belo Horizonte)

This study analyzes Belo Horizonte, Brazil's right-to-food model, which has reduced hunger and promoted social equity through integrated food policies like subsidized food programs and urban agriculture. Despite its successes, the model faces challenges in policy sustainability, financial constraints, and political continuity, and the study notes limitations including reliance on secondary data.

Pierrette Hondagneu‐Sotelo · Revue d’ethnoécologie · United States (Los Angeles)

This article examines urban community gardens and urban farms in Los Angeles as sites for the recreation and re-creation of homelands for Mexican and Central American immigrants. Based on ethnographic research conducted between 2010 and 2023 across several sites, the author demonstrates that these gardens function as hybrid spaces where everyday home-making practices unfold. Gardeners cultivate Mesoamerican plants, materially and symbolically reshaping urban space while forging bonds of attachment to place and community.

Juliana Ju Yun Hoo, Shumetha Kaur Sidhu, Tan Kok Wei · PLoS ONE · Malaysia

A study in Malaysia assessed the perceived restorativeness of tropical urban green spaces (UGSs) using 120 environmental stimuli and 87 participants. Nature and mixed urban-nature scenes were generally rated as more restorative than urban scenes. In the visual-only modality, mixed urban-nature scenes were perceived as more restorative than nature scenes, but no significant differences were found in audio-only and bimodal modalities.

Eric Vukicevich · Urban Ecosystems · Global

This paper describes a class-based soil testing project where undergraduate students partner with local community gardeners to investigate urban soil health. The project involves students examining soil properties such as pH, organic matter, nutrients, and toxic elements, and ensuring crop safety. Students develop project plans, interpret data, and make recommendations for soil management.

Elmira Ramazanova, Manvitha Marni, Roger Wong, Leah Gable, Zezhen Pan, Zorimar Rivera‐Núñez, Daniel E. Giammar · Environmental Geochemistry and Health · United States (St. Louis)

A study in St. Louis, Missouri, examined total metal/metalloid concentrations and in-vitro Pb bioaccessibility in soil from twenty community gardens. Lead was identified as a metal of concern, with soil in 21% of sampled plots containing Pb concentrations above recommended thresholds for gardens. Although Pb bioaccessibility was low (< 5.4%), total metal/metalloid concentrations varied spatially within gardens, and Pb and As concentrations correlated positively with garden age, highlighting the importance of multiple plot sampling.

ROAN BAGAOISAN · Divine Word International Journal of Management and Humanities (DWIJMH) (ISSN 2980-4817) · Global

A study investigated school garden programs in elementary schools, exploring the experiences of fifteen teachers, staff, and students using a descriptive phenomenological approach and open-ended questionnaires. It found benefits in academic learning, environmental awareness, health, and social development, but also identified challenges including resource constraints, time limitations, garden maintenance, and stakeholder engagement. These challenges require careful planning, collaboration, and creative solutions.

Kamil Pająk, Alicja Trawińska, Marcin Łapicz, Andrzej R. Reindl · Toxics · Global

This study quantified emissions and toxicological consequences of a large-scale tire fire in an urban ecosystem by analyzing soil samples from the fireground and surrounding urban allotment gardens for zinc and 16 polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). Soil at the fire site showed severe contamination with PAHs (Σ PAHs: 148.9 mg/kg), and the cumulative Incremental Lifetime Cancer Risk (ILCR) for children reached 9.7 × 10−4, exceeding the regulatory benchmark. Elevated risk levels persisted at distal residential sites, indicating long-term environmental contamination and persistent terrestrial health hazards.

Ada Folques, Mario R. Paredes, Vanessa Apaolaza, Patrick Hartmann · Business Strategy and the Environment · United States

This study examined demand-side drivers of consumers' willingness to pay for food forest produce in the United States, using a quota-based online panel sample of 845 adults. It focused on nature connectedness, perceived health risks from monoculture farming, climate change concern, and need for uniqueness. All four factors positively influenced willingness to pay, with nature connectedness being the most influential. The impact of climate change concern on willingness to pay was stronger among consumers with low uniqueness-seeking and weaker among those with high uniqueness-seeking.

Rose Jennings · DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) · United Kingdom (Glasgow)

Helen Traill explores the social complexities of community growing projects based on six years of ethnographic work in Glasgow. She followed two community growing sites during the Brexit transition and the COVID-19 pandemic, examining concepts such as inclusion and exclusion, freedom, social justice, and political activism in urban agriculture projects. This study critically looks at gardens as sites for individual and community transformation.

Alexa McLaughlin, Stephanie Ward Chiasson, Jeanne Godin · Canadian Food Studies / La Revue canadienne des études sur l alimentation · Canada (New Brunswick)

This process evaluation assessed the reach, effectiveness, adoption, implementation, and maintenance of the New Brunswick School Food Pilot Project (NBSFPP) using the RE-AIM framework in eleven schools across New Brunswick, Canada. While school administrators reported positive impacts on program optimization, student leadership skills, food literacy, and eating behaviors, no significant effect was found on teachers’ perceptions of students’ diet or academic outcomes. Program sustainability was largely dependent on receiving funding.

Piedley Macêdo Saraiva, Aline Maia de Macedo, Cicera Giovanna Michelly Ferreira de Oliveira, Enzo Fernandes Sá, Laysa Yanne Silva Moreira, Thayla Sousa de Oliveira, Rayna Petrola Rocha Dias Milfont · Revista Ibero-Americana de Humanidades, Ciências e Educação · Brazil

This study analyzed the implementation of a vertical garden in a nursing home in Juazeiro do Norte-CE, Brazil. The intervention contributed to the reuse of construction waste, the production of toxic-free food, and increased opportunities for interaction among residents and caregivers. However, it also revealed limitations related to the vulnerability of the target audience, scheduling incompatibilities with the academic team, and the institution's dependence on continuous garden maintenance.

Malone M., Johnson B., Richard SI., Garcia N., Hamlin S. · Journal of Environmental Management · United States (Seattle)

Compares heavy-metal concentrations in vegetables grown in urban community gardens in the Seattle metropolitan area with produce from the grocery stores participants regularly used — a question set by the partnering farmers themselves. Metal concentrations frequently exceeded health guidelines in both, but were generally higher in the community-garden produce. Cadmium and lead posed the greatest risk and may exacerbate health risks for some populations.

Gök A., Arıkan M. · Journal of Environmental Science and Health, Part B · Türkiye (Istanbul)

Tracks how DDT, a legacy contaminant, restructures the soil microbiome of an urban garden in Istanbul across a 15-day microcosm experiment. Rather than broad diversity loss, Shannon diversity rose steadily as sensitive taxa were suppressed; Rhodococcus, Kribbella and Nitrospira increased while Pedomicrobium and Lysobacter declined. Inferred functions shifted away from aromatic amino-acid and fatty-acid metabolism and towards degradation of chlorinated aromatics, redox homeostasis and stress response — a successional move to a stress-resilient, potentially degradative community.

Paul Shing-fong Chan, Joseph Kawuki, Mythily Subramaniam, Elizabeth Broadbent, Esther Yuet Ying Lau, Kelvin Fai Hong Lui · Education Sciences · Global

This systematic review, pre-registered with PROSPERO (CRD420251250712) and conducted following PRISMA guidelines, synthesized global evidence on the effects of horticulture-based interventions (HBIs) on student well-being. It searched PubMed, Web of Science, MEDLINE, EMBASE, and APA PsycInfo from inception to June 30, 2025, and included 15 studies (more than 2,000 students aged 5-18) from South Korea (8), Taiwan (3), Mainland China (1), Hong Kong (1), Italy (1), and the United States (1). Results showed HBIs have the potential to enhance emotional/psychological well-being (e.g., stress reduction, mood improvement), social well-being (e.g., peer relations, social skills), cognitive and educational benefits (e.g., attention, academic attitudes), and physical and overall health benefits (e.g., physical activity, quality of life). The review states that future randomized controlled trials with diverse populations are needed to address limitations such as small sample sizes and geographic bias.

Christine Jie Li, John H. Schulz, Sa Tun Bo Bo · Journal of Community Practice · United States

Semi-structured interviews with 18 Burmese refugees in the United States explored their experiences across three types of community-assisted garden programs — individual backyard gardens, personal-use community gardens, and enterprise community-assisted gardens. The interviews produced three broad themes (benefits, challenges, and issues with recruitment and support), with reported benefits including strengthened family relationships, access to culturally relevant and fresh organic vegetables, reduced food budget spending, and improved social relationships, alongside challenges that the study describes as a complex mixture affecting refugees' nutritional, economic and social well-being.

Guanxin Du, Yu Sun, Hongyan WangShenggao Lu, Baiquan Yan, Huimin Dai, Kai Liu, Keke Xu · PLoS ONE · China

In the urban-agricultural transition zone of Arongqi in China's black soil region, researchers analyzed 32 topsoil samples (0-20 cm) from three subzones — urbanizing zone, peri-urban arable land, and urban zone — for 16 trace metals including Cd, Pb, Zn, As, Hg and Cr, plus soil organic matter. Urbanization did not worsen soil acidification but significantly reduced organic matter, and Cd, Pb, Zn, Ba, Co, Mo, Sr, V and Ag were significantly enriched above background levels, with peri-urban arable land contaminated by Cd, Mo, Sr, V and Ag and the urban zone by Cd, Pb, Ba and Sr. Carcinogenic risk was higher for adults in peri-urban arable land and for children in the urban zone, with oral ingestion and dermal contact as the dominant exposure pathways and Cr and As as the main carcinogenic factors for children; source apportionment attributed the contamination to traffic emissions (27.46%), soil parent material (24.77%), contemporary agriculture (24.54%), urban combustion (11.22%) and historical agriculture (11.22%).

Karina Corada, Caroline Nash, Prashant Kumar, Stuart Connop, Laura Wendling · Nature-Based Solutions · Global

A synthesis paper on the largely unexplored role of domestic gardens in influencing local air quality. While gardens are widely recognized for cultural and health benefits, particularly mental well-being and everyday contact with nature, the paper states few studies have examined air quality dynamics within residential garden settings. It notes that general urban green infrastructure research suggests vegetation structure, plant traits, and spatial configuration shape pollutant capture, but these findings have not been tested in domestic gardens, where microclimates and spatial constraints differ markedly. Evidence from food-growing gardens and allotments further suggests edible crops cultivated near roads may accumulate airborne pollutants, particularly metals, underscoring the need for research on exposure pathways and allotment locations. The paper identifies a significant gap in current green infrastructure and air-pollution research: the lack of empirical evidence on how domestic gardens function as socio-ecological systems with implications for air-quality regulation.

Ayhan Horuz, Güney Akınoğlu · · Turkey

A Turkish book chapter arguing that agriculture-derived air pollution, compounded by growing industrial and urban pollutant loads, is threatening food production, product quality, and food security by directly and indirectly impairing plant growth and development. It notes that population growth, energy production, transportation, waste management, and biomass burning have substantially increased atmospheric organic and inorganic pollutants, pushing air quality beyond acceptable limits in many regions. The first part evaluates the effects on agroecosystems of tropospheric (ground-level) ozone, PM2.5 and PM10, nitrogen oxides (NOx), sulfur dioxide (SO2), agricultural ammonia (NH3), and volatile organic compounds (VOCs), detailing how tropospheric ozone suppresses photosynthesis causing yield losses in staple crops such as wheat and soybean, and how particulate matter directly and indirectly affects soil and plant health, alongside the effects of acid rain and nitrogen deposition on soil fertility, water quality, and ecosystem balance, assessed against the four pillars of food security—availability, access, utilization, and stability. The second part discusses integrated policy approaches, industrial emission control technologies, and low-emission transport systems at the macro level, alongside agricultural strategies such as precision farming, improved fertilizer management, and innovative production techniques, and the role of green infrastructure in urban planning.

Yus Alvar Saabighoot, Yusrafidin Yusrafidin, Rakhmini Juwita, Rizka Nurhalija, Rory Fitriani Larasati, Annisa Raudhatul Jannah, Lulu Ilma'nunah · Jurnal SOLMA · Indonesia

This case study examines a community-based program, "Waringin Sehat," delivered through an early childhood education center (PAUD Ibnu Umbara) in Waringin village, Indonesia, to address stunting and malnutrition in young children through a five-stage intervention combining education, participatory training and active mentoring. The program improved parents' and PAUD educators' understanding of balanced nutrition, equipped educators to integrate nutrition material into their curriculum, and formed active community learning groups that promoted use of local food through simple urban farming initiatives.

E. Christian Wells, Sarah Combs · Practicing Anthropology · United States

A paper examines 'healthfields'—former brownfields, land whose contamination history impedes redevelopment and which in the US are disproportionately concentrated in underserved communities of color linked to poor health outcomes—redeveloped through participatory approaches to provide health benefits such as recreational parks, community gardens, and health care centers. Noting that healthfields are difficult to realize because local governments often see them as low-return investments offering little tax-base benefit relative to operation and maintenance costs, the paper describes the history and outcomes of a university-community partnership redevelopment project that catalyzed additional development including attainable housing, evaluating its public health contribution using an established land-reuse model for safely cleaning up and reusing contaminated brownfields.

Nahide AYDIN MARAL, Pınar AYDIN ÇAYCIOĞLU, Hasan MARAL · Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) · Global

This conceptual paper proposes a framework for using medicinal and aromatic plants in preschool education, arguing that their volatile compounds add olfactory stimulation to visual and tactile input and may support attention, emotional memory and environmental awareness given the link between the olfactory and limbic systems. It recommends selecting non-toxic, low-allergenic species for school gardens or mini plant areas, growing annual aromatic species from seed so children can observe life cycles, using observation, description and drawing activities, and controlling the duration and intensity of exposure. No empirical data are reported.