Research & reports

Virginia L. J. Bolshakova, John Gieng, C. Sheena Sidhu, Mary Vollinger, Lorena Gimeno, Jessica Guild · Journal of Youth Development · United States (California)

The "Healthy Living Ambassador" school garden program in low-income communities integrated resources from schools, community programs, and the University of California Cooperative Extension. This program utilized culturally competent teenagers as teachers to educate elementary school youth on healthy living. The successes and challenges of the program development were discussed, revealing that public schools often lack the resources and support to establish sustainable garden-based programming.

Lucas Chan, Lily Han, Lia Monteferrante, Ryah Rondolo · cIRcle (University of British Columbia) · Canada

The UBC Agronomy Garden was the subject of a research project exploring strategies to increase community engagement. The research team conducted a literature review, in-person interviews, and an online survey to investigate ways to make the garden more attractive. Findings indicated that installing multilingual, informative, and welcoming signage is key to increasing engagement, with 63% of students preferring handmade, creative, simple, and colorful welcoming signs.

Kelly Gordon, Adrianne Lickers Xavier, Hannah Tait Neufeld · Canadian Food Studies / La Revue canadienne des études sur l alimentation · Canada

The Healthy Roots initiative in the Six Nations community in southern Ontario, Canada, aimed to promote traditional food consumption among First Nation families facing food insecurity. A small number of participants who consumed only locally available foods reported improved blood glucose control, positive weight changes, and increased traditional food knowledge. The program also fostered new relationships and partnerships, including with the community organization Our Sustenance, to further community-based initiatives like developing a Haudenosaunee Food Guide.

Martin Gauder, Heinrich Hagel, Nadine Gollmann, Joachim Stängle, Reiner Doluschitz, Wilhelm Claupein · Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems · Germany

A 2015 survey of 173 participants and 34 providers of self-harvest gardens in Germany aimed to characterize individuals engaged in this form of urban agriculture. Participants generally exhibited middle to high incomes, sustainable lifestyles, high education levels, and strong nutritional awareness, with a disproportionate engagement of females. Providers were primarily farmers with an affinity for organic agriculture, often benefiting from synergistic effects with farm shops. Challenges identified for some gardens included bad harvests, theft, and vandalism.

Isabel de Felipe · LA Referencia (Red Federada de Repositorios Institucionales de Publicaciones Científicas) · Global

This paper describes urban agriculture as an activity gaining new support but facing difficulties due to inadequate governance. The research identified eight instruments for sustainable urban agriculture, including food security and economic development. It concludes that each city requires specific governance to achieve synergies.

Hannah Powell · Educating Young Children: Learning and Teaching in the Early Childhood Years · Australia

Kurilpa Community Child Care in West End operates a multi-age forest school program weekly at a local community garden's wild-space native plants area. This initiative enables children from a highly urbanized area to develop meaningful relationships with the environment and benefit from ongoing exposure to local green spaces.

Natália Peres Almeida · · Global

This research aimed to identify the contribution of community gardens to healthy food for farmers and their families, with objectives of Food and Nutrition Security, Human Right to Adequate Food, and Food Sovereignty. Interviews were conducted with the president and farmers in the community garden, randomly addressed during their activities. It was concluded that the community garden significantly contributed to the healthy eating of farmers and their families through the production of in natura food of vegetal origin, of sufficient quality and quantity.

Timothy Beatley, Cecil Konijnendijk van den Bosch · Oxford University Press eBooks · Global

This chapter examines the role of urban landscapes in public health, addressing environmental health concerns arising from urbanization, such as physical inactivity. It promotes a socioecological approach, providing examples of how urban landscapes, including urban agriculture and community gardening, contribute to improved public health. The chapter introduces concepts like green urbanism and biophilic urbanism, offering suggestions for planning health-promoting urban landscapes.

David Hallberg · Journal of Sociology and Social Anthropology · Global

This paper introduces community gardens as multipurpose, technological systems with dynamic boundaries. It also aims to revise the notions of food security and health in relation to these systems.

Alisa Koroļova, S. Treija · Architecture and Urban Planning · Europe

This article provides evidence of the multi-functionality of urban gardening in addressing various societal issues. Case studies from Malmo, Birmingham, and Riga demonstrate how urban gardening contributes to social integration, inhabitants' well-being, and urban regeneration.

Corrina Moucheraud, Ram K. Chandyo, Sigrun Henjum, Tor A. Strand, Manjeswori Ulak, Wafaie Fawzi, Lindsey M. Locks, Patrick Webb, Andrew Thorne‐Lyman · Current Developments in Nutrition · Nepal

This cross-sectional study examined whether agricultural activity among a peri-urban population in Bhaktapur district, Nepal, was associated with household food security, household and maternal dietary diversity, and nutritional outcomes for children and women. A survey of 344 mother-child pairs collected data on household agricultural practices, livestock ownership, food security, dietary diversity and expenditures, anthropometric measurements of children aged 5-6, maternal BMI, and maternal anemia, with adjusted and unadjusted odds ratios (AOR) calculated via logistic regression. Cultivation of land was associated with lower odds of child stunting (AOR: 0.55; 95% CI: 0.33-0.93) and household food insecurity (AOR: 0.33; 95% CI: 0.18-0.63), but not with maternal BMI or anemia. Livestock ownership (mostly chickens) was associated with lower food insecurity (AOR: 0.34; 95% CI: 0.16-0.73) but not with nutrition outcomes. Women in farming households ate green leafy vegetables significantly more often than women in nonfarming households, and children in households that grew vegetables had lower odds of stunting than children in households that cultivated land but did not grow vegetables (AOR: 0.49; 95% CI: 0.25-0.98). Given Nepal's rapid urbanization, the study states more attention is needed on the potential role of peri-urban agriculture in shaping diets and nutrition.

Duncan Hilchey · Journal of Agriculture Food Systems and Community Development · United States

This reflective essay recounts the U.S. farm-to-school movement's evolution from a mid-1990s workshop grappling with National School Lunch and Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program protocols to the present, noting that the National Farm to School Network is now well established with federal and foundation support and that nearly half of U.S. schools purchase at least some local farm products. It traces this as a 20-year progression from the 1970s resurgence of farmers markets and 1980s community supported agriculture, extending now into farm-to-college, farm-to-prison, farm-to-hospital and farm-to-childcare programs.

Apri Kuntariningsih · Jurnal kesehatan komunitas (Journal of community health) · Indonesia

A qualitative study in schools in Blitar and Kediri, Indonesia, surveyed 30 participants — 10 students, 5 teachers, 5 food vendors at school, and 10 parents. Child malnutrition was linked to children's food consumption habits, and parents' nutrition knowledge was found lacking, particularly regarding what is consumed at school; school gardens were identified as a means of providing children with fundamental nutrition knowledge, and the study called for government policy to be strengthened to encourage sufficient fruit and vegetable consumption.

林志鈞, 葉怡貞 · · Global

This survey study of citizen-farm (allotment garden) participants analyzed how novelty-seeking, experience value and perceived health relate to continued involvement, and how these vary by demographic attributes. Some demographic variables showed significant differences in novelty-seeking, experience value, perceived health and continued involvement; novelty-seeking was positively correlated with experience value, perceived health and continued involvement; experience value was positively correlated with perceived health and continued involvement; and perceived health was positively correlated with continued involvement. Experience value was also found to partially mediate the effects of both novelty-seeking and perceived health on continued involvement, with novelty-seeking, experience value and perceived health together predicting continued involvement.

Son Truong, Tonia Gray, Danielle Tracey, Kumara Ward · Discovery Research Portal (University of Dundee) · Australia

This study revisits the "Community Greening" partnership established in 1999 between the Royal Botanic Garden Sydney and Housing New South Wales, extending from a 2004 program evaluation report to reconsider community gardening within the changing urban and peri-urban landscape of metropolitan NSW. The program has reached almost 100,000 participants since 2000 and established 627 community and youth-led community gardens across NSW; using a pre- and post-test design, this study tracked six new garden sites established in 2017, aiming to examine whether community gardening is associated with an elevated sense of community, health and wellbeing in low-income communities, and how new gardeners' experiences relate to self-reported wellbeing and engagement.

Sheri Dorn, Lucy Bradley, Debbie Hamrick, Julie Weisenhorn, Pam Bennett, Jill Callabro, Bridget K. Behe, Ellen M. Bauske, Natalie R. Bumgarner · HortTechnology · United States

The National Initiative for Consumer Horticulture (NICH), a diverse consortium of leaders in the United States, aims to provide a unified voice promoting the benefits and value of consumer horticulture (CH) by uniting national research efforts with the goals of stakeholders across industry, the public sector and home gardeners. As of this 2018 report, NICH members had set three broad goals: recognizing CH as a driver of the agricultural economy; highlighting that CH restores, protects and conserves natural resources through research and education; and cultivating healthy, connected and engaged communities through CH. Three committees (Economic, Environmental, and Community and Health Benefits), representing about 30 members, had focused on these goals over the preceding 10 months; their chairs presented results and future directions. The Economic and Environmental committees pursued campaigns to better market CH benefits and to increase environmental benefits by changing consumer behavior. After reviewing current research, the Community and Health Benefits Committee identified a gap in research specifically on the benefits of CH and personal gardening, as distinct from benefits attributed to forests, horticultural therapy, indoor atriums, community gardens, parks and other public places, and concluded that closing this gap requires strategic collaboration among a more diverse group of industry representatives, specialists and scientists.

Susana Clasen Moritz, Micheli Mari da Costa · · Brazil

A report on the Horta Comunitária Semeando Saúde community garden established in 2012 at the Centro de Saúde Santo Antônio de Lisboa health center in Brazil, where residents and health professionals collaborated to grow and consume healthy food. The project describes increased intake of healthy foods and knowledge-sharing among participants, with no quantitative outcome data given.

Mayrina Firdayati, Peni Astrini Notodarmojo, Barti Setiani Muntalif, Didit Trihartomo, Inat Shani Fathuna, Kiki Somantri · INDONESIAN JOURNAL OF URBAN AND ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGY · Indonesia

Against a background of high helminth-infection prevalence in Indonesia — which led the government to issue a 2017 ministerial regulation on preventing soil-transmitted helminths (STH) — this study investigated the potential presence of helminth eggs capable of causing STH infection in two urban agricultural areas in the northern and southern parts of Bandung City. Samples of inlet and plantation-area water, soil, and harvested water spinach from both areas were analyzed for helminth eggs using a modified Bailinger method, and egg counts of 1–119 eggs/L were found across the water, soil, and vegetable samples. The results confirmed that irrigation water in both areas was contaminated with feces, with average fecal coliform counts exceeding the allowable value for irrigation water under Indonesia's Grade 4 water-quality criteria; variation in egg counts was attributed to environmental conditions such as temperature, humidity, and soil type. Helminth-egg levels in the irrigation water and land samples exceeded the values recommended by the WHO's 2006 guidelines for safe use of wastewater in agriculture, which the study links to an increased risk of helminth infection among consumers, agricultural workers, and residents near the farmland.

Francisco Javier Vélez Zabala, Viviana Yulieth Hidalgo Zapata, Mónica Andrea Martínez Martina, Ana María Soto González, Maria Velez, Juan Diego López Vargas · WSEAS TRANSACTIONS ON ENVIRONMENT AND DEVELOPMENT · Global

This conceptual paper presents urban agriculture as a strategy to improve quality of life in vulnerable urban communities formed by rural-to-urban migration, particularly in developing countries. It covers urban agriculture's concepts, origins and evolution, draws on experiences from countries that have implemented it, and discusses the social, economic and environmental factors that influence its development, without reporting original empirical data.

Harriet Gross · · Global

This chapter reflects on the psychology of gardening, examining the relevance of gender, age and the 'gardening career,' and discusses gardens as sites of resistance and empowerment, as seen in community gardening projects. It describes guerrilla gardening — cultivating someone else's land, more surreptitiously than community gardening, by planting or sprinkling seeds at night without the landowner's permission — and horticultural therapy as a form of occupational therapy that occupies people through work, crafts and gardening, concluding that the range of psychological concepts explored in relation to gardening shows there is no single psychology of gardening.

Aline Souza, Daniel Calbino · Revista Em Extensão · Brazil

A study in the municipality of Sete Lagoas, Minas Gerais, Brazil, internationally recognized for 34 years of urban community gardening, examined a community garden established within the Association for the Protection and Assistance of Convicted People (APAC), which reports lower recidivism than traditional prison systems. Using participatory qualitative research (questionnaires, field diaries and photographs), the study analyzed effects on 30 subjects in recovery over 17 months. Results pointed to the garden serving as a means of income generation and producing social and psychological gains such as strengthened social interaction and greater food and nutritional diversity.

Veronica Barry, Chris Blythe · · United Kingdom

A book chapter frames community gardens as part of "health care as a community collective," exploring active and passive spaces that support health and well-being through practical, healthy place-making. It develops case studies from Birmingham and the West Midlands, UK: Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, which has extended its health care model beyond its buildings to the surrounding landscape, and Jasmine Road Community Garden in Dudley, where local residents have collectively developed a site supporting community and individual well-being, drawing practical and theoretical insight into how gardens can facilitate individual and collective journeys toward health and recovery.

Pedro José Santos Carneiro Cruz, Renan Soares de Araújo · Interagir pensando a extensão · Brazil

A report on the "Integrated Health and Nutrition Promotion Practices in Primary Care" (PINAB) program, a university extension initiative guided by popular education principles, carried out in the Boa Esperança community in João Pessoa, Paraíba, Brazil. The program organized activities around two operative groups, "Horta" (garden) and "Health in the Community": the first prioritized building a community garden, and the second held meetings to discuss environmental and local health, quality-of-life and sustainability issues, integrated with cleaning, conservation and planting activities for vegetables and medicinal herbs. Participatory and dialogical methods — conversation circles, creative dynamics and posters expressing local popular culture — were used, positioning the garden as a space for learning through labor and for building solidarity, welcome, dialogue and shared knowledge.

Yoshifumi Ikejima · AgEcon Search (University of Minnesota, USA) · Japan

A geographic information system (GIS) study examined food access among urban residents in Japan, focusing on elderly residents, across two study areas. Approximately 60% of residents aged 65 or older were found to live far from food stores needed for daily shopping, and the study identified nearby farmer-owned produce stands and farmers' markets as local agricultural outlets that could improve access to fresh food.

Bertrand Festus Nero, Nana Afranaa Kwapong, Raymond Jatta, Oluwole Fatunbi · Sustainability · Ghana

Combining interviews with 105 respondents in six neighborhoods and vegetation surveys of over 200 plots (100 sq m each) across five land use types, this study examined the composition, diversity, and socioeconomic contributions of Accra's urban forest and food trees in Ghana. Of 70 woody species found in Accra, 22 have edible parts (leaves, fruits, flowers, etc.), food trees make up about half of all trees counted, and species richness and abundance differed significantly by land use type (p<0.0001) and neighborhood type (p<0.0001), with diversity of food-bearing species much higher in poorer neighborhoods than wealthier ones — while respondents in wealthier neighborhoods rated overall tree and food-tree cover as low and showed greater interest in cultivating food (fruit) trees and expanding forest cover than those in poorer neighborhoods.