Research & reports

Naudé Malan · Agrekon · South Africa (Johannesburg)

This article examines urban farmers' perspectives on Johannesburg's urban agriculture policy, part of its "food resilience" strategy, using participatory and social science research methods. Through facilitated workshops, farmers identified key themes for organizational development and urban agriculture, including Land and Water, External Stakeholders, Training, Tools and Technology, Marketing, Organizational Development, Permaculture, and Security. The findings provide crucial insights for policy implementation in Johannesburg.

Alan Hallsworth, Alfred Wong · International journal on food system dynamics · United Kingdom (Portsmouth)

This empirical case study examined the potential for urban gardening to contribute to individual food security. Focusing on Portsmouth, England, the study found that prevailing economic and social structures hamper the likelihood that urban gardening can offer much greater food security. Realistically, contemporary urban gardening most closely resembles a middle-class pursuit for personal enjoyment, rather than a significant contributor to food security.

Danny Tarng · Journal of Agriculture Food Systems and Community Development · United States

This commentary discusses how nonprofit urban agriculture organizations, central to the U.S. food justice movement, can foster better allyship. It highlights that as the movement expands, the transformation of allies' privilege into empowerment at an organizational level is crucial for ongoing growth and success. The text provides insights into organizational policies and practices that can improve allyship.

Bongajum Simplice Ngoran, Suinyuy Derrick Ngoran · Journals & Books Hosting (International Knowledge Sharing Platform) · Cameroon (Bamenda)

This article examines the socioeconomic implications of urban agriculture in Bamenda, Cameroon. It found that urban agriculture has improved living conditions, providing employment to about 11% of the working population and reducing food expenses for civil servants. However, urban agriculture in Bamenda lags behind other cities due to rudimentary tools, suggesting a need for advanced technology and improved seedlings.

Brittany Kesselman · ScholarWorks -A service of University of Vermont Libraries (University of Vermont) · South Africa (Johannesburg)

This proposal outlines ongoing PhD research aimed at understanding if and how urban community gardens contribute to food sovereignty in Johannesburg, South Africa, and determining actions to enhance their contribution. The research examines the way urban community gardens contribute to six key elements of food sovereignty: access to adequate food, sustainable income/livelihoods, localization and democratization of the food system, environmental sustainability, empowerment of marginalized groups, and promotion of gender equity.

Jenny Sjöblom · · Sweden

This study describes the origin and development of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) in Sweden, identifying and interviewing organizations and entrepreneurs. While CSA is nascent but growing, with prerequisites for expansion in both rural and urban areas, the study notes implications regarding its accessibility to the broader population that require further exploration.

Shreema Rana · Journal of Natural Resources and Development · Nepal

This paper reviews existing literature on urban food supply chains and food security benefits of peri-urban agriculture in developing regions, focusing on the Kathmandu Valley, Nepal. It highlights the significance of peri-urban areas for a sustainable food chain and points out existing but unrecognized features of peri-urban agriculture at local and policy-making levels. The review identifies gaps in local preferences and policy acknowledgment, suggesting further research is needed for sustainable peri-urban agriculture approaches.

Elizabete Cristina Ribeiro Silva, Alexandre Brasil Carvalho da Fonseca, Fernanda Pereira Dysarz, Ernani Jardim Reis · Alexandria Revista de Educação em Ciência e Tecnologia · Brazil

This research identifies parameters for school gardens in Brazil, analyzing various experiences and an urban public school case. The study correlates the health of students and farmers in agricultural activities, explicitly pointing out negligences in this regard. It argues that a healthy eating concept from school gardens requires an equally healthy production system, and attention to student safety can highlight farmers' working conditions, which is crucial for food and nutritional education.

Annette B. Fromm · Journal of American Folklore · Global

"Taking Public: Redefining Foodways in a Changing World" is a volume compiling interdisciplinary approaches to five specific topics in worldwide food studies. Authors from diverse fields such as anthropology, sociology, geography, nutrition, and gender studies contribute, addressing themes like production, consumption, performance, food in the diaspora, and activism and foodways. The content spans various subjects including organic farming, veganism, agribusiness, fast food, urban gardens, and dumpster diving, with global examples from Cuba to Southeast Asia, the UK, and African American and Jewish homes in the American South.

Delgado Pontón, Daniela María · · Ecuador (Machala)

This work aims to provide guidelines for implementing a municipal urban and peri-urban agriculture program in Machala, Ecuador, to improve environmental quality and food security for the population. The proposed program's guidelines are presented, supported by arguments for its importance in combating hunger, enhancing food and nutritional security, reducing urban habitat deterioration, and generating employment for participating families.

Lauren Baker and Henk de Zeeuw · · Global

This chapter analyzes the opportunities and limitations of urban agriculture for climate change mitigation and adaptation, providing information on city projects and policies. It identifies challenges for research and policy development concerning urban agriculture's potential as a city climate change and disaster risk-reduction strategy.

Sara Parme · Educational Media Reviews Online · Global

The documentary film "Plant This Movie" (2014, 83 min) explores our relationship with food and the wasted space and resource of the 21st-century lawn. This film, one of many similar documentaries on urban farming, proposes learning from and improving upon past mistakes of the Green Movement. It notes that many agricultural nonprofits, including one highlighted, fail due to lack of funding, and while it suggests sustainability efforts should be run like a business, only a fraction of the film is dedicated to this aspect.

Courtney M. Gallaher, Antoinette WinklerPrins, Mary Njenga, Nancy Karanja · Journal of Agriculture Food Systems and Community Development · Kenya (Nairobi)

This research investigated how participation in sack gardening improved the livelihoods of farmers in the Kibera slums of Nairobi, Kenya. The study demonstrates that urban agriculture, particularly low-space activities like sack gardening, can be a viable and important livelihood strategy for households, even in densely populated slum environments.

Abdoul-Ramane Abdoulaye, Aboudou Yacoubou Mama Aboudou Ramanou · Journal of Geoscience and Environment Protection · Benin (Parakou)

This study examined urban market-gardening in Parakou, Benin, as a solution for rural farmers migrating to the city, given the city's population growth and 65% poverty rate. Using documentary research, interviews, and field observation, the study found that market-gardening areas have evolved, reducing food insecurity through consistent produce availability. It also contributes to environmental protection by draining urban areas and preserving vegetable diversity, while increasing farmers' household incomes and creating employment.

Gabriel R. Valle · Aztlán A Journal of Chicano Studies · United States

This essay explores the self-valorization of work in community gardens to advance a grounded theory of time and value, which has been lacking in Chicana/o studies. Urban community gardens are pivotal to the environmental justice movement, with Chicana/os playing a central role. The essay proposes a revolutionary logic of labor through reframing time and value, aiming to reconnect community gardeners to the means of their own production and reproduction. By creating "gardens of sabotage," communities challenge capitalism by reclaiming the value of work and confronting orthodox notions of economy, work, citizenship, community, and time.

Greg Keeffe · Research Portal (Queen's University Belfast) · United Kingdom

This chapter focuses on developing sustainable growing infrastructure at two scales: a large-scale city-wide fuel-productive landscape using algae arrays in Liverpool and a hyper-localized neighborhood food production system in Salford, UK, utilizing a closed-cycle aquaponic system. The author proposes a three-part model for urban agriculture implementation—hardware, software, and interface—concluding that urban agriculture should be viewed as a process rather than a static design, with benefits extending beyond physical outputs like energy and food.

Ursula Lang · ENLIGHTEN (Jurnal Bimbingan dan Konseling Islam) · Global

This article argues that existing alternatives to factory foods often rely on nostalgic models of rural purity, limiting the incorporation of new urban farming methods. Cultural associations with rural purity and urban pollution have led to an oversight of cities' potential to provide fresh, seasonal, and local foods by focusing on standard, horizontal spatial relationships.

V. Ernesto Mendez, Christopher M. Bacon, Roseann Cohen, Stephen R. Gliessman · Agroecology · United States

This chapter discusses the rise of movements for just and sustainable food systems in the United States over the last 15 years, encompassing areas like urban agriculture and food sovereignty. It notes that while most practitioners in US alternative agrifood movements do not use the term "agroecology," they share similar principles. The chapter also describes the evolution of agroecology from a farm-scale focus to a systems-based, transdisciplinary approach for sustainable food systems.

Jeanne Pourias, Éric Duchemin, Christine Aubry · Journal of Agriculture Food Systems and Community Development · Canada (Montreal); France (Paris)

This paper investigates the food function of collective gardens (CGs) in Paris, France, and Montreal, Canada, where their numbers have rapidly increased. Researchers conducted interviews, quantified production, and monitored plots to understand the quantities and types of fruits and vegetables produced, their destination, and space use. The results indicate a wide diversity of practices concerning CGs' food function, which should be considered alongside their multifunctionality.

Zulfadhli Nasution · · Indonesia (Jakarta)

A case study in Jakarta, Bandung, and Bogor, Indonesia, examined the engagement between urban farming communities and food sovereignty. Findings indicate that the food sovereignty discourse has not significantly exposed urban farming communities due to differing historical backgrounds and social/political views between urban farming and rural peasantry-based movements. The study suggests prerequisites for strengthening food sovereignty among urban food advocates, including building consumer consciousness and urban-rural solidarity.

Berhe, Sophia · National Academic Digital Repository of Ethiopia · Ethiopia

A comparative study in Akaki-Kaliti Sub-city, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, investigated the contributions of urban agriculture to alleviating food insecurity among 100 randomly selected poor urban households. The study found that one in two sampled households engaged in farming, earning food and cash income, which improved household food security by enhancing food availability (50%) and nutrition (50%).

Michael L. Pennell · Community Literacy Journal · Global

This abstract introduces a special issue of the Community Literacy Journal on community food literacies, highlighting the intertwined relationship between food and literacy. It notes that both are in "revolutionary" stages, with food systems re-localizing through farmers’ markets, CSAs, and community gardens. The issue presents various perspectives on community food literacies, responding to a call for service-learning practitioners and literacy workers to address these expanding relationships.

Dorceta E. Taylor, Kerry Ard · Environmental Practice · United States

A study of Detroit, Michigan, United States, combining environmental justice analysis with systems thinking to examine the city's food environment. Data were collected from ReferenceUSA, Orbis and the Michigan Department of Agriculture between 2011 and 2013 to build a database of food outlets, analyzed and mapped using SPSS 22 and ArcGIS 10.1. The study examined the locations of 3,499 food outlets across 34 categories, including 96 supermarkets or full-line grocery stores, 1,110 small groceries/convenience stores/mini marts/liquor stores, 279 specialty food stores, 306 pharmacies/dollar/variety stores, 1,245 full-service and fast-food restaurants and other food service outlets, 157 supply chain operations, 206 farms/community and school gardens/farmers markets/produce markets, and 100 food assistance programs. It found that although Detroit has areas lacking food outlets, characterizing the entire city as a "food desert" is misleading, and that the traditional food desert research approach — relying only or primarily on the presence or absence of supermarkets and full-line grocery stores — ignores many important venues people use to obtain food and the coping strategies people employ in response to limited food access.

I Ketut Sardiana · Bumi Lestari Journal of Environment · Indonesia

A field survey using subak (traditional Balinese irrigation) units as sampling points, with soil properties analyzed by standard laboratory methods, evaluated land suitability for horticultural and medicinal crops in Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia, to support agricultural planning that protects the subak system amid land conversion to tourism development. Land was found "very suitable" (S1) for rice, and "suitable" (S) for vegetables, fruit and medicinal plants with two limiting factors — poor drainage and fine soil texture — leading to recommendations for drainage improvement, organic matter addition, and zoned land-use planning by season and location (rice in the rainy season, flowers in the north, fruit and vegetables in the central area, and vegetables and secondary crops in the south).

Intan Zainab Bauw, Suharko · · Indonesia

A 2015 qualitative case study of "Bandung Berkebun," an urban farming community in Bandung, Indonesia, examines its resource mobilization process using resource mobilization theory from social movement studies (the McCarthy and Zald, and Edwards frameworks). Based on direct interviews, participant observation, and secondary data, it finds that Bandung Berkebun accessed resources through self-aggregation and self-production, drawing on human resources in the form of creative activists, cultural resources in the form of innovative ideas and concepts, and social-organizational resources in the form of strong networks. However, while the group achieved considerable community-sustainability outcomes, the study notes that in terms of realizing the movement's longer-term vision, its resource mobilization process remained mere mobilization, not yet fully directed toward ensuring that vision's realization.