Chapter: The Multidimensional Benefits of Urban Agriculture to Public Life and Well-being in Cities

From Book: Urban Agriculture in Public Space – Planning and Designing for Human Flourishing in Northern European Cities and Beyond

Author: Beata Sirowy Deni Ruggeri
Year:2024
GeoJournal Library
Volume 132

This book aims to support the process of urban agriculture research by providing theoretical and practical insights on the integration of urban agriculture in public space development – addressing its well-being impacts, design, organization, educational contexts, and urban planning aspects.

Abstract from article

In this chapter the editors reflect on the thematic scope of this publication, situating it in a wider background of urban agriculture research. They claim that to leverage its greatest impact, opportunities to engage in urban cultivation should be widely accessible to all segments of urban population, close to everyone’s home. Worldwide, due to the scarcity of and high costs of land in dense urban inner-city areas, integrating urban agriculture in already existing and planned public spaces seems like the most feasible strategy to achieve this objective. This book wants to support this process by providing theoretical and practical insights on the integration of urban agriculture in public space development – addressing its well-being impacts, design, organization, educational contexts, and urban planning aspects.

From Forward to book:

Foreword: Why Public Urban Agriculture?

In public perception, urban agriculture has evolved over the past two decades from an exotic phenomenon to an established urban component. It has found its way into many municipal agendas. New actors and networks support the cultivation of food in and around the city. Many research projects in the European context (Lohrberg et al. 2016) have addressed urban agriculture. Nevertheless, there are still many gaps in knowledge, and many specific features of urban agriculture have not yet been sufficiently captured and understood, particularly with regard to regional dif- ferences and explanatory models. It is therefore even more gratifying that the pres- ent book has filled such a gap, namely the importance of public space for urban agriculture in Northern and Central Europe.

Indeed, two aspects are surprising: first, why are so many projects of urban agri- culture – especially forms of urban gardening – located in the public space, which is not suitable for the pure production of food, think of soil conditions, spatial restrictions, vandalism and so on? Second, why has this contradiction not yet been investigated in depth, why have the public virtues of urban space not been looked at more closely?

Link to book with many urban agriculture chapters.