“A Roça na Cidade”: Horta Comunitária e engajamento em uma Comunidade Vulnerável

Community gardens are perceived as one of many forms of urban agriculture and gardening practices using high levels of social innovation and environmentally-friendly lifestyles. In contrast to the years of experience in the US and Western European countries, community gardens are rather new in Central and Eastern European countries. Our research strives to contribute to the lively discussion of the development process and effects from the management of community gardens in the urban environment, especially through a comparative analysis of community gardens in two post-socialist countries, Slovakia and Poland, with an emphasis on Bratislava and Poznań. In order to better understand the nuances of community gardening in these areas, we carried out extensive field research involving exploratory walks, participatory observation and semi-structured interviews with community garden representatives in both cities. The results of our analysis revealed both similarities and differences in the city-specific approaches in the ways community gardens are established, managed and developed under purportedly similar historical, geographical and socio-economic conditions of two post-socialist cities. We conclude that a strictly copy-paste approach does not exist. In other words, the proper way of management of community gardens and even the perception and interpretation of what is considered a community garden can vary from one place to another and is usually negotiated in the place-specific local context.

Louisville, Kentucky has over two dozen active community gardens which are used and maintained by various neighborhoods and organizations. This thesis determines how collaboration and resource sharing manifest in Louisville’s various community gardens. Participant observation was used to select three case study sites and semi-structured interviews were conducted with garden users and managers for each site, and with supporters and funders for Louisville community gardens. I found that Louisville community gardens share three challenges, which are funding, resources, and land ownership. Community garden actors navigate these challenges by exchanging physical resources, shared labor, and knowledge across multiple scales. This thesis utilizes broad scholarship in Urban Political Ecology to explore these experiences of exchange and sharing, which show that access to resources is influenced by political-economic relations in Louisville.

This qualitative study aims to understand how community garden (CG) participants experience the effects of participation on fruit and vegetable (FV) consumption and health behaviors. Semi-structured interviews and focus groups were conducted with a total of 61 CG managers and participants in the fall of 2017, in CGs located in rural low-wealth communities. Five themes were identified: Community gardens influence FV access and consumption, nutritional and agricultural knowledge improve through CG participation, CGs may serve as a kickstart to other improvements to health and wellbeing, CGs have positive impacts on participants’ mental health, and successful gardens contribute to community cohesion.

This paper presents the perspectives of participants from three Community Gardens in Edinburgh, Scotland and investigates the role that food growing plays in their recreation and leisure activities, personal development, the development of their children and the impact on their communities. Thirty-eight participants were interviewed using qualitative, semi-structured questions to explore their motivations and experiences from their involvement with community gardens. Participant observation was used to better understand the importance of the gardens in their lives. The participants felt the gardens were places that fostered neighbourly engagement, increased leisure opportunities, social support, community health, connectedness, and community diversity. They were also places that promoted knowledge exchange inside the garden and in to the homes of the people and the community itself. Anxieties over land use and land reform highlighted how community gardens symbolised empowerment but also showed resistance to the hegemonic structure of local council and government. In effect, the research suggests that community gardens grow much more than just food, they grow community.

Current food production methods in the United States contribute to environmental degradation as well as food insecurity. Food production by means of community gardens has the potential to reduce the deleterious effects of current production methods. However, many community gardens face challenges that hinder their longevity, thereby reducing the likelihood of the support they might provide for environmentally sustainable food production and decreased food insecurity for community members. A behavioral systems science approach was combined with ethnographic research methods, matrix analysis, and a literature review regarding best practices for community gardens to study the cultural practices of three established community gardens in the southwest region of the US. The results of the analyses conducted are presented in terms of recommendations to support each target community garden's sustainability. Recommendations regarding future research include environmental manipulations to identify functional relations and potential outcome measures for improving the longevity of community gardens are provided.

Abstract: Online crowdfunding (fundraising whereby groups of individuals collectively contribute money to back different projects and endeavors through the Internet) has proven to be a viable alternative for raising funds. Businesses, entrepreneurs, and individuals have used this alternative fundraising channel to raise finances to support their businesses, ideas, creative projects, or personal goals. Despite the growing importance and popularity of crowdfunding, and the documented impact of online buzz (word-of-mouth messages, shares, and tweets on online/social media platforms) in online crowdfunding performance, it is not clear what types of evolution patterns (dynamics) online buzz exhibit during online crowdfunding campaigns, and the relationship between these buzz evolution patterns and crowdfunding campaign performance. In this study, I explore the buzz evolution patterns associated with online crowd-funding and establish a relationship between the identified buzz evolution patterns and crowdfunding campaign performance. The exploratory analysis reveals four distinct online buzz evolution patterns in crowdfunding campaigns. Further, the analysis shows a link between the online buzz evolution patterns and backer activity. Finally, I develop a model based on the patterns of buzz intensity and show that, comparatively, it is better at predicting crowdfunding campaign outcomes than a model based on the campaign organizer’s social network size.

Cultivating alternative spaces – Zagreb’s community gardens in transition: From socialist to post-socialist perspective

Despite the benefits of ecological complexity, tidy and ecologically simple landscapes are the hegemonic aesthetic norm in many rural and urban settings. In rural agriculture, tidy landscapes of perfectly spaced, weed-free rows are often taken as an indication of farmer skill. Meanwhile, suburban yard owners face cultural pressures to maintain immaculate lawns through intensive lawn care regimens. In both contexts, an aesthetic of tidiness can contribute to dire ecological outcomes. Community gardens have potential to break the mold of tidiness. They are influenced by both agricultural and suburban aesthetic lineages but also by alternative agri-food movements, which place a higher value on sustainable practices, opening possibilities for alternative aesthetic outcomes that support greater ecosystem health. Drawing on a photovoice project and semi-structured interviews with community gardeners in the California central coast, we investigate the values that drive community garden aesthetics. We find that tidiness remains the hegemonic aesthetic, upheld by formal and informal governance mechanisms as well as personal taste. However, an alternative aesthetic, which we term “wildness,” provides a counterpoint to tidiness that can contribute valuable ecological resources to community gardens. Ultimately, however, we find that garden tidiness is not necessarily mutually exclusive with a sustainability orientation and wildness was not always the product of sustainability values.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s42822-023-00124-7.

Urban agriculture is increasingly promoted within urban sustainability agendas as a multifunctional response to food insecurity, climate change, and socio-spatial inequality. In many U.S. cities, these efforts are framed by an “opportunity narrative” that imagines an abundance of vacant land and assumes communities are equally capable and willing to transform it. While this framing has gained traction in post-industrial cities like Detroit or Baltimore, it has also informed policies in rapidly growing cities such as San Diego, where community gardens have been championed as tools for improving environmental and public health outcomes. This paper critically examines the political ecology of land access for urban agriculture in San Diego, arguing that celebratory narratives around community gardening often obscure the structural inequities that shape where and how food can be grown. Drawing on city planning documents, spatial data, and original fieldwork—including site audits, surveys, and interviews— we analyze how low-income and racialized communities confront legal, institutional, and economic barriers to accessing and maintaining land to collectively address food insecurity via community gardening. We argue that San Diego's urban agriculture policies exemplify a neoliberal “green fix”, where greening is used to enhance urban development potential without redistributive investment. Responsibility for food access is shifted onto marginalized communities, while land remains treated as a speculative commodity. This depoliticized approach positions gardening as benign civic participation rather than a practice embedded in struggles over land, race, and justice. By troubling the assumption that vacant land is inherently available and universally accessible, the paper contributes to urban political ecology scholarship and calls for a land justice framework that foregrounds equity, secure tenure, and community self-determination in the making of urban green space.

This is a designing services research for social innovation and sustainability and aims to understand and strengthen the collective initiatives produced from six community gardens. A literature review based on social design and innovation, collaborative design practices and service design was used as a methodology, and field activities such as interviews, participant observation and research journals were used as methodology. Two service design exercises were developed: the first part of an expert design process and a second from a codesign process in a community garden using the Dragon Dreaming method.

Although community gardens are widely promoted, very little empirical evidence exists of their contribution to food security. This study evaluated the contribution of community gardens to alleviating food insecurity for 53 community gardeners in Maphephetheni, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Using the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale, it was found that 89% of these households were anxious about food supplies, consumed insufficient food and were severely food insecure. In addition, 72% consumed poor quality food. Community gardens were unable to solve the problem of food insecurity, but their contribution to consumption cannot be entirely ignored. Improved productivity and appropriate agricultural and nutritional advice are necessary. Land availability needs to be addressed through community and other redress systems to grant communities access to less marginal and more accessible productive land close to water. Programmes to support non-farm income are needed and could provide incentives for increased production.

ABSTRACTRelationships among food security, produce intake and behaviors, health, and social capital in rural Appalachian community gardeners were examined. Gardeners (n = 120) were surveyed, with 50 responding (42% response rate). Though most respondents were food secure, approximately 15% were food insecure. Results indicated that participants ate more produce (76%), made better eating choices (74%), spent less money on food (74%), were more physically active (66%), and made new friends (74%). Food insecurity was associated with eating more produce (p < 0.05) and spending less money on food (p = 0.05) due to gardening, which warrants further exploration.

Community gardens have become increasingly popular in recent years, and the Canadian city of Prince George, BC is no exemption. Prince George hosts seven community gardens, four of which were the subject of research. Eighteen qualitative interviews were conducted to determine the structures, goals, benefits and challenges facing each of the four community gardens. The structures were quite varied, though the public and private nature of the gardens were the main divisive factor between the gardens. The two public gardens were run by organizations that offered the produce grown in the gardens to passersby, while the two private gardens offered plots to local residents to grow food for themselves. The five goals of the gardens were quite similar, and included social, a place to grow food, address food insecurity, health, and education. Benefits included social, food (food security and sovereignty), personal enjoyment, and education of the participants, especially children. The challenges the gardens faced varied considerably between the public and private gardens. They included theft and destruction, maintenance and labor capacity, awareness, and the overall structure of the garden. A disconnect was often found between the goals and the benefits of the gardens, and the challenges were especially serious in the public gardens. Public gardens should especially be managed carefully as their misdirected goals seem to be inhibiting the work necessary to run the garden. To ensure the sustainability of these important gardens in Prince George, consideration should be made to the structures of the gardens and changes made to the gardens. --Leaf 2.

As part of their strategy to further develop relationships with local communities, St Vincent’s Hospice has developed a community garden in the grounds of the hospice. Building on the success...