Urban Agriculture Europe

"How can agriculture contribute to the sustainable development of European cities? How can agriculture and horticulture create vital urban spaces that have new social and ecological qualities and are also economically viable? Urban Agriculture Europe is the first comprehensive, transdisciplinary publication about urban agriculture in Europe. Apart from well-known examples of urban food gardens in Western European metropolises, this volume also studies innovative forms of periurban agriculture, bringing in experiences in Eastern and Southern Europe. The contributions approach urban agriculture from the point of view of social science, the economy, agricultural ecology, and spatial planning and address the role of citizens, involved parties, and politics, as well as operational models and planning tools. Case studies from Barcelona, Dublin, Geneva, Milan, Sofia, Warsaw, and the Ruhr Metropolis allow a comparative view of European practice. Statements from involved parties and guidance for cities and regions round off the publication."--Page 4 of cover.

Although urban allotment gardening dates back to the nineteenth century, it has recently undergone a renaissance of interest and popularity. This is the result of greater concern over urban greenspace, food security and quality of life. This book presents a comprehensive, research-based overview of the various features, benefits and values associated with urban allotment gardening in Europe. The book is based on a European COST Action project, which brings together researchers and practitioners from all over Europe for the first detailed exploration of the subject on a continent-wide scale. It assesses the policy, planning and design aspects, as well as the social and ecological benefits of urban allotment gardening. Through an examination of the wide range of different traditions and practices across Europe, it brings together the most recent research to discuss the latest evolutions of urban allotment gardening and to help raise awareness and fill knowledge gaps. The book provides a multidisciplinary perspective, including insights from horticulture and soil science, ecology, sociology, urban geography, landscape, planning and design. The themes are underpinned by case studies from a number of European countries which supply a wide range of examples to illustrate different key issues.

This Monograph focuses on the new approaches that urban agriculture offers to grow food in cities. The author paints a dynamic picture of soil-less and indoor techniques that are currently emerging. A growing number of small scale community-led and entrepreneurial initiatives are using such techniques for diverse objectives: to increase resource efficiency; to strengthen food security; to educate and inform or to exploit new market opportunities. The described studies demonstrate how technologies that are typically used in high-tech food production can also be harnessed in small projects to generate social and economic benefits at a local level. The author puts a focus on three aspects: to outline the context within which small scale soil-less urban agriculture is developing in Europe; to give an overview of the state-of-the-art of projects focusing on this area through case study analysis and to elaborate on emerging questions. Such questions include: is the use of soil-less urban agriculture changing the relationship with, and perception of, what is natural and sustainable for urban farmers and small enterprises working in this sector? What is the perceived potential of these soil-less and indoor forms of urban agriculture to meet environmental, social and economic goals? By answering these and other questions, the volume is a valuable resource for researchers in agriculture and sustainability, as well as urban farmers.

This book gives an overview of frameworks, methods, and case studies useful for the analysis of the relations between agriculture and the city, in Europe and the Mediterranean. Its originality lies in the analysis of urban food systems sustainability from an actors’ perspective. All the chapters consider the key role of actors in the definition of innovations and pathways, which enhance sustainability, seen as an ongoing process. Part 1 presents systemic approaches of agricultural-urban interactions at the city-region scale in France, Egypt, Italy and Morocco. Part 2 deals with methods and tools for urban planning and local development, utilized to design and assess sustainable food systems. The Part 3 inventories the recent changes in urban agriculture and the new forms of governance which are emerging in European cities (Athens, Berlin, Lisbon, Montpellier, Paris and Zurich). These results are useful for students, academics and activists involved in local policies and projects.

This book explains how cultural heritage can be a tool for enhancing urban agriculture and improving landscape and life quality. It cuts across the existing literature and fills the gaps between urban agriculture, considered as a food, social and environmental opportunity and cultural heritage, considered as resource. It focuses the role of the countryside for urban areas, in the history of the city and today. Its attention is on the quality for all areas, both outstanding, ordinary and degraded, as well as large, little or fragmented (European landscape convention 2000). It considers agricultural landscape as a system of tangible and intangible heritage components and relationships, to be retained, enhanced and transmit, in a process of inevitable but appropriate dynamic conservation and management over time (ICOMOS-IFLA Principles 2017). This book can benefit the collaboration among local players – such as farmers, citizens, associations, public institutions, stakeholders – in conserving and enhancing agrarian heritage and reinforcing the identity of places and people. It can strengthen collective action and generate positive effects on good large and local -scale management. The first part has a methodological character in order to enlighten the integrated approach between cultural heritage and urban agriculture. The second part exemplifies cases where the heritage has been recognised but not yet translated into concrete action. The third Part discloses ongoing process of co-construction, where policies have recognized the cultural, environmental and social meaning of urban agriculture as heritage. This book aims to reach scholars, local administrations, professionals, farmers and citizens. It involves many authors, many of whom are directly engaged with action-research in safeguarding and implementing the mutual interaction between urban agriculture activities and agrarian heritage.

As people increasingly migrate to urban settings and more than half of the world's population now lives in cities, it is vital to plan and provide for sustainable and resilient food systems which reflect this challenge. This volume presents experience and evidence-based "state of the art" chapters on the key dimensions of urban food challenges and types of intra- and peri-urban agriculture. The book provides urban planners, local policy makers and urban development practitioners with an overview of crucial aspects of urban food systems based on an up to date review of research results and practical experiences in both developed and developing countries. By doing so, the international team of authors provides a balanced textbook for students of the growing number of courses on sustainable agriculture, food and urban studies, as well as a solid basis for well-informed policy making, planning and implementation regarding the development of sustainable, resilient and just urban food systems.

This Open Access book is for scientists and experts who work on urban food policies. It provides a conceptual framework for understanding the urban food system sustainability and how it can be tackled by local governments. Written by a collective of researchers, this book describes the existing conceptual frameworks for an analysis of urban food policies, at the crossroads of the concepts of food system and sustainable city. It provides a basis for identifying research questions related to urban local government initiatives in the North and South. It is the result of work carried out within Agropolis International within the framework of the Sustainable Urban Food Systems program and an action research carried out in support of Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole for the construction of its agroecological and food policy.

This book presents the findings of a multidisciplinary study on the effects of urban agriculture (UA) on the social, economic and environmental aspects of the quality of life in Sofia - the capital of Bulgaria. The analyses are based on a sociological survey representative of 3 districts of Sofia (among 750 people), in-depth interviews, focus groups, expert statements, ecological monitoring of UA sites, and spatial mapping of natural resources for UA. It also focuses on UA effects on the social well-being of citizens and communities, the correlation between social capital and UA attitudes, the challenges for UA to integrate disadvantaged social groups, the factors for success of small UA businesses, as well as the role of policy and civil society in developing UA. This work is also important for the analysis of the underlying links between all aspects of urban agriculture, many of which are valid beyond the local socio-economic context and environmental specifics of the city of Sofia.