A systematic review highlights that there are multiple benefits of urban agriculture besides food

Pradhan, Prajal; Callaghan, Max; Hu, Yuanchao; Dahal, Kshitij; Hunecke, Claudia; Reußwig, Fritz; Lotze‐Campen, Hermann; Kropp, Jürgen P.

doi:10.1016/j.gfs.2023.100700

Cited by 21 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 149 publications

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“…Although local food and energy production can benefit urban sustainability by reducing stormwater, regulating climate, enhancing resilience and biodiversity, and lowering costs and food wastage 35 , nuanced management is required to avoid adverse impacts on urban food and energy transformation 36,37 . Smart urban solutions could involve planning districts for agriculture based on food demands, and other districts for photovoltaic for convenient power transmission or demand, thus minimizing production fragmentation.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Since the business opportunities of urban RA are still untapped 35 , it's meaningful to estimate the transformation potential of food systems like the economic benefit of RPV. The Net Present Value (NPV) 17,[55][56][57] in a 30-year system lifetime was quantified in this part, which can be calculated through Eq.…”

Section: Economic Benefit Of Ra and Rpvmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Large-scale RA and RPV now face lots of issues to be resolved, such as complex ownership and high investment costs, leading to competition with other types of use and untransferable production capacities of cities 73,74 . Although we have conducted local life cycle assessment of RA and RPV in China, there is still potential for continuous improvement in production efficiency 34,35 . Moreover, penetration of renewable energy sources in power system 72 , local preference, and varied recycling and waste disposal methods, should also be considered in future studies.…”

Section: Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Optimal use of urban rooftops can synergize food and energy production objectives

Hu,

Yang,

et al. 2024

Preprint

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Urban rooftop agriculture (RA) and photovoltaics (RPV) offer sustainable solutions for energy-food systems in cities but compete for limited rooftop space. We explore the potential benefits (provisioning, economic, and environmental) and allocation strategy of RA and RPV across 13 million buildings in 124 Chinese cities, considering building height, age, function, rooftop type and occupation, and regional productivity. We found that RA yields superior economic benefits, while RPV excels in cradle-to-grave greenhouse gas emission reduction benefits. Prioritizing either RA or RPV compromises 70–100% of the above benefits brought by the other. An optimized allocation to maximize the overall benefits would retain >55% of their potential, meeting 14% (mean, 0.5–99% across cities) of urban vegetable needs and 5% (0.5–27% across cities) of the electricity needs. Such a scenario requires allocating 54% (varied 4–99% across cities) of the flat rooftop area to RA, and all remaining rooftops to RPV. Together, the productivity from rooftop RA and RPV are equivalent to 2.3×103 km2 of cropland and 86 Mt of coal, contribute 1.5% of the national GDP and reduce 1.6% of national greenhouse gas emissions (account for 0.1–33% of city levels), requiring considerable water (up to 18% of urban residential water use) and material demand (e.g., totalling 9 kt silver). By elucidating the benefits and resource costs of rooftop utilization, our findings can support synergetic decision-making to meet multiple sustainability goals in diverse cities.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Economic Benefit Of Ra and Rpvmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Optimal use of urban rooftops can synergize food and energy production objectives

Hu,

Yang,

et al. 2024

Preprint

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“…are common agricultural activities among Dalhousie University School of Agriculture, Saint Paul University School of medicine, and other American edible campuses. Conversely,Pradhan et al (2023) expressed concerns about poultry farming and livestock farming, pointing out that improper management of livestock manure can lead to potential risks of zoonotic pathogen contamination. Fifthly, the technology application of an edible campus.…”

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confidence: 99%

Design factors promoting the benefits of an edible campus in China

Ding,

Zhao,

Yue

et al. 2024

Front. Sustain. Food Syst.

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Currently, most university campuses in China are plagued by issues such as high food demand, imbalanced diets, serious food waste and poor environmental quality. Research has shown that the multiple benefits of an edible campus, which may also be referred to as a school garden or farm catering to various educational levels, can help alleviate the aforementioned problems. However, there is limited research on how to promote the benefits of an edible campus through design. Therefore, taking the South Campus of Hebei University of Technology in China as an example, this paper aims to explore the correlation between design and benefits of an edible campus. The design factors and benefit factors related to an edible campus are extracted through literature search. The design preferences and benefit predictions are obtained through 261 questionnaire surveys and interviews with 30 participants. During the statistical analysis phase, principal component analysis and multiple regression analysis are applied to analyze the correlation between design factors and benefit factors. The results indicate: (1) The design factors of an edible campus can be categorized into seven categories: spatial location, spatial carrier, size, space function, facility configuration, planting and crop varieties, and technology application. (2) The benefits of an edible campus include environmental education, physical and mental health, social interaction, ecological protection, and economic output. (3) There are significant differences in design factors that positively or negatively correlate with different benefits. Among them, the strongest positive correlation exists between planting function and the five benefits, followed by central landscape and container planting. Furthermore, the causes behind the correlation between design factors and benefit factors are analyzed, and design strategies for an edible campus under different benefit orientations are proposed. The findings of this study can contribute to the sustainable development of university campuses in China.

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“…Further, urban agriculture also has its own limitations. For example, this systematic review 2 mentions health and other risks associated with urban agriculture. Thus, it would be better to embed the tool in the existing literature.…”

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confidence: 99%

ediblecity: an R package to model and estimate the benefits of urban agriculture

Pueyo-Ros,

Comas,

Corominas

2023

Open Res Europe

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Urban agriculture is gaining attraction to become one of the pillars of the urban ecological transition and to increase food security in an urbanized planet. However, there is a lack of systematic quantification of the benefits provided by urban agriculture solutions. In this paper, we present an R package to estimate several indicators related to benefits of urban agriculture. The goal is to provide a tool for researchers and practitioners interested in the impacts of urban agriculture. The ediblecity package provides functions to calculate 8 indicators: urban heat island, runoff prevention, green areas accessibility, NO2 sequestration, jobs created in commercial gardens, volunteers involved in community gardens, green per capita and, finally, food production. Moreover, the package also provides a function to generate scenarios with different implementations of urban agriculture. We illustrate the use of the package by comparing three scenarios in a neighborhood of Girona (Spain), which is included in the package as an example dataset. There, we compare scenarios with an increasing amount of urban agriculture solutions. The ediblecity package is open-source software. This allows other R developers to contribute to the package, providing new functionalities or improving the existing ones.

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A systematic review highlights that there are multiple benefits of urban agriculture besides food

Cited by 21 publications

References 149 publications

Optimal use of urban rooftops can synergize food and energy production objectives

Optimal use of urban rooftops can synergize food and energy production objectives

Design factors promoting the benefits of an edible campus in China

ediblecity: an R package to model and estimate the benefits of urban agriculture

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