Sustainable HCI for grassroots urban food-growing communities

Abstract

Mainstream food growing practices around the world call in to question our future food security, and in particular the sustainability of food consumption in urban centres. At the same time there has been a dramatic recent increase in grassroots urban food-growing communities in the UK and beyond. This paper looks at how research in sustainable human-computer interaction (HCI) can support better social and environmental practices through a focus on urban food-growing communities. In this paper we respond to recent work within sustainable HCI. We report on a field study at an urban city farm in inner London which took a participatory research approach with staff and volunteers. We discuss the values, needs and practices of the farm community which have emerged from the fieldwork. We conclude with a discussion of the implications and opportunities for designing with computational technology to help inform the conceptualisation of sustainable HCI and to serve as a resource for designers engaging with urban food-growing communities.

Constructing and constraining participation in participatory arts and HCI

“…There are many ways to approach this problem. One could be to turn to participatory design for guidance; indeed, this is already being done (e.g., Davis, 2009;Bonanni et al, 2010;Heitlinger et al, 2013). We chose another route.…”

The talking plants

“…As part of a larger research project that explores how digital technologies can be used to support urban grassroots food-growing communities, we worked with staff, volunteers and visitors to explore key values, needs and practices of the farm [6]. Arising out of this initial stage of the research we identified opportunities for designing interactive systems to support the learning around community-based knowledge, particularly around plant knowledge.…”

“…These have a broad dominance on individually-focussed persuasive applications or "green" products (see [6] for an overview). We agree with [5] that the global environmental crisis is as much a cultural problem as an engineering one, and therefore research must engage with questions of how we understand society, "and our role in it as consumers and makers of things.…”

Understanding social media-enabled participation and resilience in urban farming communities

“…In a broader context, urban farming is seen as a grass-root initiative that helps shape sustainable urban food systems (Heitlinger et al, 2013). It does so through increasing the capacity of small-scale food producers and extending the proliferation of foodgrowing communities.…”

“…For example, Odom (2010) denotes opportunities to design interactive systems that can attract more visitors to urban farms by increasing the visibility of urban farm sites. Heitlinger et al (2013) highlight the prospect of designing for face-to-face communication within urban farms in response to the need of affection and social connectedness in interactivity. Lyle et al (2013) convey design opportunities in mitigating the vulnerability of urban farm locations in the face of natural disasters.…”