Monitoring urban agriculture: a nature-based solution to transform city food systems

Urban agriculture is a nature-based solution to increase the economic, social and environmental sustainability of cities and city food systems. However, sustainability is difficult to measure, and there is therefore discussion about whether urban agriculture really contributes positively to sustainability. Monitoring data could provide evidence of the impacts of urban agriculture and help inform decision makers about whether and where to prioritise different forms of urban agriculture above competing interests.

Using case examples from five European cities, we identified the challenges involved in monitoring urban agriculture, from selecting indicators and gathering data, to using the results. We found large differences in approach in terms of what topics to monitor and who was responsible, who gathered the data and when, what data was recorded and how they were stored, and how findings were disseminated or published. Based on these experiences, we recommend stronger involvement of existing interest groups and educational institutions in monitoring urban agriculture, and promotion of convenient tools for data collection by citizen science and for long-term data storage.