WHAT IS A COMMUNITY GARDEN?
A community garden is a space set aside for planting trees, produce, herbs, and/or flowers and is cultivated by a communal population, such as a neighborhood, school, church, nursing home, hospital, or other facilities. Plots may be nurtured individually or by the entire group.
There are many advantages that communities and residents can receive from community gardens. This article will explore 15 of those benefits.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
15 Benefits of Community Gardens
Conclusion - Read More About It - Learn More About It - Sources
1. environmental Cleanup
Land once abandoned or used as an unauthorized trash dumping site can gain new life as a place of beauty. Creating a community garden can rid a community of an eyesore. Using land for gardening can reduce stormwater runoff into the streets by improving the land’s water-holding capacity allowing plants to absorb rainwater.
Garden composting can reduce neighborhood waste. And gardening can help restore soil quality. Plants add oxygen to the air and reduce air pollution.
If there is possible soil contamination, a raised bed garden can avoid ground contamination.
Cleaning, Planning, and Creating a Community Garden
BEFORE
2. Fresh, Nutritious Food
A community garden provides inexpensive and fresh produce in a neighborhood where fresh fruit and vegetables may be limited and costly.
Children who learn to grow vegetables are more likely to eat the vegetables they’ve grown, giving way to healthy eating. These kids become more familiar with fresh, healthy foods. They know what different fruits and vegetables taste like and can identify them. They gain knowledge that can last a lifetime.
Neighbors can obtain fresh produce without traveling many miles to a supermarket.
3. Food Security
Many families experience food insecurity and have irregular access to food. They may not know where their next meal is coming from.
More than 34 million people, including 9 million children, experience food insecurity in the United States. — Feeding America
Food insecurity can be a temporary situation or can last a long time. It can be caused by poverty, unemployment, or other reasons. Community gardens can help families have more reliable access to nutritious food and lower household food security concerns by up to 90%. And excess produce from the gardens can be shared with friends and neighbors.
Share of Adults Reporting Household Food Insecurity
Source: Health Reform Monitoring Survey, March to April 2020, April 2021, and June 2022. Urban Institute.
In June of 2022, the percentage of households reporting food insecurity included White households, 17.3 %; Black households, 29.2%; and Hispanic/Latinx households, 32.3%.
A garden within walking distance, especially in an urban area, can help families who do not have a neighborhood retail store that sells fresh produce; and who may not have access to fresh food from a food pantry or food bank.
FOOD BANK
FOOD BANK — Produce from community gardens can also be donated to food banks, then distributed to food pantries and food shelves where even more people can be provided with fresh fruits and vegetables to supplement their diet.
FOOD PANTRY
FOOD PANTRY AT PACIFIC, CALIFORNIA
FOOD PANTRY — Common food pantry items are canned vegetables and meats, tomato products, juice, and baking items.
FOOD SHELF
WHITE BEAR FOOD SHELF, MINNESOTA
FOOD SHELF — Typically offers dry goods, dairy, meats, and fresh produce; set up like a store where neighbors can shop.
4. Social Health and Community Cohesion
When neighborhood residents are welcome to participate and care for a garden, it helps build community cohesion. People become invested in a common goal, and it brings them together. They cultivate, nurture, and harvest the produce from plots that can be shared among gardeners or cared for individually.
A community garden is a welcoming place for all ages and people of all backgrounds. Residents meet and get to know people they may not have taken the time or had the opportunity or inclination to get to know. They have a chance to work side-by-side with neighbors.
A community garden contributes to community bonding, and for older ones who may feel isolated, it offers a chance to be more involved with their neighborhood.
5. Community Meeting and Event Space
A community garden becomes a meeting place where residents can gather and collaborate on different projects. Workshops and classes related to gardening can be held there.
“The seating area can become the heart of the community garden.” — Sari Albornoz, Sustainable Food Center (SFC).
It can be a place where people can share ideas. It can be a place for casual conversations, potlucks, and performances.
A small recreational area for children can be a welcoming bonus for young ones.
Roosevelt Community Garden — Roosevelt, New York
A community garden should have a kiosk or message board, a way to visually communicate meeting times and sign-up information, and days when the garden is open. Signs should be clearly and prominently posted. Should have ample signage where passersby can see how to get involved.
6. LOCAL AND ETHNIC IDENTITY
A community garden is a good place to nurture and preserve the community's cultural identity. It increases a sense of belonging, allowing communities to connect with their heritage.
For example, ancestral practices and cultural food choices are important in expressing and continuing family history.
Though tomatoes, cucumbers, green beans, and peppers may be popular crops to plan, some culturally favorite foods are:
GOJI BERRIES
CHAYOTE OKRA
BOK CHOY
BITTER MELON
COLLARD GREENS
MUSTARDS
GREEN TOMATOES
FAVA BEANS
People who plant and cultivate community gardens also share their diversity and traditions. It’s an important part of cultural identity. It’s part of communication and cultural cohesion. Food is more than nourishment; it represents ethnic identity. And food helps people to maintain their cultural identity.
A garden is a place where people from different cultures can create understanding and respect. A potluck with produce grown in the community garden is a great way for neighbors to share their food traditions and culture.
7. Neighborhood Beautification & Community Pride
Transforming an empty, vacant lot or a trash-filled lot into a community garden can improve the look of a neighborhood. The fragrant scents of a flower garden and the beautiful colors and greenery of vegetables can remake a neighborhood.
BEFORE AND AFTER
An unused lot can be turned into a natural dwelling place for birds and beneficial insects.
Besides improving the look of a neighborhood, a community garden can increase the property values of the surrounding area.
Pride builds when the residents become personally invested in their communities and have a sense of ownership in their community garden. There’s a reduction in litter. And maintenance of nearby homes improves.
8. CRIME REDUCTION
Neighbors engaged in community gardening become better at looking out for one another. As their feelings of empowerment increase, their attitudes and perceptions of the neighborhood improve, as do their crime watch activities.
Cutting overgrown grass, cleaning up broken glass, and removing illegal trash dumping may help curb crime.
According to research by the University of Michigan, communities that repurpose vacant spaces for activities such as gardening experience higher reductions in neighborhood violence and crime than neighborhoods that do not clean and repurpose vacant lots.
Communities can partner with stakeholders, such as businesses or non-profit organizations, so residents are not unintentionally burdened with making land improvements that require funds, supplies, and extensive training.
9. Self-Esteem
The tranquil characteristics of gardening positively affect mental health and self-esteem.
Being able to produce their own food gives individuals an increased sense of competency, accomplishment, and satisfaction. They are creating something of beauty, learning, and being able to teach others and pass along helpful knowledge, which gives gardeners a self-esteem boost.
Gardening allows time to build supportive relationships with others.
Teen gardeners reported feeling relaxed and having feelings of peacefulness. And it helped improve their coping skills and self-esteem.
10. Anxiety and Stress Reduction
Tending a community garden allows one to “slow down” and “connect” with nature and escape daily stresses. Gardening lowers the stress hormone cortisol and increases serotonin and dopamine, which are “feel good” hormones.
Supportive social relationships built through gardening activities can increase individual resilience, decreasing stress and anxiety.
Besides being a worthwhile endeavor, a community garden is a great place to escape and relax. A place where members can join together, commune with nature, and even share in non-gardening activities such as exercise.
11. Physical Health Improvements
Tending a garden encourages regular exercise. The bending, reaching, twisting and pulling weeds that gardeners perform is an aerobic exercise that helps build flexibility, strength, and stamina.
Being outdoors in the sunshine improves exposure to vitamin D, which can increase calcium levels and, in turn, helps bones, joints, and the immune system stay healthy. Especially for older gardeners being outdoors can help them achieve adequate vitamin D levels.
Gardeners should use good judgment and apply sunscreen if needed. Sunglasses and a brimmed hat can provide added protection for skin and eyes.
There are other health benefits. Gardeners eat the produce they grow, increasing their intake of fruits and vegetables.
A diet rich in fruits and vegetables can lower the risk of stroke and heart disease.
A diet rich in fruits and vegetables can:
Lower the risk of digestive problems
Have a positive effect on blood sugar
Can lower blood pressure
Prevent some types of cancer
Lower the risk of eye problems
Help control appetite
12. Environmental Awareness
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 83% of Americans live in urban areas. City living leaves fewer chances for youth and adults to have positive experiences in natural environment elements. Tending a community garden offers a chance to reconnect with the environment.
At 15, Yahir Hernandez signed up for a summer job but got much more than he expected. At Cadillac Urban Gardens in southwest Detroit, he learned to appreciate the environmental aspect of gardening, which focused on the world and on helping the community.
Hernandez enjoyed working with his hands — planting, caring for the plants, and harvesting. The next summer, his responsibilities grew, and he was hired as a supervisor and participated in air quality research.
Yahir Hernandez, 19, started working at Cadillac Urban Gardens on Merritt four summers ago. He’s now a sophomore at Michigan State University. Image credit: Eric Bronson, Michigan Photography
Flowers, vegetable, and herb gardens attract birds, butterflies and other animals to create aesthetically pleasing ecosystems dispersed throughout the neighborhood.
Community gardens allow neighbors and participants to explore the natural environment instead of being locked indoors.
13. Learning Opportunities
The participants in community gardening learn useful skills in food production. They also learn team building as they work together to achieve their individual and community goals.
Soil improvement, recycling, measuring space, philanthropy, pollination, germinating, and saving seeds are lessons learned through gardening and cooperative efforts.
Sarah Clark, a University of Michigan graduate, had the idea of utilizing unused grounds at the former Cadillac Clark Street plant and transforming it into an urban garden that could help the local community.
Besides growing fresh produce for local residents, it’s also a place for area youth to learn and grow.
14. Inter-Generational
As young and old residents participate in the garden, they become involved in the process of learning and growing. Conversations centering on the garden act as an ice breaker as residents get to know one another.
Community gardening provides an opportunity to engage young ones in hands-on training and work experience. Constructive activities end with the consumption of healthy foods they have grown themselves.
Image Credit: Northwest Louisiana Master Gardeners
Besides the skills and knowledge youth gain from gardening, they also develop intergenerational relationships with elder gardeners. These older residents may have learned gardening skills by tending their own home gardens.
Community gardening also engages youth when structured school learning is unavailable during the summer.
Youth can be given specific duties, especially during the summer, keeping them busy and filling their time with positive activities.
Older residents, through life experience, can play an important role in helping young ones start and maintain the garden.
For young people who have never gardened before, older ones can act as instructors and supervisors and give youth direction. Some beginning activities for youth are: clearing lots of trash and weeds, planting, watering, and harvesting.
Tending a garden, youth learn the value of hard work, dedication, responsibility, and delayed gratification. Vegetables and fruit plants must be tended to for months—weeding, watering—before bearing fruit. And children eat the fruit they’ve grown and taste dishes prepared with the vegetables they grow.
They increase their knowledge with life skills that transfer to academic and work environments. They learn appropriate behavior, respect, and language skills.
The youths’ activities may extend to helping the elderly of the community with yard work and keeping the neighborhood’s yards maintained.
Sharing their produce with others will teach them kindness and compassion toward others.
15. Economic Development
Community gardens can help improve the economics of an area.
The closing of factories in inner cities has left abandoned properties, some contaminated. Cleaning the lots, reclaiming them, and using them as vital parts of the community can help improve property values.
Gardeners can sell their harvest at local farmers’ markets and community-supported agriculture programs (CSAs) and make extra income. Individual members can benefit financially by saving money that otherwise would have been spent on groceries. And property owners can generate income by renting out garden space.
Urban agriculture can create jobs and improve the property values of surrounding areas. In addition, they attract other businesses to the area.
A small plot of land can yield large amounts of products giving a high monetary value and significant savings for participating households.
They enable gardeners to sell their produce through a local farmer’s market.
They offer a method to encourage the donation of surplus produce.
Community gardens increase surrounding property values by up to 9.4%.
Every $1 invested in a community garden yields around $6 worth of produce.
There are over 29,000 community gardens in the 100 largest U.S. cities.
Community gardeners eat 37.5% more fruits and vegetables than non-gardeners.
Common reasons for garden participation are access to fresh foods, health benefits, and to enjoy nature.
Women community gardeners are 46% less likely to be overweight than their neighbors.
CONCLUSION
Community gardening can improve your physical and mental health, help you save money on groceries, reduce local crime, beautify your neighborhood, and increase the value of your home.
It’s a great way to become active in your community and get to know your neighbors.
Visit a community garden in your area to find out how you can get involved.
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Buying a Vacant Lot in Detroit for $100 and Transforming it into a Community Garden
How Radical Gardeners Took Back New York City
New York City looked a lot different in the 1960s and 1970s. A sharp economic decline and white flight meant there was mass disinvestment and urban decay, particularly in the city’s lower-income neighborhoods. It’s what Hattie Carthan and Liz Christy noticed in their communities when they each set out to revive their neighborhoods by making them greener. Ultimately, their radical acts of gardening would transform the landscape across New York City.
PLANT - GROWING - FACT - SHEETS
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