Agroecology and the Struggle for Food Sovereignty ... - Yale University

case study: cultivating community, food, and empowerment
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Case Study: Cultivating Community, Food,
and Empowerment – Urban Gardens in
New York and Havana
Margarita Fernández
An estimated 800 million people worldwide are involved in urban agriculture, mostly
in cities of developing countries (Mougeot 1994) 1 . The status of urban farms in city
plans is precarious, because they tend to either be labeled as vacant lots open for
development or have temporary leases that terminate when the city government finds
a profitable use for the land. However, in the past decade there has been an increased
recognition of the social, economic, and environmental benefits of urban agriculture.
The United Nations Development Program founded the Urban Agriculture Network
in 1996 after conducting research on urban agriculture practices worldwide and
finding that growing food in cities offers solutions to hunger, lack of jobs, and
environmental degradation (UNDP 1996) 2 .
By 2025, 80 percent of the world’s people will live in cities. In developing countries,
urban populations are increasing much faster than agricultural production, distribution,
and marketing networks (UNDP 1996) 3 . The social and environmental services
offered through urban agriculture are essential to today’s cities, but urban agriculture
is not sufficiently supported by city, regional, or national governments. There is a
pressing need for integrated management plans that take urban gardens into consideration
as permanent structures within the urban landscape.
The challenges and benefits of contemporary urban gardening movements can be
seen through two case studies of initiatives operating in very different social, economic,
and political contexts: New York City, USA, and Havana, Cuba.
1 Mougeot, Luc (1994). Urban
Food Production: Evolution,
Official Support, and
Significance. Cities Feeding
People Series. International
Development Research Centre,
Ottawa.
2 Smit J, Ratta A and Nasr J.
(1996). Urban Agriculture:
Food, Jobs and Sustainable
Cities. Publication Series for
Habitat II, Vol. I. New York:
United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP).
3 Ibid.
Sowing Seeds of Reclamation: The Case of New York City
The history of urban gardening in the United States demonstrates the cyclical process
of urban garden creation and destruction that moves in conjunction with economic
crisis and recovery. Urban gardening in the U.S. dates back to the economic depression
of the mid-1890s, when the city of Detroit allotted 455 acres of land and seed
potatoes to 945 families. The city’s temporary leasing of abandoned land spread to
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