Crisis Gardening: A Global Perspective

Gardening during times of crisis can have significant benefits to individuals and populations in terms of health, well-being, social and economic outcomes. So-called ’crisis gardening’ can even be linked to transformative change in food systems through socio-ecological aspects of agroecology. In this book, crisis gardening is explored to better define, describe and provide recommendations about this activity globally. Diverse perspectives are offered from scholars around the world, providing an overview of gardening during crises with ties to agroecology. Such a perspective is critical as we grapple with food system crises, pandemics, climate change, biodiversity loss, mental health issues and political conflict globally.

• The first section defines and explains crisis gardening in relation to agroecology, transformative change in food systems and public health
• The second section describes case studies from around the world of crisis gardening from various social-ecological perspectives
• The third section provides policy and practice recommendations and how to scale up the lessons from crisis gardening to transform food systems, public health systems, and policy and landscape planning processes

Bringing together leaders and experts (academics, policy makers and practitioners) from around the world, the book provides case studies of crisis gardening and develops recommendations to harness the lessons from this practice.

Jonathan Kingsley is a Senior Lecturer in Health Promotion at Swinburne University of Technology. Prior to moving into academia Jonathan worked in Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations, government bodies, and NGO’s across Australia in public health and community development. Examples of these organisations include Oxfam Australia, VicHealth and the Victorian Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation. Jonathan views the natural environment as having the capacity to bridge health inequalities (the basis of his Honours, Masters, PhD and previous Visiting Academic position at Cambridge University). Jonathan views himself as not only an academic but an activist winning environment community engagement awards (for example, from Parks Victoria and the International Association for Ecology and Health) and sitting on multiple steering committees and research groups related to Indigenous and environmental health.

Dr. Monika Egerer is a professor at the Technical University of Munich in the School of Life Sciences. Her research investigates relationships between biodiversity conservation, ecosystem service provision, and human wellbeing in urban ecosystems, with a focus on urban agricultural systems such as urban gardens and farms. Monika’s work aims to bridge theory and practice to create productive systems in cities that offer food, habitat and community.