JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Community-based agriculture has been found to decrease food insecurity and ameliorate population health inequities. Furthermore, community gardens have been found to provide a connected set of benefits to intersectionally diverse gardeners: a sense of ownership, resources to help integration within new communities, and a space to nurture existing cultural identities. This sense of belonging in connection with access to community garden plots has been linked to psychological well-being and resilience. However, there is little knowledge on how psychosocial benefits connected to plot ownership affect resilience and which aspects of resilience in this process are salient. This community-based participatory research projects will examine the role of community gardens in decreasing food insecurity and facilitating various forms of resilience in various food-insecure groups of people residing in Rochester. Since psychosocial benefits provided by community garden participation nurtures various forms of resilience along individual, group and community dimensions, our research inquiry seeks to understand how dimensions of resilience vary along intersectional lines. In addition to mapping the psychosocial benefits linked to community garden plot ownership, we find that examining which forms of resilience are possible in community-based agricultural projects addresses an important gap in the academic literature, which can help us propose policy-level practices that reduce various forms of health inequities connected to food and nutrition at the local level. Using a mixed-methods approach, we will examine the experiences of two food insecure communities in Rochester: current and new growers with VCGLC plots, and individuals who currently supplement their vegetable and fruit intake via their use of community food pantries Data collected will help us accomplish two things: 1. We will examine and use CBPR methods to disseminate information on the organizational practices by The Village to assist others in planning and implementing similar community-based agricultural projects in their communities. 2. Findings will give us preliminary data to implement a larger intervention that foregrounds community-based agricultural initiatives as a model to improve physical and mental health outcomes in food-insecure communities.