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Results of a US and Canada community garden survey: shared challenges in garden management amid diverse geographical and organizational contexts

• Published: 17 October 2014
• Volume 32 , pages 241–254, ( 2015 )

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• Luke Drake 1 , 2 &
• Laura J. Lawson 2  

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Community gardens are of increasing interest to scholars, policymakers, and community organizations but there has been little systematic study of community garden management at a broad scale. This study complements case study research by revealing shared experiences of community garden management across different contexts. In partnership with the American Community Gardening Association, we developed an online questionnaire. Results from 445 community garden organizations across the US and Canada reveal common themes as well as differences that are particularly significant across different organizational sizes. The findings suggest that organizers see multiple benefits, and respondents confirmed recent expansion of gardening efforts. Analysis then focuses on challenges, which are closely related to garden management. We address garden losses as well as challenges to routine operation. Key challenges included funding, participation, land, and materials. We developed a typology based on organization size, to reveal distinctions between small organizations (serving 1 garden), medium-sized organizations (2–3 gardens), large organizations (4–30 gardens) and very large organizations (31 or more gardens). These categories shed light on different needs for funding, land, material, and participation. Together, this analysis suggests that community gardens can be linked through the work it takes to sustain them rather than specific causes or outcomes. Community gardens can be better integrated into local food systems through analysis of how people involved with this work navigate these shared processes.

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• Medical Ethics

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Drake, L., Lawson, L.J. Results of a US and Canada community garden survey: shared challenges in garden management amid diverse geographical and organizational contexts. Agric Hum Values 32 , 241–254 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-014-9558-7

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Accepted : 05 July 2014

Published : 17 October 2014

Issue Date : June 2015

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-014-9558-7

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Fall equinox tour of KU medicinal garden planned Sept. 22

Wed, 09/18/2024

Kirsten Bosnak

LAWRENCE — The public is invited to the fall semiannual tour of the University of Kansas Native Medicinal Plant Research Garden at 6 p.m. Sept. 22 on the autumnal equinox.

The garden, situated just east of the Lawrence Municipal Airport ( directions and map ), includes research plantings, a large native plant demonstration garden and the KU Community Garden. Garden pathways are ADA-compliant, and the site is open to the public dawn to dusk.  The appearance of the garden changes seasonally, with different species coming into bloom. Kelly Kindscher, senior scientist at the Kansas Biological Survey & Center for Ecological Research and professor in the KU Environmental Studies Program, will give an overview of the research gardens and highlight key species. Mary Anne Jordan, KU professor of visual art in textiles, will discuss the dye garden at the site. The group will explore the garden and see the work of the Douglas County Extension Master Gardeners, who partner with the research center to manage the garden.  The tour will end before dark, but visitors are welcome to bring lawn chairs and stay to watch the sunset at about 7:15 p.m. 

The garden site, established in 2010, serves as a gateway to the KU Field Station , as it is the first of several Field Station sites on East 1600 Road in Douglas County north of Highway 40. Land for the garden was made available by KU Endowment. See the KU Calendar event and the Facebook event page .

The KU Field Station, established in 1947, is managed by the Kansas Biological Survey & Center for Ecological Research, a KU designated research center. The core research and operations area of the Field Station, just north of Lawrence, consists of 1,650 acres, with five miles of public trails. The Field Station is a resource for KU students, faculty and staff in the sciences, arts, humanities and professional programs, as well as for visiting researchers and community members.

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Help the RHS understand how climate change is affecting UK gardens

What patterns and surprises have you observed in your garden? Take part in a survey to share your experiences and contribute to scientific research

A new collaborative PhD   project aims to explore what the future of UK gardening could look like, how gardening practices could shift in a changing climate, and which plants are the most resilient in order to help us futureproof our gardens. Have you noticed your roses blooming better in recent years – stronger blooms, deeper colours and more repeat flowering? Or perhaps you’ve had a disappointingly damp spring, with the daffodils and tulips struggling to make it through the puddles that shouldn’t really be there. Have you watched that clump of primroses by the front door flower earlier and earlier each year, or are you confused as to why the Magnolia blossom escaped the frost this year, when last year your Choisya was decimated by it? Gardening has always been interesting and challenging, but as more unusual weather patterns become the norm, it is increasingly important to understand how our plants respond and to plan ahead by predicting what further climate change will mean for the plants we want to grow in our gardens. In an exciting new collaborative project with the Universities of Sheffield and Reading, RHS PhD student Elle Chmiewliski is exploring how climate change is affecting our garden plants, both in terms of what we are already observing, but also what may happen in future. We are calling for UK gardeners to share their views and experiences to help us build a nationwide picture of the shifts and patterns being observed in gardens across the UK.  Elle has developed a survey to assess gardeners’ thoughts about climate change, and how it already is affecting, and will continue to affect, our garden plants and gardening habits. Find out how to take part below.

What does the survey entail?

The questionnaire is part of a PhD research project run by the RHS and the Universities of Sheffield and Reading. The project aims to better understand the implications of climate change on gardening, our gardening habits, and what sort of plants may be most appropriate for a changing UK climate. The research builds on previous work carried out by the RHS, which informed key reports such as ‘ Gardening in a Changing Climate ’ and ‘Gardening in the Global Greenhouse’. Key objectives from the new research are to understand:

• How plants cope with the stress factors associated with a changing climate – e.g. excessively wet soils, periods of drought, higher temperatures and greater wind speeds
• What can gardeners learn from nature – for example, what sorts of plants can cope with both drought and waterlogging within a relatively short period of time when growing in their natural environment
• What gardeners are doing to help adapt their gardens to a changing climate

Sharing your experiences in your own garden will contribute towards setting the direction of the PhD and assessing UK gardeners’ attitudes and resilience to climate change. The survey should take 10-15 minutes to complete. Results will be shared on the RHS website and in The Garden in due course.

How do I take part?

The survey can be accessed below. The survey closes on 15 October 2024.  

Please note: This survey is being run by the University of Sheffield. When you click on ‘Take part’, you are leaving the RHS website, and will be subject to the University of Sheffield’s Participant Information Sheet and its Privacy Notice .  Please read the University of Sheffield Participant Information Sheet and Privacy Notice for more information on how they will process your personal data and how you can exercise your rights under the Data Protection Legislation.

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Survey: People Turned to Gardening for Stress Relief, Food Access During Pandemic

More green spaces and urban farming opportunities could be helpful in future disasters.

• by Emily C. Dooley
• March 17, 2022

Quick Summary

• People gardened to relieve stress, anxiety, depression
• People saw gardening as way to safely socialize, grow food for community
• Report suggests more ‘green’ opportunities needed during disasters

People who turned to gardening during the COVID-19 pandemic did so to relieve stress, connect with others and grow their own food in hopes of avoiding the virus, according to a survey conducted by researchers at the University of California, Davis, UC Agriculture and Natural Resources (UCANR) and international partners.

The survey report , “Gardening during COVID-19: experiences from gardeners around the world,” highlights the positive role gardening plays in mental and physical health, said Alessandro Ossola, an assistant professor of plant sciences.

“Connection to nature, relaxation and stress relief were by far the biggest reasons gardeners cited,” Ossola said.

The researchers sent links to online surveys via targeted emails to gardening groups, in newsletters and on social media between June and August 2020. They were hoping to gauge the significance of gardening as a way to cope with risk, how the pandemic changed gardening and what barriers existed.

More than 3,700 surveys were returned by gardeners from Australia, Germany and the United States.

Isolation, depression, anxiety reported

More than half of those responding said they felt isolated, anxious and depressed during the early days of the pandemic, and 81% had concerns about food access. During this time, people also had more time to garden, and they saw the activity as a safe haven and a way to connect socially with others.

“Not only did gardeners describe a sense of control and security that came from food production, but they also expressed heightened experiences of joy, beauty and freedom in garden spaces,” said the report, which broke up responses by region or states.

In California, for instance, 33% of gardeners said their plots generated about 25% of their produce needs. Some gardeners with access to large spots to garden also grew food for their community.

Explore more stories on food and agriculture

Gardening during the pandemic offered a way to socialize safely.

“People found new connections in the garden,” said Lucy Diekmann, an urban agriculture and food systems advisor with UCANR who helped write the report. “It became a shared hobby as opposed to an individual one.”

Responses were fairly similar across all locations, even though the surveys hit in the summer and winter depending on location. “We see remarkable similarities in terms of what people are saying and the way they are interacting with their gardens,” she said.

More green opportunities needed

Many respondents also found it hard to find and buy seeds or plants and locate a spot to grow.

The report findings suggest an opportunity for government, community groups, businesses and others to promote community health by providing green spaces.

Gardening should be thought of as a public health need, one that could serve communities well in future pandemics or disasters. New Zealand , Canada and some countries in Europe write green prescriptions for people to garden to improve health.

“We need to change the narrative of how urban gardening is framed and elevate it to a key strategy for both environmental and public health,” Ossola said.

UC Davis graduate student Summer Cortez assisted with the research, as did Monika Egerer at the Technical University of Munich in Germany and experts from these Australian-based entities: Brenda Lin at Commonwealth Science and Industrial Research Organization, Jonathan Kingsley at Swinburne University of Technology and Pauline Marsh at University of Tasmania.

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Media Contacts:

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• Emily C. Dooley, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, 530-650-6807 , [email protected]
• Amy Quinton, UC Davis News and Media Relations, 530-601-8077, [email protected]

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What gardens grow: Outcomes from home and community gardens supported by community-based food justice organizations

Christine m. porter.

University of Wyoming

Supporting home and community gardening is a core activity of many community-based organizations (CBOs) that are leading the food justice movement in the U.S. Using mixed methods across multiple action-research studies with five food justice CBOs, this paper documents myriad layers of benefits that gardening yields.

Our participatory methods included conducting extensive case studies with five CBOs over five years; quantifying food harvests with 33 gardeners in Laramie, Wyoming, and surveying them about other gardening outcomes (20 responded); and conducting feasibility studies for assessing health impacts of gardening with two of the five CBOs, both in Wyoming.

Analyses of these diverse data yielded four categories of gardening benefits: (1) improving health; (2) producing quality food in nutritionally meaningful quantities; (3) providing cultural services; and (4) fostering healing and transformation.

Examining these results together illustrates a breadth of health, food, and cultural ecosystem services, and social change yields of home and community food gardening in these communities. It also points to the need to support CBOs in enabling household food production and to future research questions about what CBO strategies most enhance access to and benefits of gardening, especially in communities most hurt by racism and/or insufficient access to fresh food.

Introduction

Food gardening has become a mainstay of community-based food security, food justice and even obesity prevention initiatives in the United States ( Gatto, Martinez, Spruijt-Metz, & Davis, 2017 ; Gonzalez, Potteiger, Bellows, Weissman, & Mees, 2016 ; Lawson, 2005 ; Saul & Curtis, 2013 ; Zanko, Hill, Estabrooks, Niewolny, & Zoellner, 2014 ). In addition, gardening has becoming increasingly popular overall in the U.S. For example, the Five Borough Farm project in New York City documented 700 community food gardens and farms in the city in 2011; then, in a second canvas three years later, they identified over 900 ( Altman et al., 2014 ). Similarly, a National Gardening Association study found that household gardening increased by 17% over five years (2008–2013), including by 38% among lower-income households (≤S$35,000). Also, given the 63% increase in gardening among millennials, public interest in gardening seems unlikely to abate soon ( National Gardening Association, 2014 ).

Given that a growing body of research suggests food gardening may offer a partial solution towards tackling a few of our most wicked social problems in the U.S.—including chronic disease, food insecurity, socioeconomic inequity, and shrinking social ties—this growth of food gardening in the U.S. is arguably a welcome trend and one potentially worthy of public support and investment. This paper briefly reviews the evidence base about the benefits of food gardening. It then shares results from research generated over five years via a wide range of mixed and participatory methods with five U.S. food-justice oriented, community-based organizations (CBOs), to answer the following research question: what was the range, quality and quantity of gardening outcomes in these communities, with support from these five CBOs?

As the first study in the U.S. to use multiple methods over multiple years with multiple communities and CBOs to document multiple forms of gardening yields, this research contributes an uniquely rich breadth and depth of data and analysis to the benefits-of-gardening literature.

Literature Review

Growing literature about benefits of home and community gardening suggests that gardening improves health, produces meaningful amounts of food, and provides multiple forms of ecosystem services. A smaller body of work, observational or occasionally theoretical, also considers the role of gardening in social change.

Health benefits of gardening, that have been suggested by a mostly observational body of work, have included increasing fruit and vegetable intake ( Alaimo, Packnett, Miles, & Kruger, 2008 ; Armstrong, 2000 ; Litt et al., 2011 ; Meinen, Friese, Wright, & Carrel, 2012 ; Twiss et al., 2003 ), fostering physical activity ( Armstrong, 2000 ; Draper & Freedman, 2010 ; Park, Shoemaker, & Haub, 2009 ), reducing food insecurity ( Baker, Motton, Seiler, Duggan, & Brownson, 2013 ; Corrigan, 2011 ; Stroink & Nelson, 2009 ), improving metal health ( Austin, Johnston, & Morgan, 2006 ; Brown & Jameton, 2000 ; van den Berg, van Winsum-Westra, de Vries, & van Dillen, 2010 ; Wakefield, Yeudall, Taron, Reynolds, & Skinner, 2007 ), improving body mass index ( Utter, Denny, & Dyson, 2016 ; Zick, Smith, Kowaleski-Jones, Uno, & Merrill, 2013 ), and increasing social capital ( Alaimo, Reischl, & Allen, 2010 ; Armstrong, 2000 ; Twiss et al., 2003 ).

The quality of this evidence base is mixed. Few studies of health impacts of home and community gardening have control groups and we found none with randomized control groups. However, evidence should be available by 2022 from three randomized controlled trials in the U.S. that are currently recruiting. One is assessing health impacts of community gardens ( University of University of Colorado at Boulder, Michigan State University, Colorado School of Public Health, University of South Carolina, Colorado State University, & Denver Urban Gardens, 2017 ). Two are assessing home food gardens ( University of Wyoming et al., 2016 ; University of Alabama at Birmingham, Auburn University, & National Cancer Institute, 2016 ). (Note: the Growing Resilience trial emerged from the feasibility pilot studies reported in this paper.)

In the meantime, a recent meta-analysis of quantitative results from 22 garden studies confirms most of the health outcomes described above ( Soga, Gaston, & Yamaura, 2017 ), with the notable exception of garden impacts on food insecurity, which was not examined in the included studies.

Though the literature above has provided only weak evidence about impacts of gardening on food security, a growing body of harvest quantification research suggests that gardeners harvest nutritionally and economically meaningful amounts of food ( Algert, Baameur, & Renvall, 2014 ; Algert, Diekmann, Renvall, & Gray, 2016 ; CoDyre, Fraser, & Landman, 2015 ; Gittleman, Jordan, & Brelsford, 2012 ; Pourias, Duchemin, & Aubry, 2015 ; Smith & Harrington, 2014 ; Vitiello & Nairn, 2009 ; Vitiello, Nairn, Grisso, & Swistak, 2010 ). Also, a survey with 66 New York City gardeners found that gardens were the primary or secondary produce source for 90% of respondents who were food insecure ( n =19), versus for 71% of the 47 gardeners who were food secure ( Gregory, Leslie, & Drinkwater, 2016 ).

Overall, these findings indicate that it is plausible that successful food gardening would improve food security by provisioning nutritional meaningful quantities of food. Also, obviously, gardening yields a particular kind of food: fruits and vegetables. U.S. adults of all socioeconomic groups eat much less of these foods than recommended ( Guenther, Dodd, Reedy, & Krebs-Smith, 2006 ), and to those struggling with low incomes (and some living in communities predominantly of color report price) availability and quality serve as barriers to consumption ( Haynes-Maslow, Parsons, Wheeler, & Leone, 2013 ; Yeh et al., 2008 ). Successfully growing produce at home could help overcome some economic and geographic barriers to fresh vegetables or fruits.

Other Ecosystem Services

Gardening provides ecosystem services, that is, benefits that people obtain from ecosystems, such as fiber, water filtering, and enjoyment ( Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005 ). These ecosystem services include “provisioning” benefits, in providing food and health outcomes described above.

Evidence suggests that gardening also yields “regulating” ecosystem services, via increasing climate and water quality, supporting soil formation, fostering nutrient cycling, and sustaining biodiversity ( Altman et al., 2014 ; Calvet-Mir, Gómez-Baggethun, & Reyes-García, 2012 ; Cohen & Reynolds, 2015 ; Cohen, Reynolds, & Sanghvi, 2012 ).

The third set of ecosystem services that gardens provide are cultural (including spiritual), social, and recreational services. Growing food, including culturally relevant foods, has helped some communities maintain cultural connection and continuity ( Companion, 2016 ; Hartwig & Mason, 2016 ). Several garden studies have found that participating in community gardens especially, has helped to build social capital and connectedness, self-efficacy, and civic engagement ( Firth, Maye, & Pearson, 2011 ; Hartwig & Mason, 2016 ; Litt et al., 2011 ; Ober Allen, Alaimo, Elam, & Perry, 2008 ). For example, one case study with an urban gardening program found that it provided a, “social bridge to build community cohesion” ( Gonzalez et al., 2016 , p. 107). One scholar, examining the history of gardening in the U.S. and two community garden cases in San Fransico, suggests that such, “organized gardening projects,” serve to, “cultivate specific kinds of citizen-subjects” ( Pudup, 2008 ). Pudup’s paper points to a fourth category of gardening outcomes, i.e., shaping society and promoting social change work (while also noting that such cultural services are not always inherently positive; see also Glover, 2004 ). The cultural ecosystem services that gardens yield might be seen as both foundations for and contributions to ways gardening also might foster social change.

Social Change

Organizers and organizations in the U.S. food justice movement ( Bradley & Herrera, 2016 ; Sbicca, 2012 ) extensively employ home and community gardening as part of anti-oppression and other transformational strategies for creating equity, health, sustainability, and/or food sovereignty ( Broad, 2016 ; White, 2011a , 2011b , 2017 ; Winne, 2008 , 2010 ). Others have also linked propagating seeds with promoting social change ( Follmann & Viehoff, 2015 ; McKay, 2011 ; Nettle, 2014 ). This includes empowerment outcomes identified in case studies with Seattle community gardens ( Hou, Johnson, & Lawson, 2009 ) and the Five Borough Farm action research project documenting benefits of community-based food production for, “making New York City a healthier and more socially connected, economically secure, and environmentally sustainable city” ( Cohen, Reynolds, & Sanghvi, 2012 , p. 9).

Of the four categories of gardening yields discussed here—health, food, cultural ecosystem services, and social change—social change outcomes are the widest reaching and also the most challenging to systematically identify, attribute, and assess. The aforementioned health, food, and cultural “services” from gardening plausibly enable and contribute to such larger social change. Indeed, in their analysis of case studies with four community garden groups in London, United Kingdom, two scholars find that these organized gardening projects foster, “prefigurative social change,” based on a shared practice of gardening rather than on strategic intention, “opening up new possibilities for being, seeing and doing” ( Guerlain & Campbell, 2016 , p. 220).

The research presented here adds to the garden outcome literature described above by examining results from a group of related studies using multiple research methods to identify and characterize yields from home and community gardening.

This work originated with Food Dignity, a five-year action-research project about food system sustainability and security strategies employed by five food justice CBOs in the U.S. These CBO partners were Blue Mountain Associates (BMA) on Wind River Indian Reservation; Feeding Laramie Valley (FLV) in Laramie, Wyoming; Whole Community Project (WCP) in Ithaca, New York; East New York Farms! (ENYF) in Brooklyn, New York; and Dig Deep Farms (DDF) in the unincorporated areas of Ashland and Cherryland in the San Francisco Bay area of California.

Results in this paper derive from Food Dignity and other collaborative action-research projects conducted with these five CBOs between 2011 and 2016. As described in more detail below, we used a wide array of methods in three relatively distinct but related research endeavors:

• Developing deep case studies, or rigorous stories, with and about the work of each of the five CBOs partners in Food Dignity.
• Quantifying garden yields via gardener-researchers weighing every harvest and assessing other forms of outcomes via surveys with the gardeners. This was a sub-project of Food Dignity conducted in partnership with FLV. We called it “Team GROW.”
• Implementing controlled trial feasibility pilot studies to assess the health impacts of gardens with FLV and BMA. We called these pilots “Growing Resilience.”

I was the project director and principal investigator for all of these studies.

Food Dignity Case Study Methods

The main research method in Food Dignity is rigorous storytelling, or deep case studies, to document the context, history, and practices of the five CBO collaborators. Our methods included conventional case study approaches ( Yin, 2009 ). We conducted 150 stakeholder interviews, over five years of insider and outsider participation and observation, and extensive primary and secondary document analysis. We created collaborative pathway models with each CBO, which illustrate the theories of change underlying a CBO’s activities by linking them to expected outcomes ( Hargraves & Denning, 2017 ). We also produced first-person digital stories about our journeys to food justice and Food Dignity work, 12 of which were created by CBO partners ( Food Dignity, 2015 ).

For this research, I sifted back through this enormous data set to identify outcomes from gardening. I coded the five CBO collaborative pathway models and the transcripts of the 12 community-authored digital stories for gardening-related themes, extracting every mention of the word “garden” and its variations for further analysis. I focused particularly on these because they are products in their own right, which CBO partners in Food Dignity have used to codify their work. I also electronically searched for variations on the word “garden” to identify all potentially relevant passages from our collection of interview transcripts and our field notes from participation and observation. I then analyzed these passages for instances of outcomes, desired or achieved, in association with home or community gardening. Ultimately, I grouped these outcomes into the four themes identified in the results section. Food Dignity co-investigators in each of the five CBOs have reviewed and approved the findings reported here.

Team GROW Garden Harvest Measures and Survey

Team GROW (Gardener Researchers of Wyoming) formed a subset of the Food Dignity research with FLV. In 2012, FLV convened five experienced gardeners to ask what garden-related research questions they had. This resulted in the Team GROW endeavor to quantify food production in Laramie home and community garden plots. Between 2012 and 2014, a total of 33 gardening households tending 39 unique plots weighed and recorded each of their garden harvests. Their records included whether they ate, stored, or shared the harvest.

After the pilot year, FLV recruited 31 participants (including three households repeating from 2012) for the 2013 season, actively seeking diversity both in demographics and gardening expertise. In 2014, only gardeners who participated in 2012 and/or 2013 were invited to participate again. Twelve gardeners tending 14 plots measured their harvests again in the 2014 growing season.

In 2015, we also surveyed the gardener-researchers about other outcomes of their gardening. The outcome questions in the survey, listed in Table 1 , drew from the garden literature reviewed above and from the input of Team GROW members during annual planning and celebration meetings. We also asked a parallel set of questions about their motivations for gardening. FLV invited all Team GROW gardeners who had participated in any year, whom they could still reach ( n =28 out of the 33 households), to take the survey. Twenty responded.

Results below denote the percent of respondents and (number of respondents) for each “extent” rank. Items are listed in decreasing order of respondent ranking (by the sum of “to a moderate extent” or higher answers).

Core results from the harvest data are reported elsewhere ( Conk & Porter, 2016 ). In this study, I provide additional outcome detail from that data and analyze results from the 2015 survey.

Growing Resilience Controlled Trial Feasibility Pilots

By 2012, FLV and BMA had found more community interest in food gardening than they could support with their Food Dignity sub-award funding alone. Building on this interest, the observational literature, and early reports in our case study work about health benefits of gardening, we secured additional funding for a two-site feasibility study to assess health impacts of new home gardens. The research here reports results from these pilots, conducted in 2013. We used a controlled trial design and were guided by a community-university steering committee in each place. We called the pilots Growing Resilience.

We recruited 21 households with 29 adult participants total, across the two communities. Nine households with 10 participants were in Laramie, Wyoming, where three people in three households were controls and seven people in six households gardened. In Wind River Indian Reservation, BMA, and tribal health organization, partners recruited 12 households with 19 adults. Eight households were randomized to gardening and four to serve as controls. Thus, in total, one third of the households (14) received garden installation and support from FLV or BMA in 2013. The remaining seven households served as control households (some of whom received garden support the following year). Each CBO recruited these households from their personal and professional networks among those interested in gardening but who did not have a home or community food garden in the past year.

With each adult participant, we sought to measure height and weight, administer a validated quality-of-life survey that assesses mental and physical health (SF-12 ® Health Survey version 2), and assess hand strength before gardening began (in May 2013) and then at the tail end of the gardening season (in September). The survey included an open-ended opportunity for comment. We were able to gather complete pre- and post-data with all 10 adult participants in Laramie. In Wind River, we collected pre- and post data-for one control adult and six gardening adults; we have only one data point for the remaining 12 participating adults. 1

We also held focus groups in late 2013, one in Wyoming and one on the reservation, which included representatives from 12 of the 21 participating households. In each group, one person from the University of Wyoming facilitated the group while another took detailed notes that approximated transcription.

For this study, I coded the open-ended survey responses and the focus group notes for outcomes of gardening. In addition, though the sample sizes were much too small to draw any quantitative conclusions, I share some of the pre- and post-results in an anecdotal way.

By examining the gardening outcome results from the mix of research methods described above, I identified four categories of benefits from food gardening: (1) improving individual health; (2) producing healthy food; (3) providing cultural ecosystem services in recreation, culture and social networks; and (4) fostering healing and transformation.

1. Gardens for health

Results from the research projects described here corroborate the growing evidence base that suggests gardening improves health and wellness for gardeners. For example, in the focus groups and post-season surveys conducted as part of the feasibility pilots on health impacts of gardens, new gardening participants in Laramie and on Wind River Indian Reservation reported four types of health benefits:

• Reduction in medication use for chronic health issues (e.g., “My blood pressure went down. I’m taking less meds”; “My doctor took me off my anti-depressants… it really made a difference for my depression and my pain levels… taking fewer painkillers.”)
• Deepened and widened family and social networks (e.g., “It connected the neighborhood. It became our little mini-community”; “It brought the family closer—everyone wanted to see what was coming from the garden. They’d all be around the kitchen when we were cooking.”)
• Improved emotional health (e.g., “It gave me routine and a purpose to be outside in the sunshine. It calmed me”; “It’s just fun. I put my swing right by the garden.”)
• Improved access to fruits and vegetables (e.g., “I love fruits and vegetables, but can’t afford it… this is something I can afford”; “It provided more fresh stuff for our family… that really helped our diet.”)

Quantitatively, while the pilot sample was not even close to being powered to detect significant differences, the Laramie pre- and post-data we gathered with all seven gardening and three control adults might possibly indicate the gardeners could possibly enjoy better outcomes than controls in BMI, hand strength, and mental health. For example, the three control participants gained an average of 4.67lbs. (2.11kg), with a mean BMI increase of 0.57 kg/m 2 . The seven gardeners gained 1.14lbs. (1.52kg) on average, with a 0.2 BMI increase. On the 100-point, 12-item Short Form Health Survey (SF-12) scale for mental health, gardeners improved by seven points on average and controls decreased by one point on average. We have found similar directional (but again, nonsignificant) trends in a second pilot design year with another 10 households in Laramie 2016 (unpublished data), and these results are consistent with the gardens-and-health research reviewed in the introduction. However, our samples were much too small for these numbers to suggest more than the need for further research. We are currently assessing these and other health outcome questions in an RCT with BMA and other partners on Wind River Indian Reservation (Growing Resilience in Wind River Indian Reservation (GR), 2017).

In Team GROW, all 20 gardener-researchers (the Laramie gardeners who had quantified their food harvests) who responded to a survey about the outcomes they experienced from gardening, reported that gardening benefited their health to at least “some extent.” (See Table 1 for full survey results about gardening outcomes.) In addition, their top ranked outcome from gardening was “feeling productive.”

In addition, community-based coinvestigators and participants in the Food Dignity project have described more systemic and community-level yields of gardening that are related to health. I share these in the healing and transformation section below.

2. Gardens for high-quality food

Our research indicates that gardeners produce nutritionally relevant quantities of food. In addition, gardeners highly value the quality of the food they produce.

In the Team GROW research, home and community gardeners measured the quantities of food they were growing between 2012 and 2014 in Laramie, Wyoming. Results indicate that the average plot was 253ft 2 (23.5m 2 ) and yielded an average of 128lbs. (58.06kg) f food, or 0.51lbs. (0.23kg) per square foot. The average vegetable harvest was enough to supply two adults with the daily U.S. Department of Agriculture-recommended amount of vegetables for four and a half months ( Conk & Porter 2016 ). This is in spite of Laramie having a challenging high-altitude, windy and semi-arid growing climate (designated as USDA zone 4b, the toughest growing zone in the continental U.S.).

Variation in productivity rates between Team GROW gardeners was enormous. For example, in the 2014 season, harvest rates varied nearly 10-fold between plots (by 967%, ranging from 0.12 to 1.16 lb./ft 2 [0.59 to 5.66 kg/m 2 ]). Within-gardener yield variation, from season to season in the same plot, was much lower, though still substantial, at 39% on average (calculated from the 12 gardeners who participated in more than one season). At the top end, the gardener with the highest yield rate by weight grew 247lbs. (112.04 kg) of food in a 120ft 2 (11.15m 2 ) community garden plot (2.06 lbs./ft 2 [10.06 kg/m 2 ], in 2012). The harvest with the highest economic value, in total and per square foot, was US$2,599 worth of produce (calculated at Laramie Farmers’ Market prices) from a 391ft 2 home garden (US$6.64/ft 2 , in 2013). This included 145lbs. (65.77kg) of cucumbers valued at US$362 and 255lbs. (115.67kg) of tomatoes valued at US$1,274. Of total harvests recorded by the 31 gardeners participating that season, this particular gardener raised two-thirds of the cucumbers and 35% of the total tomatoes. Also, that year, at the other end of productivity, six gardeners—nearly 20% of the participants that season—had harvest rates under 0.2 lbs./ft 2 (0.98kg/m 2 ).

Quantity aside, producing high quality food was a highly valued outcome among gardeners. The Team GROW members who took the survey reported having better quality food and food they know is safe, as two of the four top-ranked outcomes from gardening (see Table 1 ). In another set of questions about their motivations for gardening in that survey, which mirrored the outcome questions, having better quality food emerged as their top-ranked reason for gardening. Similarly, in interviews and during site visits, gardeners working with the four CBO partners in Food Dignity that support gardens (ENYF, WCP, BMA, and FLV) also mentioned the importance of gardening in yielding quality food. For example, a gardener in eastern New York noted, “all the vegetables, I think, are sweeter,” from her garden than what she can buy in the store. Several people in Wind River discussed how growing their own food helped to avoid “chemicals” in store-bought food. One noted, “the supermarket carrots don’t have hardly any taste but if you taste one that you grow yourself, it’s just like the difference between night and day.” Also, in three of the four communities (with the exception being Ithaca), at least some of the interviewees noted that growing their own food was the best, and sometimes the only, way to get high quality produce.

Even people new to gardening via the Growing Resilience feasibility pilots, who had small gardens (about 80 ft 2 [7.43m 2 ] with BMA and 15–30 ft 2 [1.39–2.79m 2 ] with FLV, in accordance with steering committee advice and gardener preferences) and struggled with multiple growing challenges, felt that their gardens gave them meaningful amounts of food. For example, in addition to the comments cited above about improved access to fruits and vegetables, participants reported that “it gave me fresh vegetables for my family that I grew and saved me money” and “I can reduce my food cost.” As one ENYF gardener who was looking forward to retiring put it, “the main reason for it is the quality of the food and if you’re retired, you’re not going to have the income, so financially it’s going to help. You’re not going to have to buy all those foods.”

3. Gardens for “cultural ecosystem services”

The sections above report health and food provisioning ecosystem services provided by gardens. This section focuses on “cultural ecosystem services” that gardens may provide through recreation, continuation and expansion of cultural and spiritual traditions, and development or deepening community networks.

Growing recreation and aesthetic enjoyment

Gardeners connected with these action research projects talk about gardening, at least in part, as recreation. Growing Resilience gardeners described the pleasure their gardens gave them, saying, for example, “walking down those steps, digging in the dirt, having a great time watering, watching the bees, I’m just in love with those silly bees. I kept my yard cleaner too.” Another noted that gardening is “something you have to do, but you don’t feel like you have to.” In the survey of Team GROW gardeners, 19 out of 20 said they experienced “leisure or pleasure” from gardening to at least some extent ( Table 1 ).

In addition, the community gardens and other public food growing spaces supported by the CBOs draw not only gardeners, but also garden and farm visitors who watch the produce develop over the season, enjoy the flowers, and/or learn about the foods people grow. For example, a visitor to FLV said she had walked by their building regularly just to monitor the progress of pumpkins being grown to share with the Laramie community, and appeared to be a little disappointed when they were harvested. FLV, DDF and ENYF in particular, regularly receive formal requests for tours and, collectively, host hundreds of visitors each year who want to admire and learn from their work.

Growing culture and spirit

BMA on Wind River Indian Reservation is helping community members restore traditional varieties of Indian corn and reestablish chokecherries. Gardeners supported by ENYF in Brooklyn grow culturally important foods such as callaloo, long beans, bitter gourd, and hot bonnet peppers. Gardeners in both places help anchor local farmers markets, providing not only fresh produce in general, but diverse varieties that would not otherwise be available for purchase. One gardener who sells at the ENYF market noted that “things that sell like hot bread in the market is callaloo. You cannot plant enough callaloo.” These outcomes include, not only maintaining cultural food traditions, but also sharing them. For example, through their Food Dignity connections, a Jamaican gardener in East New York grew Indian corn from Wind River seeds. Some gardeners in the feasibility pilot studies about gardening appreciated learning about vegetables that were new to them, one saying, “who would have thought I would fall in love with bok choy?”

Growing people and relationships

Gardeners report sharing and exchange harvests, labor, and knowledge with their communities. This sharing is likely one of the core means by which gardening deepens social networks and connections.

In Team GROW, the gardener-researchers, who tracked whether they ate, stored, or shared each harvest, shared 30% of what they grew with others ( Conk & Porter, 2016 ). Those who responded to the survey also reported “sharing food with others” as both a motivation for and an outcome of gardening ( Table 1 ).

In interviews, many gardeners talked about sharing food, exchanging knowledge, and offering and receiving physical assistance with gardening labor. Several described, not just what they gave, but also what they receive by sharing. For example, one experienced gardener said that inspiring and mentoring people to grow their own food, “just makes me feel so good.” She also noted the physical help she gets when people come to visit her garden, noting, “I wish that I’d had more people come out. One thing that helps me, is I can’t do all the physical stuff very well anymore, but it passes [knowledge] on and I like to pass on my passion.” Another person reported that someone who shared her land for growing food for the community felt, “glad that she could provide something. She doesn’t have a lot of resources but she has this yard so she was glad that she could use that yard to benefit others and to have that be a resource.” Some gardeners in the feasibility pilots reported with pride, being consulted about gardening; for example, “I had people asking me, how do you do this? What did you use? I’m the expert on raised gardens now, of my friends.”

Some gardeners in the feasibility studies who struggled with depression, physical movement limitations, or both, reported that their new gardens gave them a reason to get up in the morning, noting, “it got me on a better sleep schedule” and “it got me out of bed.” When one person in the Laramie, Wyoming focus group said that, “I spent more time outside than I ever have,” another replied, “wasn’t that neat?” and a third confirmed “me too!” They talked about children coming over to point out new growth or study bugs in the gardens, and friends and neighbors coming over to eat from their gardens or even just to admire them; for example, “my friends came over, and sat on the patio and looked at the garden while we ate. People just really liked it. It was pleasant. We had lunch, we picked fresh basil, made sandwiches.”

Also, several gardeners most involved with the Ithaca, Wind River Reservation and Laramie-based CBOs (WCP, BMA and FLV, respectively) have described the local collaboration teams in these action-research projects as feeling like family. One of the Team GROW gardener-researchers said that the project had connected her with “my people.” All but one of the Team GROW survey respondents noted that meeting other community members was at least a partial outcome from their gardening.

An organizer on Wind River Indian Reservation describes how gardening also helps to educate children ( Potter, 2015 ), which illustrates results from the small subset of Team GROW survey respondents (4 out of 20) who had children at home, who unanimously ranked teaching their children as an outcome from gardening ( Table 1 ). Both WCP and ENYF intentionally build inter-generational relationships by matching teens with local elders who provide mentorship while receiving help with their gardening ( Brangman, 2017 ; Daftary-Steel & Gervais, 2015 ).

These “cultural ecosystem services” create foundations for and contribute to the last category of outcomes from gardening found in this study: individual and community healing, and transformation.

4. Gardens for healing and transformation

The five CBOs collaborating in these food system action research projects both report and aspire to individual and collective healing and transformation with their communities. They intentionally design their community food growing and growing support activities to help reach these goals (Porter, 2018a, this issue), as articulated in their collaborative pathway models ( Hargraves & Denning, 2017 ). They also particularly aim to support people and communities who suffer the most and offer expertise derived from lived experience with food injustice and food insecurity.

BMA and FLV partnered in the feasibility pilots as part of intentionally using home gardens as a strategy for helping people on Wind River Indian Reservation and in Laramie, Wyoming, increase control of their lives and their physical health. A gardener supported by FLV said, “I never would have attempted a garden without this. It wasn’t a possibility. Without this, it would have never happened.” Another also said, “I never would have had a garden. I wouldn’t have gardened at all without this project.” A third mentioned she could not get down on her knees to tend her garden, so it was the raised boxes that FLV provided that made it possible for her to grow food. More broadly, at the start of the Growing Resilience pilots, the head of a tribal health organization collaborating with BMA and me said he approved of the gardening project idea, because, “we need to put health back into the hands of the people.” Similarly, an expert gardener working with ENYF noted that she and other gardeners feel that, “growing, sharing and selling fresh food, growing stuff and selling it to the community, it’s making the community healthier. It’s making us, me, mentally healthier, because people see that this comes from the heart, it’s going here.”

Achievement of such transformative outcomes is challenging to assess or attribute, but the results from these action-research projects do illustrate some examples of how gardening and other forms of community food production have contributed to fostering health and transformation.

Several of the digital stories composed by some Food Dignity partners to share their individual journeys in food justice work vividly illustrate these themes of growing food for healing and transformation. For example, two men who worked as farmers at DDF entitled their stories, “Fresh Start,” and, “My New Life,” with each describing how growing food offered pathways away from jail or prison ( Rucker, 2015 ; Silva, 2015 ). The availability of these paths was no accident; their boss, a captain in the Alameda County Sherriff’s Department who co-founded DDF, entitled his story, “When Good Food Makes for Good Policing” ( Neideffer, 2015 ).

Some gardeners have planted to regain control of their health and to heal. One gardener began growing her own food to recover her health after becoming highly chemical sensitive from exposure to pesticides ( Dunning & Owens, 2016 ). Another says she planted gardens to take root, more figuratively, in a new community ( Dunning, 2015 ). One participant in the feasibility pilot about health impacts of gardens reported that gardening saved her life. Several gardeners on Wind River Indian Reservation talked about growing their own food to take control over their diabetes and to prevent their children from being diagnosed by building healthy lifestyles, in addition to providing well for their families overall.

For some, gardening also appeared as a gateway to improving their communities and increasing personal influence. One young DDF farmer, in conversation with me, marveled at the power he had to physically change his community after being part of transforming a corner lot from an eyesore into a beautiful and productive garden. A person who became a gardener with help from FLV via the feasibility pilot, later went to his first city council meeting to support providing public land for a proposed FLV community farm. While there, earlier in the agenda, he spoke powerfully in favor of locating a recreation facility on the west side of Laramie, which is literally and figuratively on the other side of the tracks from the city center. Similarly, that was also my first Laramie city council meeting, and though there to support the farm proposal, I also spoke up on an earlier agenda item, in favor of aquifer protection. In this way, our involvement with FLV also led us to become more active citizens, and to speak up in this formal policy-making setting. Leaders at ENYF talk about people in their communities dedicated to growing food to take back empty lots, beautify their worlds, and feed their neighbors ( Daftary-Steel, 2015 ; Marshall, 2015 ; Vigil, 2015 ). Others describe how growing food contains transformational lessons about having, “the grace to receive” ( Dunning 2015 ) and heeding calls for environmental healing ( Brangman, 2015 ). Other stories are about viewing, acting, and being in our world in a transformed way ( Daftary-Steel, 2015 ), including, as another storyteller concludes, “once you start to see the potential in the people and the place, you can’t help but look for that everywhere you go” ( Vigil 2015 ).

Results from this research confirm and expand upon previous work showing that benefits of food gardening include: improving individual health; producing nutritionally meaningful amounts of quality food; providing cultural ecosystem services in recreation, culture and social networks; and fostering healing and transformation. This array of positive outcomes suggests that supporting home and community food gardening offers an effective public health and sustainable community development strategy.

Understanding more about why and how gardening produces these outcomes, and for and with whom, would inform how to best deepen and broaden these and other positive impacts. To begin outlining future action and research agendas in this arena, I draw from the results presented in this paper and from previous research to discuss potential mechanisms.

Health, Food, and Gardening

For some of the individual health benefits associated with gardening, mechanisms that likely produce them seem obvious. For example, being physically active and reducing sedentary time are known to improve overall wellbeing ( Kohl et al., 2012 ; Warburton, Nicol, & Bredin, 2006 ) and gardening inherently entails activity. The link between producing vegetables and increased access to and consumption of them seems transparent. Spending time outside is known to improve mental health and gardening requires being outdoors ( Ryan, Weinstein, Bernstein, Brown, Mistretta, & Gagné, 2010 ). In addition, several gardeners here reported that their gardens draw them to sit outside even when not actively gardening. Why being outside improves emotional health is less certain, though one plausible mechanism is that sun exposure improves vitamin D levels, while inadequate levels are associated with depression ( Penckofer, Kouba, Byrn, & Estwing Ferrans, 2010 ). An additional theory involves exposure to mood-improving microbes that are common in soil ( Reber et al., 2016 ), which may more easily transfer to humans via gardened foods than via store-bought foods ( Bryce, 2013 ).

The power conveyed by becoming a producer, as opposed to only a consumer, may also improve well-being; self-determination theory suggests that feelings of autonomy and control contribute to health ( Deci & Ryan, 2008 ). Also, gardeners report feeling productive, which is associated with a higher quality of life ( Kim, 2013 ; Litt, Schmiege, Hale, Buchenau, & Sancar, 2015 ), especially when the productive activity also benefits others ( Aknin et al., 2013 ; Matz-Costa, Besen, Boone James, & Pitt-Catsouphes, 2014 ). Some of the gardeners in this study have said that sharing their food and their knowledge has enhanced their own well-being. This is in addition to the benefits of increased family and community feelings of connectedness found in this and previous research.

Though some of the health benefits observed in association with gardening maybe be only that—correlated but not causal, simply indicating that healthier people are more likely to garden—the feasibility pilots reported here and in the 22 studies in the meta-analysis review ( Soga, Gaston, & Yamaura, 2017 ) all involved pre- and post-health outcome measures. This time order, of hypothesized cause before effect, adds to the plausibility of gardening positively affecting health. Also, arguably, if a person reports that gardening makes them feel healthier, as so many in this and other studies do, then their subjective well-being is indeed improved by definition. If a survey used to measure well-being (such as the SF-12 used in these feasibility pilots) does not capture this improvement, then this is a failure of the instrument.

Healing, Transformation and Gardening Support

The array of potential causal pathways for health and food benefits of gardening discussed above, if real, would suggest that such benefits would accrue to gardeners at large, even those who do not receive technical assistance or associate with food justice CBOs that support such food production. This would also likely be true for many of the recreational services that gardening provides. However, it seems plausible that the, “growing people and relationships,” outcomes, and moreover, “healing and transformation,” ones, would be enhanced by the support strategies the five CBOs use. Moreover, CBOs extend these benefits to people who wish to garden but could or would not without such support. Because all of the gardeners in this research were associated with the work of food justice CBOs, I can only hypothesize from our observations about how these associations may have impacted distribution and depth of these gardening outcomes.

The broad set of benefits in culture and spirit, people and relationships, and healing and transformation reported here, appear to be entwined with and emerging from the CBOs’ strategies for supporting gardening and gardeners. As described elsewhere (Porter, 2018a, this issue), these CBOs extensively use organizing strategies to achieve transformational goals with their communities. Technical support for gardening, such as that traditionally provided by cooperative extension agencies in the U.S. and also included in activities of these CBOs, simply aims to help improve gardeners’ skill levels for greater food production. However, rather than as an end in itself, the CBOs view gardening as a strategic activity that provides one of many means to larger ends of community health, food security, equity, and power. These CBOs intentionally enable gardeners to also become vendors, farmers, mentors, donors, policy advocates, educators, grantees, grantors, and more, if and as they wish to. They also help enable people to become gardeners, or even farmers, if they wish to. As two food justice activist scholars note, “no amount of fresh produce will fix urban America’s food and health gap unless it is accompanied by changes in the structures of ownership and immigration laws and a reversal of the diminished political and economic power of the poor and lower working-class” ( Holt Giménez & Shattuck, 2011 , p. 133). As articulated in their collaborative pathway models ( Hargraves & Denning, 2017 ), all five CBOs aim to increase political and economic power of people who currently have the least, including via supporting community-based food production such as gardening. As the authors of case studies with four community gardens in eastern London argue, such gardens create, “contexts for effective community mobilization… opening up new possibilities for being, seeing and doing” ( Guerlain & Campbell, 2016 , p. 220). The intentionality in creating these spaces leads Pudup (2008) to argue that community gardens should instead be called organized garden spaces (see also Saldivar-Tanaka & Krasny, 2004 ).

As a public health nutrition scholar, when I present results from this work about health benefits of gardening, I have reason to fear that I am framing gardening as another health-behavior-change imperative: not only should people eat more fruits and vegetables, they should grow them. A scientist in the audience at one seminar, who also identified as a single mother, asked wearily, “when do I get to rest?” However, the CBO organizers appear to be agnostic about whether community members become gardeners at all; they focus on people and community, not on production or even food more generally (Porter, 2018a, this issue). For example, after the Growing Resilience feasibility pilots, FLV engaged with me to redesign our approach to enable people to set their own health improvement goals and then choose how to reach them, rather than randomly assigning people to gardening. By offering multiple ways for community members to engage, these CBOs model what Guerlain and Campbell describe as better accounting “for what participants themselves would like to achieve in their own lives, rather than in relation to externally imposed notions of what counts as political change” (2016, p. 220).

That said, when people do wish to garden, four of the five CBOs (one focuses on community farming and does not engage directly in gardening activities) strive to support and enable them to do so (Porter, 2018a, this issue). The full gardening support and installation “packages” that FLV and BMA provide have almost certainly enabled more people to garden. As reported above, a few of the FLV gardeners have said explicitly that they would never have been able to garden without that help. Also, the community gardening spaces that ENYF, WCP, and FLV have cultivated offer the space, soil and, especially with FLV in Laramie, affordable water, that are all necessary for gardening but not everyone has access to. Results from another study within the Food Dignity project, where US$40 gardening mini-grants were randomly provided to half the attendees at a gardening workshop, found that even small amounts of material support spurred interested people to start or expand food gardens ( Porter, McCrackin, & Naschold, 2016 ).

Future Research

Results from the three randomized controlled trials currently underway will substantially improve the quality, quantity, and specificity of evidence for how gardening impacts individual health outcomes. If these studies find positive results, the next question would be about if and how much the quantity of food produced—in total and as rate per area—is related to health outcomes. Based on our qualitative observations and gardener insights, I would hypothesize that most of the physical and mental benefits are not closely tied to productivity, as long as a harvest does not fail entirely.

In links between healing, transformation, and gardening support, it seems plausible that technical assistance alone would likely help gardeners to improve yield quality and quantity. The enormous range of harvest rates found in Team GROW certainly indicates that there is room for such increases. In addition, technical support would help urban gardeners avoid and mitigate heavy metal exposure risks that gardening in contaminated soil poses ( Al-Delaimy & Webb, 2017 ). However, such narrow and limited forms of support are unlikely to enable people, particularly those who face physical, financial, and/or land access challenges, to begin growing their own food in the first place. Technical assistance alone also would not, plausibly, work to connect gardeners more directly and deeply with one another and with other food system activities (e.g., sharing, selling, advocating, mentoring) the way the CBOs’ strategic activities aim to (Porter, 2018a, this issue). The social healing and transformation outcomes, and potential outcomes, of gardening may hinge upon the kinds of community organizing strategies that the food justice CBOs use (Porter, 2018a, this issue).

The gardening outcome data from the Food Dignity case stories, Team GROW project, and Growing Resilience feasibility pilots, confirm and expand findings from previous research which indicate that gardening improves health, produces nutritionally meaningful quantities of quality food, and provides important cultural ecosystem services (such as recreation, cultural enrichment, and community building). In addition, perhaps especially because of the strategies employed by food justice CBOs that collaborated in this research, gardening activities have also yielded individual and social healing and transformation.

Arenas ripe for future research on impacts of gardening include further quantifying and specifying individual health changes and causality, assessing relationships between garden productivity and outcomes, and further documenting and evaluating community-level outcomes. Another action research priority is trialing and assessing strategies for maximizing access to gardening and for maximizing positive outcomes from gardening via policy, technical, and community-organizing forms of support. In the meantime, however, the growing evidence for multiple benefits of home and community gardening suggests the wisdom of enabling anyone who wishes to start growing some of her own food to plant some seeds.

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the action research teams of Food Dignity and Growing Resilience, including gardener-researchers of Team GROW and Elisabeth “Livy” Lewis, and especially the community-based researchers and leaders at each CBO who reviewed my use of our work here. Thanks also to Monica Hargraves and Cecilia Denning for their Collaborative Pathway Model work and for reviewing and advising on my use of those here.

1 Based on this experience, we completely redesigned our data-gathering approach in the full-scale Growing Resilience randomized controlled trial currently underway in Wind River Indian Reservation ( University of Wyoming et al., 2016 ). Instead of scheduling data-gathering appointments with participants at their homes, households came to a central data-gathering location, with transportation provided as needed and stipends provided. The project also now includes more substantial partnerships with the tribal health organizations involved than during the feasibility pilot. So far, in our first two years of the full-scale study, we have had excellent participant retention and return rates.

Contributors and Supporting Agencies

Funding Disclosure

Food Dignity ( http://www.fooddignity.org ) is supported by Agriculture and Food Research Initiative Competitive Grant no. 2011-68004-30074 from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture. The Growing Resilience pilots are supported by grants from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (8 P20 GM103432-12) from the National Institutes of Health. The full Growing Resilience project ( http://www.growingresilience.org ) is supported by the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute and the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (R01 HL126666-01) from the National Institutes of Health.

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• Open access
• Published: 19 November 2013

Association between community garden participation and fruit and vegetable consumption in rural Missouri

• Ellen K Barnidge 1 ,
• Pamela R Hipp 2 ,
• Amy Estlund 1 ,
• Kathleen Duggan 2 ,
• Kathryn J Barnhart 1 &
• Ross C Brownson 2 , 3  

International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity volume  10 , Article number:  128 ( 2013 ) Cite this article

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Fruit and vegetable consumption reduces chronic disease risk, yet the majority of Americans consume fewer than recommended. Inadequate access to fruits and vegetables is increasingly recognized as a significant contributor to low consumption of healthy foods. Emerging evidence shows the effectiveness of community gardens in increasing access to, and consumption of, fruits and vegetables.

Two complementary studies explored the association of community garden participation and fruit and vegetable consumption in rural communities in Missouri. The first was with a convenience sample of participants in a rural community garden intervention who completed self-administered surveys. The second was a population-based survey conducted with a random sample of 1,000 residents in the intervention catchment area.

Participation in a community garden was associated with higher fruit and vegetable consumption. The first study found that individuals who worked in a community garden at least once a week were more likely to report eating fruits and vegetables because of their community garden work (X 2 (125) = 7.78, p = .0088). Population-based survey results show that 5% of rural residents reported participating in a community garden. Those who reported community garden participation were more likely to report eating fruits 2 or more times per day and vegetables 3 or more times per day than those who did not report community garden participation, even after adjusting for covariates (Odds Ratio [OR] = 2.76, 95% Confidence Interval [CI] = 1.35 to 5.65).

These complementary studies provide evidence that community gardens are a promising strategy for promoting fruit and vegetable consumption in rural communities.

Fruit and vegetable consumption reduces chronic disease risk [ 1 , 2 ], yet the majority of Americans do not meet current consumption recommendations [ 3 ]. Although individual and interpersonal determinants are important, there is an increased emphasis on environmental factors that influence fruit and vegetable consumption. One specific environmental strategy - community gardens - is gaining attention for the potential to increase the availability of, and access to, fruits and vegetables [ 4 , 5 ].

Community gardens are associated with increased community connectedness and civic engagement, but few studies examine the effect of community garden participation on fruit and vegetable consumption [ 6 – 9 ]. McCormack and colleagues identified only 4 cross sectional studies examining this relationship in the United States [ 7 , 8 , 10 – 12 ]. Each study found a significant association between community garden participation and fruit and vegetable consumption; however, methodological issues such as use of non-validated measures, convenience samples, or lack of pre-intervention measures limit the findings. A more recent study in Denver, Colorado addressed some of these methodological issues: using an in-person population-based survey, the researchers found that those who participated in an urban community garden consumed more fruits and vegetables per day than those who did not participate in a community garden [ 6 ].

The existing data supporting this association is promising yet limited to urban settings. To the authors’ knowledge, there are no published studies examining this relationship in rural settings in the United States. Rural settings are of particular interest for several reasons. Rural residents are less likely to meet recommendations for fruit and vegetable consumption than suburban and many urban residents [ 13 ]. Rural areas have higher poverty rates than urban and suburban areas [ 14 ]. A recent study found that while the majority of rural residents live within 10 miles of a grocery store, low-income rural residents are more likely to live 10 or more miles from a grocery store than middle and high income rural residents [ 15 ]. High poverty rates coupled with limited access to a grocery store may explain why rural residents are less likely to meet recommendations for fruit and vegetable consumption. Identifying intervention strategies that increase access to and availability of fruits and vegetables for low income rural residents is needed. The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between community garden participation and fruit and vegetable consumption in rural Missouri.

Overview of the intervention

Healthier Missouri Communities (Healthier MO) is a community-based research project conducted by the Prevention Research Center in St. Louis (PRC-StL) and community partners from 12 counties in rural southeast Missouri. The impetus to work in partnership with southeast Missouri communities is the high poverty rate (approximately 20%, nearly double the Missouri rate of 11.8%) and a significantly higher burden of chronic disease than the rest of the state [ 16 ]. Compared to the US average, fewer Missouri residents eat fruit 2 or more times a day (27.3% Missouri v. 32.5% US) or vegetables 3 or more times a day (23.0% Missouri v. 26.3% US) [ 17 ]. Data suggest that southeast Missouri residents are even less likely to meet recommendations for fruit and vegetable consumption than the state as a whole [ 18 ].

Healthier MO seeks to implement environmental and policy interventions to promote healthy eating in this geographic region. In 2010, community partners participated in an evidence-based decision-making training in which they identified community gardens as a feasible and important option to promote fruit and vegetable consumption in their communities. This manuscript reports the findings from two surveys conducted as part of Healthier MO. The community garden intercept survey assessed the effect of frequency of community garden participation in Healthier MO gardens on fruit and vegetable consumption. The population-based survey assessed general community garden participation in the intervention catchment area and the effect of community garden participation on meeting recommendations for fruit and vegetable consumption.

This research was approved by the Saint Louis University Institutional Review Board.

Community garden intercept survey

This study included 12 community gardens, representing seven counties within the 12-county intervention catchment area. As part of the intervention, communities received funding for garden equipment, technical assistance, and access to a regional community garden resource network. The placement of intervention gardens depended on the interest and commitment of each community. Five of the 12 gardens were newly developed for this intervention period. Seven gardens existed prior to the intervention and expanded during the intervention period. The community garden formats varied across the study sites. Half of the community gardens (n = 6) had a single large plot tended collaboratively by multiple gardeners. The other half (n = 6) included multiple individual plots within a larger designated area each tended by individual gardeners. Gardens ranged in size from 147′ to 132′ for the single plot to 4′x20′ for individual plots. Community gardens with individual plots included between six and 40 plots each; 3 of these gardens utilized raised beds as the individual plots. The number of gardeners per garden ranged from three to sixteen. The garden season lasted from approximately May 1st to September 30th.

A quantitative, self-administered, post survey was conducted with a convenience sample of community gardeners from each of the 12 intervention gardens during October of 2011. Gift cards were provided to respondents in appreciation of their participation. The intercept survey included questions about demographics, frequency of working in the community garden, and the self-perceived impact of working in the community garden on behaviors, attitudes, knowledge and skills [ 19 ]. Frequency of working in the community garden was dichotomized into “once a week or more” and “less than once a week.” A five-point Likert scale that ranged from “Strongly agree” to “Strongly disagree” was used as response options for questions on behavior, attitudes, knowledge, and skills. Responses were dichotomized as “Yes” if response was “Agree” or “Strongly Agree,” and “No” if response was “Neutral,” “Disagree,” or “Strongly Disagree.” “Don’t know” and “refused” responses were excluded from analysis.

Population-based telephone survey

The Survey Research Laboratory at Mississippi State University conducted 1,000 telephone interviews with adult respondents from the following towns in the 12-county intervention catchment area: Charleston, Ellington, West Plains, Mountain View, and Doniphan. The towns were chosen because they each have a community garden within a five mile radius. Household telephone numbers were selected from a random-digit-dial sample of 16,000 landline numbers within a five-mile radius of the latitude and longitude coordinates for each town. The sample included households with unlisted numbers. The total number of completed surveys from each location was stratified according to 2009 population estimates. Interviewers collected data during October and November 2011.

Interviewers asked respondents about demographic characteristics based on questions from the 2009 Behavioral Risk Factors Surveillance Survey (BRFSS) questionnaire [ 20 ]. The research team assessed respondents’ perceptions of their social and physical environments across three domains: sense of belonging, social cohesion, and food environment. Respondents were asked to answer questions on social and physical environment using a five-point Likert scale that ranged from “Strongly agree” to “Strongly disagree”. The sense of belonging scale included items such as “my community is a good place for kids to grow up” and “I expect to live in this community for a long time [ 21 ].” The social cohesion scale included items such as “people around here are willing to help their neighbors,” and “this is a close knit community [ 22 ].” The food environment scale assessed ease of buying fresh fruits and vegetables in their neighborhood, quality of fresh produce, selection of fresh produce, ease of buying low fat products, quality of low fat products, and selection of low fat products [ 23 ]. Scores for each scale were summed for component questions within each domain to produce a composite domain score, with higher domain scores reflecting stronger sense of belonging, social cohesion, and food environment.

The research team assessed community garden participation based on questions developed by Litt and colleagues for measures of garden participation in Denver [ 6 ]. Community garden was defined as a garden where land is shared by others. Community garden participation was defined as growing fruits and vegetables in a community garden and/or receiving fruits and vegetables from a community garden in the last six months; all others were coded as non-participants of community gardens.

Fruit and vegetable consumption was measured using six items from the 2009 BRFSS [ 20 ] that determine the frequency of consumption of specific fruits and vegetables per day, week, month, or year. A composite measure of fruit and vegetable consumption was calculated to determine the typical number of times participants consumed fruits and vegetables per day. The composite measure was dichotomized into those who reported consuming “fruit 2 or more times a day and vegetables 3 or more times a day” (meeting recommendations) and those who do not meet this recommendation.

The research team performed all analyses using SAS version 9.3 (SAS Institute, Cary, NC). Descriptive statistics were used to examine study population characteristics for each survey. Both surveys were used to examine the effect of community garden participation (independent variable) on fruit and vegetable consumption (dependent variable).

Because this survey was conducted on a sample of known community gardeners, community garden participation (independent variable) was based on self-reported frequency of working in the community garden: once a week or more vs. less than once a week. Meanwhile, fruit and vegetable consumption was determined by the response to “Because I work in the community garden, I eat more fruits and vegetables” (dependent variable). Responses to other behavior, attitudes, knowledge, and skills questions were secondary outcomes. Chi-square analyses were conducted to estimate the association between more frequent participation in a community garden (once a week or more) with each primary and secondary outcome.

Population-based survey

For the population-based survey, community garden participation (independent variable) was based on self-reported community garden participation (grows fruits and vegetables in a community garden, or obtained fruits and vegetables from a community garden in past 6 months) vs. non-participation. Fruit and vegetable consumption (dependent variable) was based on a composite measure estimating consumption of eating fruits 2 or more times a day and eating vegetables 3 or more times per day (reflecting meeting and not meeting the daily fruit and vegetable recommendations). A series of multivariate logistic regression models were used to examine the relationship between community garden participation and fruit and vegetable consumption with and without adjustment for covariates. Model 1 examines the effect of community garden participation alone on fruit and vegetable consumption. Model 2 adds sociodemographic covariates: gender, race/ethnicity, age, and education. Model 3 adds sociodemographic covariates as well as social and physical environment domains: social cohesion, sense of belonging, and food environment.

One hundred and forty-one adult community gardeners completed the survey. Participants in the intercept survey were mostly women (67.4%) and mostly Non-Hispanic White (54.6%) or African American (34.8%) (Table  1 ). Most were 45 years of age or older (72.3%) and more than half had more than a high school education (53.2%). Sixty-four percent of the survey participants reported working in a community garden once a week or more.

There is a significant relationship between frequency of community garden participation and perception of consuming more fruits and vegetables because of their community garden work (X 2 (125) = 7.78, p = .0088) (Table  2 ). Community gardeners reporting participation once a week or more were more likely to perceive eating more fruits and vegetables.

Those with more frequent community garden participation were also more likely to report the following secondary outcomes as a result of their community garden work: eating food that is fresher (less packaged food), spending less money on food, being better able to provide food for family and self, eating less fast food, caring more about the environment, and feeling better about where one’s food comes from (Table  2 ).

Participants in the population-based survey were mostly women (73.4%) and non-Hispanic whites (88.0%) (Table  3 ). Most were 45 years of age or older (81.2%) and less than half had more than a high school education (44.2%). Forty-two percent of the participants in the population-based survey reported growing fruits and vegetables at home while 5% of participants reported participation in a community garden (grows fruits and vegetables in a community garden, or obtained fruits and vegetables from a community garden in past 6 months).

Community garden participation was significantly and positively associated with meeting daily fruit and vegetable recommendations (consumption of fruit 2 or more times a day and vegetables 3 or more times a day) in all three statistical models (ORs ranged from 2.70 to 2.76). The effect sizes for this association were consistent across all three models, with community garden participation associated with a more than two-fold increase in likelihood for meeting daily fruit and vegetable recommendations in the final fully adjusted model (OR = 2.76, 95% CI: 1.35 to 5.65) (Table  4 ).

Further regression analyses were performed on the population-based survey disaggregating those who work in the community garden (2.3%) and those who receive fruits and vegetables from a community garden (3.9%). Results show that working in a community garden was not significantly associated with increased fruit and vegetable consumption but the three models trended in the right direction (ORs ranged from 1.56 to 1.78). Obtaining fruits and vegetables from a community garden was significantly associated with fruit and vegetable consumption in all three models and odds ratios were similar to the results for examination of any participation in a community garden.

Together, the findings from our community garden intercept survey and the population-based survey demonstrate an association between community garden participation and fruit and vegetable consumption in rural settings. The intercept survey was a post evaluation of a community garden intervention with known community gardeners. Despite the limitations of the post evaluation only design, our findings suggest that frequent participation in a community garden has greater impact on community gardeners’ perception that they consume more fruits and vegetables. The population-based survey was a random sample that allowed us to estimate general community garden participation in rural settings and compare those who participate in community gardens to those who do not. The association between community garden participation and fruit and vegetable consumption in the population-based survey was robust after adjustment for covariates that reflected both sociodemographic factors and participants’ perception of the social and physical environments.

The findings from these studies contribute to the literature in several ways. To the authors’ knowledge this is the first study to examine the relationship between community garden participation and fruit and vegetable consumption in rural settings. There is one known published study exploring the feasibility and perceived benefit of developing a community garden in a rural African American community in Virginia [ 24 ]. Its findings indicated that participants believe a community garden would increase fruit and vegetable consumption among residents and youth and perceived that working in a community garden would increase one’s willingness to try new fruits and vegetables [ 24 ]. Although this information is necessary when considering community interest in an intervention strategy, it does not address intervention effectiveness. Data from the studies presented in this article begin to build the evidence.

The studies presented here examined both frequency and types of community garden participation which differs from other studies. The intercept survey examined frequency of community garden participation while most studies compare participation versus non-participation like the population-based survey [ 6 – 8 ]. Unlike other studies that define community garden participation as growing fruits or vegetables in a community garden [ 6 , 8 ], the population-based survey included those receiving fruits and vegetables from a community garden. Together, these studies allow us to consider whether working in a community garden and the frequency of doing so affect consumption. The findings are mixed. The intercept survey found that those who participate more often in a community garden are more likely to report a connection between eating more fruits and vegetables and community garden participation. Further regression analyses were performed on the population-based survey disaggregating those who grow fruits and vegetables in a community garden and those who simply obtain fruits and vegetables from a community garden. The results show that working in a community garden alone was not significantly associated with increased fruit and vegetable consumption; however, the models trended in the right direction and may not have been statistically significant due to small numbers (only 2.3% reported working in a community garden). Obtaining fruits and vegetables from a community garden was significantly associated with fruit and vegetable consumption after controlling for covariates. This suggests that community garden impact on increased fruit and vegetable consumption may be a function of access to produce as much as it is about having a communal place to grow produce.

Limitations

There are several limitations to note. The intercept survey was designed to be brief as it “intercepted” community gardeners in action. As a result, a single item was used to assess fruit and vegetable consumption. The wording of the question could be leading which introduces bias. Participants may have been more likely to report a perception of eating more fruits and vegetables due to the wording of the question. The intercept survey was conducted with a convenience sample which may introduce selection bias.

The population-based survey collected data using a random sample of landline telephone numbers. Due to increased reliance on cell phones the population sampled in the population-based survey may not reflect the general population of the target area. The population tended to be older (81.2% of the sample is older than 45 years compared to 43.0% of the catchment area population [ 25 ]) and may be more or less likely to participate in community gardens than the general population. Descriptive statistics indicated that 13% of data for the dependent variable were missing due to non-response. Examination of missing value patterns showed that our data were not missing completely at random, indicating the potential for bias if we only included those with non-missing values in our analysis (complete case analysis). Without a complete dataset available for comparison, it is not possible to test for other patterns of missing values (missing at random, or MAR, and missing not at random, or MNAR). Although we were not able to differentiate between MAR and MNAR, we explored a multiple imputation approach that assumes MAR [ 26 ]. We specified an imputation model that included all the variables used in analysis and also auxiliary variables [ 27 , 28 ] (specifically, food security status, marital status, county of residence, meets/does not meet physical activity recommendations, and self-rated health status) in order to generate 10 imputed datasets with missing values replaced with reasonable estimates. Analysis was conducted on each imputed dataset and PROC MIANALYZE was used to generate combined odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals that incorporate the uncertainty arising from imputation. We performed sensitivity analysis to examine results both without imputation (complete case analysis) and after multiple imputation under the assumption of MAR. Results were identical in direction and similar in magnitude. We therefore presented only results from complete case analysis here because the similarity of results observed in sensitivity analysis suggest the missing values were not a source of bias.

We measured fruit and vegetable consumption differently in each survey and only captured cross sectional data from a rural area of Missouri. Because we used two separate measures of fruit and vegetable consumption, comparisons of the two surveys is limited. Cross sectional data limits the ability to determine causality. It is plausible that those who participate in community gardens or participate more frequently are already eating more fruits and vegetables than those who do not participate in community gardens. We collected data for both surveys from a 12 county area in rural southeastern Missouri. The results presented here may not reflect associations in other rural communities.

More information on accessibility and distribution of community garden produce is needed. Healthier MO community garden distribution practices varied. Some gardens allowed relatively open access to produce regardless of participation in growing while others restricted access to only those who grew the produce. Others have suggested that when community food infrastructure is designed to accommodate the needs of the poor, such as open access to community gardens, dietary behavior change may result [ 4 ]. One way to increase the reach of community gardens is to distribute the produce grown beyond the gardeners. A second consideration of accessibility of produce grown in community gardens is the location of the gardens to the population. As noted earlier low income rural residents are more likely to live further away from grocery stores. This may be an important limitation of the effectiveness of community gardens in rural areas as well. The research team for this study did not collect data on distance to a community garden. Community garden location is an important consideration given transportation needs and barriers for some rural residents. It is important to note that the focus on community gardens was chosen by rural residents participating in Healthier MO who prioritized community gardens as an environmental strategy that was both important and feasible for their communities.

Conclusions

The findings summarized here suggest that community gardens may be an effective environmental strategy to promote fruit and vegetable consumption in rural communities. Public health practitioners should consider participants’ level of participation in a community garden as well as informal policies about who has access to the produce grown if community gardens are developed as a community resource. One of the advantages of community gardens is that the food grown can be distributed to a wider population than those immediately involved. It can therefore reach more people in the community and has the potential to create a ripple effect. As the evidence for community gardens as an environmental strategy to promote fruit and vegetable consumption builds, the next step is to conduct additional rigorously designed studies, and if associations are replicated, develop a systematic approach for scaling up this intervention [ 29 ].

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank our community partners in Butler, Carter, Dunklin, Howell, Mississippi, Oregon, Pemiscot, Scott, Shannon, Reynolds, Ripley and Wayne counties for their continued commitment to the health and well-being of their communities. We thank Sarah Denkler, our University of Missouri Extension partner, and Freda Motton and Imogene Wiggs, our community-academic liaisons, for their contributions to the community gardens. Dr. Elizabeth Baker played an important role in the design and implementation of the Healthier Missouri Communities project. We are also grateful to John Edwards at Mississippi State University for his assistance in data collection.

This article was supported by Cooperative Agreement Number U48/DP001903 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Prevention Research Centers Program. The findings and conclusions in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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Barnidge, E.K., Hipp, P.R., Estlund, A. et al. Association between community garden participation and fruit and vegetable consumption in rural Missouri. Int J Behav Nutr Phys Act 10 , 128 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1186/1479-5868-10-128

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Growing number of war-weary Ukrainians would reluctantly give up territory to save lives, suggests recent survey

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Kristin M. Bakke has received funding for research in Ukraine from the Economic and Social Research Council (UK) and the Research Council of Norway.

Gerard Toal has received funding from the US National Science Foundation and the Research Council of Norway.

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The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, is trying his best to shake up the dynamics of the Russia-Ukraine war. He recently undertook a major cabinet reshuffle in which he replaced no fewer than nine ministers, including his foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba. Announcing the changes, Zelensky said he wanted his government to be “more active” in pressing for aid from its western allies.

These cabinet changes came as Ukraine pressed ahead with its offensive in the Kursk oblast in Russia. Zelensky has said that holding some Russian territory will give Kyiv leverage for future territorial exchange negotiations with Russia.

And, while criticism of Zelensky’s gamble has increased as Ukraine’s position in the Donbas in the east of the country has deteriorated, seeing Ukrainian soldiers turn the table on Russia has undeniably given Ukrainians a morale boost.

Ukrainians needed this. As the war has endured and its costs mounted, morale and public health have suffered .

We have tracked Ukrainian sentiment for years. In June and July 2024, in cooperation with the Kyiv International Institute for Sociology ( KIIS ), we conducted a telephone public opinion survey of 2,200 respondents representative of the adult population of government-controlled areas of Ukraine. This was to follow up on a survey from October 2022.

We should treat wartime polls with caution . But our survey findings suggest people are worried about war weariness among their fellow Ukrainians. It also suggests that there is growing, if reluctant, support for negotiations and territorial concessions.

Open to compromise

Attitudes among Ukrainians toward territorial concessions have also started to shift – but only slightly. Most people have opposed giving up land since 2014, but KIIS’s own regular omnibus survey provides evidence of growing recognition, now shared by one-third of Ukrainians, that territorial concessions may be necessary.

In June-July 2024 we repeated a question we asked in October 2022 on territorial concessions, shown in the figure below. “All choices about what to do during this current Russian aggression have significant, but different, costs. Knowing this, which of the following four choices should the Ukraine government take at this time?”

The biggest change was this: in 2022, 71% of respondents supported the proposition to “continue opposing Russian aggression until all Ukrainian territory, including Crimea, is liberated”, but in 2024 the support for that option had dropped to 51%.

In 2022, just 11% agreed with “trying to reach an immediate ceasefire by both sides with conditions and starting intensive negotiations”. In 2024, that share had increased to 31%.

But there are differences in how people look at these choices. Much depends on whether they have been displaced (though whether they lost family members or friends does not seem to make a difference), whether they worry about war fatigue among their fellow Ukrainians, and whether they are optimistic or pessimistic about western support.

There is more at stake in this war than territory — not least, saving lives, ensuring Ukraine’s sovereignty, and protecting the country’s future security. KIIS’s own recent research has shown that in a hypothetical negotiation scenario , people’s views on the importance of preserving territorial integrity might depend on how any possible deal might safeguard other things they care about.

For two and a half years, the brutal war has affected everyday lives of Ukrainians , and many (43%) believe that the war will last at least another year. Most of the respondents in our survey had not been physically injured in Russian violence (12% had), but about half had witnessed Russian violence, and most had lost a close family member or friend (62%). About one-third had been displaced from their homes.

Consistent with an increasing number of reports, the survey shows growing recognition of war fatigue. Rather than asking directly about whether respondents felt this themselves, we asked whether they worried about it among fellow Ukrainians. The results were revealing: 58% worry “a lot” and 28% worry “a little”, whereas only 10% report that they do not worry about war fatigue.

While there are signs of war weariness among Ukraine’s western allies, our surveys show that Ukrainians are still broadly optimistic about continued western support, though less so than in October 2022. About 19% believe western support will grow (down from 29% in 2022), while 35% believe it will stay the same (41% in 2022). Almost a quarter (24%) believe it will continue but at a lower level than now (up from 16% in 2022), and 13% believe it is unlikely to continue (up from 3% in 2022).

Life or death

Research from early on in the war showed that Ukrainians strongly preferred strategies that preserved the country’s political autonomy and restored the entirety of its territory . This would hold, “even if making concessions would reduce projected civilian and military deaths, or the risk of a nuclear strike over the next three months”.

As the authors of the study pointed out: “Russian control of the government in Kyiv or of territories in the east would put the lives of many Ukrainians at risk, as it is well documented that Russia has committed widespread human rights violations in temporarily occupied territories.”

Given the war’s accumulating death toll, in our 2024 survey we designed a simple framing experiment that can give us an indication of whether considerations about loss of life may shape people’s views on negotiations. We asked half of the respondents, randomly selected, if they would accept that “Ukraine concede some of its territories to end the war”. About 24% said yes.

For the other half, we asked if they would accept that “Ukraine concede some of its territories to save lives and end the war”. In that case, 34% said yes. So, if – rightly or wrongly – territorial concessions are associated with saving lives, it increases support for them.

But when asked directly in the 2024 survey if they agreed with the statement “Russia should be allowed to control the territory it has occupied since 2022”, 90% disagreed. So while there is still majority – if diminished – support for fighting to restore full territorial integrity, there is growing support for negotiations.

What we also know from our surveys is that there is very little evidence that Russia’s territorial annexations will ever have any legitimacy among Ukrainians.

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In Tied Presidential Race, Harris and Trump Have Contrasting Strengths, Weaknesses

What if they win harris and trump supporters differ over the acceptability of presidential actions by their own candidate, table of contents.

• Other findings: An uncertain election outcome, the more critical candidate, Trump and the 2020 election
• Voting preferences among demographic groups
• Support for Harris, Trump among voters and nonvoters in recent elections
• How Harris and Trump supporters see their vote
• Do voters think it’s clear who will win?
• Most voters cite several issues as very important to their vote
• Changes in confidence in candidates on issues, following Biden’s departure from race 
• Do voters see the candidates as ‘too personally critical’?
• Do the candidates make you feel proud, hopeful, uneasy or angry?
• How the candidates make Harris and Trump supporters feel
• How men and women view the impact of the candidates’ genders
• Views of the candidates’ races and ethnicities
• Views of the candidates’ ages among younger and older voters
• Views of the values and goals of the other candidate’s supporters
• Should the president work with the opposing party in Congress?
• Top economic concerns: Food and consumer prices, housing costs
• Acknowledgments
• The American Trends Panel survey methodology

Pew Research Center conducted this study to understand Americans’ views of the 2024 presidential election campaign.

For this analysis, we surveyed 9,720 adults – including 8,044 registered voters – from Aug. 26 to Sept. 2, 2024. Everyone who took part in this survey is a member of the Center’s American Trends Panel (ATP), a group of people recruited through national, random sampling of residential addresses who have agreed to take surveys regularly. This kind of recruitment gives nearly all U.S. adults a chance of selection. Surveys were conducted either online or by telephone with a live interviewer. The survey is weighted to be representative of the U.S. adult population by gender, race, ethnicity, partisan affiliation, education and other factors. Read more about the ATP’s methodology .

Here are the questions used for this report , the topline and the survey methodology .

Ahead of the scheduled Sept. 10 presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump, the presidential race is deadlocked. About half of registered voters (49%) say if the election were held today, they would vote for Harris, while an identical share say they would back Trump.

With less than two months before the November election, the candidates bring contrasting strengths and weaknesses to the presidential contest.

Trump’s key advantage is on the economy, which voters regard as the most important issue this year. A 55% majority of voters say they are very or somewhat confident in Trump to make good decisions about economic policy, compared with 45% who say that about Harris.

Harris’ lead over Trump on abortion is a near mirror image of Trump’s on the economy: 55% of voters have at least some confidence in Harris, while 44% express confidence in Trump.

And Harris holds sizable leads over Trump on several personal traits and characteristics, including being a good role model (a 19 percentage point advantage), down-to-earth (13 points) and honest (8 points).

The latest national survey by Pew Research Center, conducted among 9,720 adults (including 8,044 registered voters) from Aug. 26 to Sept. 2, 2024, highlights how much has changed in the campaign – and what hasn’t – since President Joe Biden withdrew from the race and Harris became the Democratic nominee.

Trump’s advantage on “mental sharpness” has disappeared. Currently, 61% of voters say the phrase “mentally sharp” describes Harris very or fairly well, compared with 52% who describe Trump this way. Two months ago , more than twice as many voters viewed Trump as mentally sharp (58%) than said that about Biden (24%). ( Read more about perceptions of the candidates in Chapter 3. )

Democratic satisfaction with the candidates has increased. The share of Harris supporters who are very or fairly satisfied with the presidential candidates is nearly triple the share of Biden supporters who were satisfied in July (52% now vs. 18% then). As a result, Harris backers now are more likely than Trump backers to say they are satisfied with the candidates, a clear reversal from just two months ago. ( Read more about voter engagement and views of the candidates in Chapter 5. )

The state of the race. The overall patterns of support for each candidate have changed little since last month . For instance, Trump holds a lead among White voters (56% to 42%), while Harris maintains large advantages with Black voters (84% to 13%) and Asian voters (61% to 37%). Latino voters, whose support was evenly divided between Biden and Trump in July, now favor Harris, 57% to 39%. (Read more voter preferences in Chapter 1 and explore demographic breaks on voter preferences in the detailed tables. )

Americans’ views of the economy continue to be largely negative. Americans’ views of the national economy are about as negative today as they were at the start of this year. Only 25% rate national economic conditions excellent or good. Prices for food and consumer goods continue to be a major concern for most Americans, and increasing shares express concerns about housing costs and jobs. ( Read more about economic attitudes in Chapter 7. )

In a historic election, how voters view the impact of candidates’ races and ethnicities, genders and ages

If she wins in November, Harris will make history by becoming the first woman president. She would also be the first Asian American and first Black woman president. If Trump wins, he will become the oldest person to take office, at 78. ( Read more about voters’ views of the candidates’ demographic characteristics in Chapter 4. )

Voters overall have mixed views of the impact of Harris’ gender and race and ethnicity on her candidacy. More say the fact that Harris is a woman and that she is Black and Asian will help her than hurt her with voters this fall. Somewhat more voters see Harris’ gender as a potential negative (30%) than see her race and ethnicity this way (19%).

Harris supporters are far more likely than Trump supporters to say the vice president’s gender and race will be a liability. More than twice as many Harris supporters (42%) as Trump supporters (16%) say the fact that Harris is a woman will hurt her with voters. Fewer Harris supporters think her race and ethnicity will be a hindrance (31%), but just 8% of Trump supporters say the same.

Nearly half of voters say Trump’s age will hurt his candidacy. Far more voters say Trump’s age will hurt him (49%) than help him (3%) in the election; the remainder say it will not make much difference. The reverse is true for how voters see the effect of Harris’ age: 46% say the fact that she is 59 will help her with voters, while just 3% say it will hurt her.

Harris, Trump supporters weigh in: What actions are acceptable for a president?

Looking ahead, Harris and Trump supporters have very different ideas about the kinds of presidential actions that would be acceptable if their preferred candidate takes office ( read more about these views in Chapter 6 ):

Investigating political opponents

More than half of Trump supporters (54%) say it would definitely or probably be acceptable for Trump to order federal law enforcement officials to investigate Democratic opponents. Half as many Harris supporters (27%) say it would be acceptable for Harris to order investigations into GOP opponents.

Pardoning family, friends and supporters; firing disloyal federal workers

Trump supporters also are far more likely than Harris supporters to say it would be acceptable for their candidate to pardon friends, family or political supporters who have been convicted of crimes and to fire federal workers at any level who are not personally loyal to them.

Executive orders

Majorities of both Trump supporters (58%) and Harris supporters (55%) say it would be acceptable for their candidate, if they win, to use executive orders to make policies when they can’t get their priorities through Congress.

Trump is widely viewed as too personally critical of Harris. About two-thirds of voters (66%) say Trump has been too personally critical of Harris. By comparison, fewer (45%) say Harris has been too personally critical of Trump. About four-in-ten Trump supporters (41%) say Trump has been too critical of his opponent, compared with just 12% of Harris supporters who say the same of Harris.

Most say it’s not yet clear who will win. Only 20% of voters say it is already clear which candidate will win the election, while 80% say it is not yet clear. Voters who say it is clear who will win overwhelmingly say their preferred candidate will prevail. When those who say it is not yet clear are asked for their “best guess,” they also opt for their candidate.

Trump’s role in the 2020 election remains divisive. More than four-in-ten voters (46%) say Trump broke the law in an effort to change the outcome of the 2020 election, while another 14% say he did something wrong but did not break the law. Another 27% say Trump did nothing wrong. These views are largely unchanged since April . While Harris supporters overwhelmingly say Trump broke the law (88% say this), Trump backers are divided: 54% say he did nothing wrong while 27% say either he did something wrong or broke the law. Trump supporters (18%) are more likely than Harris supporters (7%) to say they are not sure.

Voters also divided on Trump’s New York fraud case. The survey was completed before a New York judge delayed sentencing in the criminal case against Trump in which he was found guilty of falsifying business records and other charges related to “hush money” payments to Stormy Daniels. Among all voters, 39% say Trump should serve time in jail, while 45% say he should not. About seven-in-ten Harris supporters (72%) think Trump should have to serve jail time, while an even larger share of Trump supporters (81%) say he should not.

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Introducing the 2024 Cook Political Report Demographic Swingometer

Back by popular demand, The Cook Political Report with Amy Walter is pleased to introduce our 2024 Demographic Swingometer — an interactive tool that allows anyone to simulate how fluctuations in turnout and partisan support among unique components of the electorate could alter this year’s outcome in the Electoral College.

Ever wondered what the 2024 election map would look like if:

• Kamala Harris improves upon Democrats’ 2020 performance with seniors?
• Donald Trump makes inroads with Black and Hispanic voters?
• College-educated white voters make up a larger share of the electorate than in 2020?
• Trump performs better among non-college white voters than polls currently indicate?

Our interactive starts with the results of the 2020 election and allows you to choose your own adventure, estimating how shifts in voting patterns would impact all 50 states plus Washington, D.C. (Democrats’ starting point is 303 Electoral votes rather than the 306 Joe Biden and Kamala Harris carried four years ago, owing to reapportionment).

For example, what if turnout among 18-29-year-old voters drops from 50% to 42% but every other group remains steady? Trump would flip Arizona. What if Harris improves from 54% to 56% of college-educated white voters? She would flip North Carolina.

As in 2020, users can choose to break down the electorate by either five race/education categories (white college graduates, white non-college graduates, Black voters, Hispanic voters and Asian/other voters) or four age categories (18-29, 30-44, 45-64 and 65+). Although these broad categories are imperfect and there are infinite ways to slice and dice the electorate, distinct changes in turnout and voting patterns within these groups explained Trump’s upset win in 2016 and the Biden/Harris defeat of Trump in 2020.

To arrive at baseline estimates of 2020 support and turnout levels for each featured demographic, we blended data compiled by Catalist — a Democratic data vendor widely respected for its number-crunching by strategists in both parties — with Census data on the citizen voting-age population and state and county-level results compiled from official sources. To bring the interactive to life, The Cook Political Report once again teamed up with data visualization prodigy Sophie Andrews and the web development team at Vardot. 

This year’s edition of the interactive features two exciting new features:

• Adjust third-party vote share: moving beyond simply the major-party vote, we’ve introduced a three-way slider that allows users to adjust each demographic’s breakdown between Democrats, Republicans and independent/third party candidates. (We began designing this innovation when Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was still in the race and taking a sizable share of the vote; now, of course, the third-party vote share is likely to be much closer in line with the 2020 “preset” values).  
• Isolate key swing states: Our national Swingometer allows users to simulate proportional swings among demographic groups in all 50 states and Washington, D.C. (plus district-level Electoral College votes in Maine and Nebraska). But swings from year to year are never perfectly uniform. For example, between 2016 and 2020, Trump made much greater strides with Hispanic voters in Texas and Florida than in Arizona, where the Hispanic electorate is more urban and less culturally conservative.  So this year, the interactive gives users the ability to isolate seven key battleground states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. By adjusting the party preference and turnout sliders within each state, users can not only simulate the statewide result but the result/margin in each county as well. For example, a two-point increase in Trump’s support among non-college whites would flip bellwether Sauk County, Wisconsin — and the entire state — to Trump.  

View the 2024 Demographic Swingometer

View four scenarios created by David Wasserman

The CPR Demographic Swingometer was designed as an interactive election outcome modeling tool for website users and third parties and do not represent the analysis or projections of The Cook Political Report. Users may share their election projections by using this tool and agree that they are solely responsible for their use in accordance with the terms & conditions of this website.

More from the Cook Political Report

Four November Scenarios, Mapped Out with the 2024 Cook Political Report Demographic Swingometer

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