I would be looking at availability, quantity, and quality of the land to be allocated. Climate zone of the urban environment. Projected effects of climate change and urban growth on the target environment. Suitability of the land allocated for the grain crop to be grown vs it's suitability for another crop (interesting - and problematic - constraint - never heard of community gardens or household gardens that were crop constrained - grain isn't usually productively farmed in small spaces) Nature of the standard diet for that community. Nature of an optimum diet. Objectives of the governing municipality - sustenance or improved health for instance. Availability and quality of water, sunlight, etc. in the urban gardening environment. Other environmental hazards/risks to the success of the urban garden environment - environmental pollutants for instance. Density of the urban as built environment.

I would like to assume that the grain crops are major staples of the community. If this is so then i would consider the following:

1. Harvets per acre and convert to harvest per land no matter the size

2. Value of the harvest in cash

3.What % of the harvest is consumed by the farmers household?

4.What % of the harvest is sold?

5.How are the harvest sold; direct to customers or through middle men?

6.Impact of the farming activities on the community in terms of access to fresh produce and cost of the produce compared to the past?

7.Impact on the local economy in form of employment generation, improved income and livelihood etc

8.Sustainability?

-The types of crops and quantities realized for the survey reference period of time... with this you could be able to convert quantities harvested to kilo-calories. With this too, you could eventually compute proportion of calories that came from urban agriculture.

-Urban agriculture could also include the rearing of small livestock (poultry, etc) by households to supplement their diets, i.e. type of livestock and quantity of livestock products realized within the survey reference period...

-any labor engagement that brings income into the households as a result of providing services to urban agricultural activities...

I would look at income levels of the urban farmers, the household structure (men, women, children, elderly), educational level of key people in the household, government policy (or lack of it -urban agriculture may be present even when authorities do not allocate land for it), seasonality of the urban centre in question, purpose of the agricultural activity (is it for home consumption or for sale on the market?).

Do you also want to challenge your assumptions? Why not embark on an observation study and then identify various factors at play in the field?

Hi

Good list from John Strohl. Would need to know more about your context and background for your question. If it is South Africa, for example, I would recommend reading other work on this for what they have found, focusing on the urban household food security. There is a considerable international literature, but you may want to try:

Thornton A.C., 2009, Pastures of plenty?: Land rights and community-based agriculture in Peddie, a former homeland town in South Africa, Applied Geography, 29(1), 12-20. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.apgeog.2008.06.001

Thornton, A.C., 2008, Beyond the metropolis: Small town case studies of urban and peri-urban agriculture in South Africa, Urban Forum, Vol. 19(3), 243-262.

Thornton, A.C. & Nel, E., 2007, The significance of urban and peri-urban agriculture in Peddie, in the Eastern Cape Province, South Africa, Africanus: Journal of Development Studies, 37(1), 13-20. ISSN: 97703046150-2.

Good luck.

I think thay you must to use variables as consumption production, available production, qualitity food, prices, with it is important thay define the teorical model based on macro and micro economic related to food security and productivity.

The urban agriculture seeks to increase food and nutrition security for the populations

vulnerable urban and peri-urban food producing the consumption in confined spaces.

Urban agriculture benefits people more vulnerable conditions permanent or temporary: it generates additional income, enriches the family diet, promotes efficient technologies and using sustainable natural resources and inputs, respects the environment, knowledge and local traditions and promotes gender equality.

In this process it is important to consider the contributions that makes urban farming family nutrition, by quantifying the production and consumption of vegetables suitable for this purpose. There's also keep in mind what the producciñon for their surplus consumption and can supply other sectors of the population. Similarly, food proucir own means significant savings for families. Also, I must add that urban agriculture is mobilizing local resources to stimulate the development of other related micro-enterprises such as those devoted to the production of fertilizers biological products processing, packaging and marketing of the products, the production of fertilizers and compost, the manufacture of tools and what it means for local businesses that genuine resources families have to spend on food and other necessities.

On the other hand, urban agriculture can function as an important strategy for poverty reduction and social inclusion. Numerous experiences developed by municipalities and NGOs which have involved various sectors of society, usually excluded from the formal system of work: women, elderly, disabled, orphans, new urban migrants, unemployed UA production projects which has enabled reintegration into society of these sectors, improving their self-esteem to be content and have half decent living. The project participants may feel enriched by the opportunity to work on building their community, working together while producing their food and other products for consumption and sale.

Urban agriculture is part of the urban ecological system and may come to play an important role in the management of the urban environment.

First of all, you have to define what are you going to understand for household food security, because it has relationship with food availability and access. In addition, the type of research question you want to answer, for example: Can urban agriculture is enough to produce food for household consumption?. Besides, what you want to probe, i mean what are your hypothesis. Then, I would say that some variables you might consider are: Main crops cultivated and animals raised, food production (yield), type of food (poultry, vegetables, fruits, etc) per square meters and season or year, percentage of food for household consumption, to give away and for selling; nutrition status of the family with urban and non-urban food production, food selfsufficiency, etc.

Analysis the consumption of food crops through the type of diet consumed at the household level

I believe that food security of urban households should be assessed through the same dimensions normally used for any household. Generally speaking these are referred to as 'availability', 'access' and 'utilisation' (for a definition see for instance http://www.fao.org/docrep/013/al936e/al936e00.pdf). Since the first dimension, availability, refers to the capacity of the (urban) household to generate agricultural production, the specific contribution of urban agriculture would be evaluated in the first place in terms of the share of production generated from land cultivated (whatever the title deed or usage agreements) inside the urban perimeter (however this is defined). This would typically include crop production (homestead gardens or other plots) but also livestock production if animals are raised in the same perimeter. In principle also aquaculture would be included if applicable. Cultivation or other agricultural activities carried out by an urban households outside the urban perimeter are therefore excluded. Therefore area cultivated and yields by crop, number of animals per type, etc. would be the variables to be considered in this respect. Indirectly, the availability dimension would also affect the access dimension. In the sense that crops or livestock and livestock products, etc. exceeding the consumption of the household would be, at least in principle, marketable. In this case a household food balance should be calculated and the production exceeding self-consumption, valued at market prices. This in turn, after deduction of paid inputs required for the production, would contribute to the 'access' dimension of the household. In this case variables to be considered include the marketed share of production, prevailing market prices, costs of agricultural production (items times unit prices). The third dimension of utilisation, descends from the type of production obtained and other factors which are not related to the urban origin of the production.

Some would also consider activities which are indirectly related to farming as part of agriculture. In am referring to on-farm food processing, for instance.

I am acording with you, but it is important considers the urban conditions where the agricultural system have other or complementary activities from the terciary sector.

Income level of urban household, per capita consumption of food in calories, crop yield per unit of area like acre or hectares, sustainability of crop in micro-climatic condition and marketing system are some of the variable for assessing of urban agriculture to urban household food security.

Well it depends of the teorical model, I suggest you use DEA approach, which consider inputs and output from any agricultural system.

Thank you Kenneth, The study is to be carried out in Zimbabwe (Gweru urban) where urban households grow crops on small pieces of land that are allocated to them temporarily by the urban council. In Zimbabwe most land in urban areas is owned by the urban council for future develoments. So before the areas are developed for housing there are huge pieces of land that are lying idle at the present moment and the urban councils allow urban households to use those pieces for agricultural purposes. The council allows this because it helps urban households as well as the council as the small scale farmers clears the small pieces of land and prevents thick bushes from forming as these would definately harbour criminals. Villagers grow a variety of crops that include grain crops, vegetables and other horticultural crops. Community gardens have also been established.My aim is to investigate on the contribution of these type of farming to household food security. Thank you all for suggesting some of the variables that i can consider, if there are any studies where those variables were used, i would appreciate if you link me to some of the studies

When describing food security issues, consider the following dimensions (see for example: FAO, 2006):

1. Food availability: including availability of land, water, labour, inputs and knowledge for food production, or food provided by companies/ food aid;

2. Food access: including means of obtaining food such as producing food, purchasing capacity and access to food markets;

3. Food utilization: adequate diet, water and sanitation to reach a state of nutritional well-being, including time spent on collecting water and fuel to prepare food;

4. Food stability: stable access to adequate food for a population, household or individual and resilience to economic or climatic shocks.

Based on the specific objective of your study (in your case urban agriculture), you can operationalse these four dimensions (make them measurable qualitatively or quantitatively):

Source: FAO, 2006. Policy brief: Food Security. June 2006, Issue 2. Retrieved online from: ftp://ftp.fao.org/es/ESA/policybriefs/pb_02.pdf.

Hi Tichaona,

An important criterion to consider is if this type of agriculture is intended for market and consequent monetary income or if it is self-sustainable alimentation. Depending on which one of these two objectives is, the variables to consider would be different. Important variables in the first case would be prices of food items in the market and prices of fertilizers and other inputs; both would be in great measure determined by the balance between offer and demand. However, you mention “urban household food security”, which to me sounds like you refer mostly to the second case. If that is in fact your interest, I think the variables to consider would be the nutritional value of the intended food products and very importantly the potential to recycle. Keep in mind that in urban settings there is limited availability for disposal of waste and high sensitivity to odors caused by organic matter involved in agricultural activities (neighbors might be not so happy). This would be also an issue for the first case but here there is more chance to achieve a closed or semi closed system since there is not large amounts of products going out of the system neither large amount of inputs (like fertilizers) coming in the system. Conversely, in the second case you can try to approach the natural system by using the waste as inputs. I hope this is helpful.

Ok I suggest to check the agricultural smart from the FAO. http://www.fao.org//news/story/en/item/46865/icode/

Download Contribution of Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture to Food Security in Sub -Sahara Africa by Olufunke O. Cofie, Rene van Veenhuizen and Pay Drechsel

Variables can be in the environment, social and economic dimension. For example: % waste recycling, % of recycling organic waste, practice of soil and water conservation, amount of food produced consumed and sold, income obtained from selling over-production, amount of money saved by growing own food, daily consumption of calories and proteins, variety of food consumption, amount of fresh food consumed daily, number of individuals or family members involved in food production, among others.