1. Perception of non-gardeners on food in CG
• 74% showed interest in purchasing produce from CG
• 71% perceived difference between buying produce from CG and commercial sources
• 41% expressed disinterest in CG produce while 30% prefers harvest from CG
• 69% indicated disinterest in involving in CG, or contributing to it in any sense
Possible explanation
• Lack of assurance in consuming food from CG due to absence of proper licensing and regulations
• New concept as food usually purchased from mainstream commercial sources
• Gardens perceived as exclusive (reasons e.g. fences, involvement of grassroots)
• Lack of willingness of to participate in CG
Possible future direction
• People are shifting towards urban agriculture, more aware of greening and food security issues
• Need to understand the science underlying gardening practices for troubleshooting
• Involvement of government agencies to facilitate regulation of CG practices
• Regular soil tests to ensure safety of produce for consumption
Results
Eleven general practices summarised in %
Most commonly grown plants
In SG: Pandan, Ladyfingers, Banana, Sweet potato, Papaya
Reasons: Easy, good harvest, grows well in tropics
In SE: Tomatoes, Cabbage, Onions, Potatoes
Reasons: Commonly consumed food, can keep through winter
Differences in gardeners’ profiles?
Gardeners’ age
• Gardening commonly perceived as activity for elderly in SG
• Young people generally engaged in career building
• Gardening as a way of life that young and old do in SE
• SE gardeners generally younger
Gardeners with education background
• Lack of higher education in horticulture discipline in SG
• Free higher education, also agricultural universities in SE
• Educated could translate to efficiency in finding solutions
• More IT-savvy to connect with the gardening network
Differences in their garden profiles?
Membership fee
• Membership imposed usually for individual allotment in SG
• As little as S$2 per month in SG
• As little as S$5 per month in SE
• Membership fee could encourage more ownership & responsibility
Fences
• Fences as preventive measures of possible damage in SG
• But may appear exclusive
• SE faced the same challenges of theft and damage in the past
• Community learnt to respect the garden
Sale
• May sell produce if surplus in SG
• But barely enough for the volunteers most of the time
• Concept of Community Supported Agriculture is growing in SE
Differences in their motivations?
Singapore — Production , Education
• Budding concern on urban agriculture
• Children lack opportunity elsewhere to see how food grow
Sweden — Production , Social , Environmental
• Swedes’ love for organic food consumption
• Possible drive to use CG for quality food production
• Lack of opportunities for interactions by reserved Swedes
• CG provides common space for bonding
Differences in the 11 practices?
Chemical free principle
• Some wish to do but hard to enforce in SG
• Sale and use of chemical pesticide strictly regulated by
Swedish Chemicals Agency
• Consciousness about consuming “organic” amongst Swedes
Green manure
• Common knowledge of green manure species in SE
• Nettles, comfrey also used as homemade fetilisers
Crop rotation
• Relatively less crop rotation in SG
• Herbs and fruit trees grown and harvested on the same spot
• Garden plants changes with season in SE
• Also listed as one of the regulation to sell organically labelled
produce
Difference between SG & SE?
• Overlap of horticultural practices in SE and SG
• Practices are generally similar despite climatic differences
Community Gardens in Singapore and Sweden
Lim Mioa Shan
Supervisor:Assoc. Prof. HughTan Tiang Wah
Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Science, National University of Singapore
Background
• Community garden (CG) = Piece of land gardened collectively by people
• Benefits, e.g: access to fresh food, social bonding, community building, health benefits, environmental sustainability
Knowledge gaps?
• Primarily known in sociological aspects but scarcely for their horticultural practices (Guitart et al., 2012)
• Literature is geographically limited, mainly in the U.S. (Guitart et al., 2012).
Scope of this study
• Singapore (SG) and Sweden (SE) are extreme ends of spectrum of CG internationally
• SE started in 1895, SG in 2005
• Exploratory study with focus on horticultural practices
Both Singapore and Sweden
• What are the profiles of the community gardeners and their gardens?
• What kind of gardening practices do people engage in?
• How do gardening practices differ between SG & SE?
• What do community gardeners usually grow?
Possible future outlook of Singapore community gardens
• CG as supplementary food source for SG?
Questionnaire
• Survey design to cover horticultural
practices comprehensively
• Together with profile and motivations
• Face to face interview in SG
• Online interview in SE
• Snow-ball sampling method
• Total of 36 CG in SG + 13 CG in SE
Data
• Non-metric Multidimensional Scaling to
visualise SG and SE results in a
multidimensional space
Non-gardeners’ survey in SG
• Views on their nearby CG on food
• Total of 337 respondents
Materials & Methods
• Gardeners’ profiles in SG & SE similar except SE gardener usually well-educated
• Garden profiles in SG & SE similar except more fenced CG in SG
• Production being the most common motivation in both SG and SE
• Gardening practices in SE & SG generally similar and applicable despite climatic differences
• Challenges faced in SG CG are normal, like what Sweden CG had faced in the past century
• More young people to be involved to help CG move to a more innovative and sustainable way
• CG could do better being welcoming and inclusive of the community.
Conclusions
Assoc. Prof. Hugh Tan, for his supervision and inputs. Triyanto Suriadi, horticulturist in CUGE for survey design inputs.
National Parks Board Community In Bloom Ambassadors and Community Gardeners who participated in my study.
Swedish municipality officer Sten Göransson and a community gardener Emil Hillve for initial contacts and understanding
of Sweden’s situation. Research students from the boTANy lab for their feedback during the course of the thesis.
Acknowledgements
Guitart, D., Pickering, C. & Byrne, J. (2012). Past results and future directions in urban community gardens research.
Urban Forestry & Urban Greening, 11: 364‒373.
References
Survey Questions Information Obtained
a-i Basic profile of garden and its gardeners
1.1, 1.7-1.10 Motivation in community gardening
1.2-1.6 Plant diversity* and reasons for plant choice
2.1-2.8, 4.5, 4.6 Soil improvement methods and use of fertilisers
3.1-3.8, 4.8, 4.9 Pest and disease management
4.1-4.4 Utilisation of water
4.7-4.15 Minimising garden waste and composting
5.1-5.5, 5.9-5.19 Other horticultural practices and maintenance
5.6-5.8, Sources of gardening materials, plants and seeds
5.20 Challenges in gardening
5.21-5.23 Source of knowledge in gardening
6.1-6.6 Seasonal practices
7.1-7.4 Distribution of produce and local food production
8.1-8.4 Community support, funding and volunteer management
Singapore Sweden
Introduction
Aims
-1.5 -1.0 -0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0
-1.0-0.50.00.51.0
NMDS1
NMDS2
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23 24
25
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4445
46
47
48
49
Tested Chemfree
Compost
Household
Mulching
DIYpesticide
Companion
Naturalw ater
Greenmanure
Saveseed
CroprotateSE
SG
Results & Discussion (SG)
Discussion
Motivation SG(%) SE(%)
Social 58 85
Environmental 50 85
Educational 61 77
Leisure 50 38
Production 86 100
Profile of gardeners SG(%) SE(%)
Min. age (average) 34 29
Max. age (average) 66 57
No. of active gardeners 2 – 31 2 – 15
% CG with one gardener with
tertiary education
50 % 100 %
Profile of garden SG SE
Size (m2) 20 – 8000 50 – 10000
Membership fee required 11 62
Fenced gardens 44 08
Shared plots (not allotment) 92 92
CG within:
• Residential Area 67 69
• School 11 15
• Organisation 17 8
• Public spaces 11 15
Sale of garden produce 25 46