Urban associative gardens in poor neighbourhoods of Seville and Paris: garden productions and access to food

Abstract

The economic crisis that hit Europe in 2008 appears to have shifted to some extent the perspective on the food function of urban gardening. During this study, we carried out semi-structured interviews with 31 gardeners from 9 urban gardens located in poor neighbourhoods in the Parisian region in France and in Seville in Spain. With the help of the gardeners, who actively participated in collecting data, we monitored their farming and food practices (places of purchase, transformation of products, etc.), for the purpose of understanding their situation in terms of access to food and the role of the garden in their food. Our results show that the gardens allow them to produce a large variety of vegetables in quantities that vary widely from one plot to another and from one gardener to another.