Plants Power the World-Combating Climate Change with Urban Gardening

Hi everyone,

This summer has been crazy (as life is usually) so finding time to stop and write has been difficult. Besides working a full time job, I'm also taking English 101 online this summer, trying to get my Etsy started up, and working on completing my summer bucket list. One of my friends is out staying with my family and I this summer, so we made a bucket list together and try to do things on our mutual days off. Some of the things we've done so far have been: camping in the Badlands, hiking the Crazy Horse Volksmarch, going to the drive-in movie, seeing the petroglyphs, hiking Harney Peak, and more.

I've been so wrapped up in experiencing everything that I often forget to document it, or post about it, which is one of the reasons why I haven't posted anything in this blog for a while.

Hopefully before the summer is over I can sit down and write a more detailed article about all of the adventures of the summer.

For now, I thought I would post the latest essay I wrote for my English class. While it is a research paper, I think the topic is really important and aligns with a lot of the themes of this blog. While maybe a bit longer and more academic than some of my other articles, I hope you at least learn something new, and maybe are encouraged to start gardening if you haven't already begun so.

Plants Power the World: How Gardening Combats Climate Change

A single plant has the power to change carbon dioxide, water, and sunlight into energy and oxygen. Photosynthesis is the amazing chemical process that allows plants to grow and support other life; without plants the world would be a very different place. For humans, plants are a source of nutrition, beauty, and survival. However, as industrialization grows and deforestation increases, entire communities are being destroyed. This loss of life is hurting not only local ecosystems, but also the globe. In correlation with this travesty, other adverse effects, such as climate change, are getting worse. Several movements have been proposed to help combat climate change, most fall upon deaf ears. Many people consider climate change a distant, yet powerful disaster, that they cannot do anything to change. This ideology is false, for climate change is affecting everyone, and people can do something about it. A simple, yet effective plan that anyone can take part of is gardening. Planting more trees rather than tearing them down has many positive effects. In human-dense areas such as cities where pollution is high, gardening becomes even more important. Urban gardening is a great method for combating climate change with multiple benefits such as increased air quality, higher food production, and improved human health.

Gardening in any form can help combat climate change. From planting a small herb garden in a windowsill or an arbor in the backyard, anything helps. Gardening is not only beneficial for the environment, but has been shown to increase human health as well. A person’s physical health is improved by gardening in several ways. First, gardening gets people outside, moving, and doing manual labor. Exercise can appear in many forms, and getting down and dirty pulling up weeds can certainly get someone’s heart rate up. Secondly, studies have shown that healthy eating is more likely to occur when fresh produce is easily accessible. A study by John Taylor and Sarah Lovell exploring home food gardens notes that home-grown produce is especially important for low-income families with limited food access who often cannot pay for the more expensive fresh fruit and vegetables (Taylor and Lovell 288). It is a lot easier to buy a five-dollar meal at McDonalds than a five-dollar head of cauliflower at the grocery store. Nutrition is as equally, or more important to health as exercise is, so it is vital to fuel the body with good nutrients.

When people make healthier choices for their bodies, they often start making better decisions to help their mental health. Humans are by nature social creatures, and gardening is an activity that builds community. This is especially true for people who participate in community gardens or farmer’s markets. Community gardens can help people connect with their neighbors, leading to conversation and the sharing of ideas and beliefs. Hearther Okvat and Alex Zautra have studied how gardening and other relaxing forms of getting into nature, such as walking, have been shown to improve mental health (Okvat and Zautra 375). Going out into nature decreases stress, which is hard to do in cities, thus making gardens all the more valuable. Even little pockets of green spaces and areas of quiet are able to lower stress levels.

Besides aiding in mental and physical health, gardening can be financially beneficial. For some individuals gardening can help increase income or lower spending costs. Homegrown produce can supplement food that would otherwise have to be bought from the grocery store. Taylor and Lovell explain that gardening allows for the growth, sharing, and selling of food, which can enhance food security in the entire community (Taylor and Lovell 288). If the gardens are large enough to supply larger harvests, the owners can sell the extra produce to make a profit.

For businesses, especially restaurants, gardening can be a sustainable way to help the environment. Using nearby gardens, whether in the building, on the walls, or a community plot, restaurants can use some of the produce they’ve grown in their food. This system of going literally from the farm (or garden) to the table would make for a unique dining experience, which could attract more customers. Restaurants and other companies could try sourcing some of their food from community members or farms, which both helps the financial ecosystem and the environment.

While many people can take up gardening as a hobby, others dedicate their lives to gardening or farming. For full time members of the agriculture field, the business can be very stressful as their livelihood depends on the success of their crops. Supporting local farms is extremely important, for as Deepak Ghimire and Dinesh Panday note, the majority of poor, rural farmers rely on their crops to survive (Ghimire and Panday 271). This dependency on nature becomes more worrisome as climate change continues to alter the environment. Farmers are greatly impacted by climate change, especially due to extreme weather discrepancies that affect crops and their livelihoods (Ghimire and Panday 272). Heat waves can kill crops, droughts, hurricanes and other storms, and long wet seasons can hurt planting times or drown seedlings. With more temperature variation, planting and harvesting seasons may shift dangerously to later times in the year, which can hurt the farmer’s income when they try to sell their crops. Buying local helps farmers with their income. Also, eating local reduces carbon emissions as less fuel is needed because the produce has less distance to travel.

Fuel usage is a major component to climate change. There is more demand for fuel and other non-renewable recourses in cities due to a much higher population density. The amount of cars and other transportation devices are huge producers of waste. Another way city dwellers can help offset their carbon footprint is by walking or taking public transportation. Heather Okvart and Alex Zautra state that “a defining characteristic of today’s cities is demand for energy, with most urban activities [are] dependent on…as a result, urban lifestyles are linked to the global climate change crisis” (Okvat and Zautra 375). Therefore, it is extremely important to combat this crisis with activities many civilians can partake in. Gardening is one such activity, and planting a few herbs does not need a lot of effort or space to get started.

Urban gardening can effectively utilize already available spaces in cities. If public gardens spaces do not already exist, vacant lots can be converted into garden plots. Cities that have started utilizing empty land have shown positive results, as Nicholas Zingale observed in Cleveland as the city started integrating urban gardening to allocate around 20,000 vacant lots for “land reclamation projects” (Zingale 93). An amazing effort, the sustainable movement faced several challenges, mainly trying to convince board members that the change was necessary and showing them that the people actually wanted the project to take effect (97). Most people are happy to have little squares of nature scattered throughout cities, breaking up harsh lines and the grey tones of buildings. Conserving or building green spaces rather than creating more structures is better for the environment, cheaper, and often easier to do. Green spaces do not have to be the classical city park or garden in someone’s yard, they can be imaginative and unconventional.

Urban gardens are versatile and can be found anywhere. Traditional lot and community gardens can use up empty space, replacing beat up buildings or abandoned structures. Sidewalk gardens have been implemented in some cities, where edible fruits and vegetables are planted instead of the normal bright flowers. An article by BBC News covers the story of how one town in England has turned Lancashire park to a huge community garden that local volunteers tend (“Rossendale’s Incredible Edible” 1). The network of gardeners works together to care for the garden, and visitors can lend a hand as well. The garden is modeled after the original edible garden launched in Todmorden as part of a healthy eating project, visitors walking by the garden are encouraged to stop and snack on fresh veg or fruit and maybe help with pulling weeds as they pass by (“Rossendale’s Incredible Edible” 1). The system encourages people to engage in a city-wide movement of caring for the plants, and each other, in a space already set aside for greenery. In areas with less space available, wall gardens and window gardens are easy vertical forms of gardening. These types of gardens would work really well for business and restaurants that need more table space but still want to participate in the gardening movement. Rooftop gardens are great for larger buildings with flat tops. They can work as community or business gardens, and can be watered naturally by the rain.

An issue with farming is that many plants need a lot of water to thrive. When in areas of drought or lower moisture, this can lead to a lot of extra water usage. While gardening has many benefits, John Taylor and Sarah Lovell realize “community gardens…provide ecosystem services [but] at the same time, community gardens may have negative ecological effects or create ecosystem disservices” (Taylor and Lovell 291). Gardens and farms use a huge amount water and can also deplete soil nutrients, but with proper care these effects can be minimized. For example, water needed for gardening can be obtained using rainwater, or people can grow plants that need less water.

As for nutrient loss, rotation of plant species can help offset nutrient depletion. Certain plants like clover and peas bring nutrients back into the soil, so proper rotation of these plants in between other crops can help keep the soil healthy. Plants produce nutrients that humans need, besides releasing oxygen and using carbon dioxide. In their study, Okvat and Zautra estimate in the United States around 10,000 community gardens “have sequestered 190,000 tons of carbon [in ten years] offsetting about one year’s worth of carbon emissions for 30,400 Americans” (Okvat and Zautra 380). This is huge, as carbon emissions are directly linked to climate change. The field of agriculture supplies about 13.5 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, mostly between methane release and fertilizer use (Ghimire and Panday 271). While some of this is agriculture related, a lot is probably linked to ranching and the dairy industry, as cows are huge producers of methane. Nevertheless, agriculture is an important field that supports the world’s population. Without agriculture, the human population would not be able to exist as it does today, for so much food is required to support the massive amount of people living on the planet. Thus, it is important to support those involved in agriculture and help farms, large and small, take action to tackle climate change.

While many solutions to climate change exist, urban gardening is an easily accessible method that most people are able to participate in. It is a versatile, wide-ranging activity with many levels of experience and opportunities available. Gardening can be a fun pastime, a way to build community, and an opportunity to get out into nature and destress. It is an activity that benefits the environment and humans directly and indirectly. Urban gardening should be encouraged, or mandatory, in cities to help decrease carbon emissions and combat climate change. Vacant areas in cities can be set aside for community gardens instead of creating more structures and using more materials. Apartments can offer rooftop gardens for residents, which could attract more people to the building as well. Restaurants could have wall gardens suppling produce or window boxes with fresh herbs. Anyone can, of course, have their own mini garden in pots around their house or partake in a local community garden. Whether in the backyard or indoors, gardens can be anywhere and everywhere. To help combat climate change, everyone can dig deep, get down and dirty, and help save the planet.

Works Cited

Ghimire, Deepak, and Dinesh Panday. "Interconnection of Climate Change, Agriculture and Climate Justice: Complexities for Feeding the World Under Changing Climate." Development, vol. 59, no. 3-4, 2016, pp. 270-273. ProQuest, https://search-proquestcom.ezproxy.usd.edu/docview/1943624737?accountid=14750,doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.usd.edu/10.1057/s41301-017-0118-5.

Okvat, Heather A., and Alex J. Zautra. "Community Gardening: A Parsimonious Path to Individual, Community, and Environmental Resilience." American Journal of Community Psychology, vol. 47, no. 3-4, 2011, pp. 374-87. ProQuest, https://search-proquest

com.ezproxy.usd.edu/docview/855909437?accountid=14750, doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.usd.edu/10.1007/s10464-010-9404-z.

“Rossendale’s Incredible Edible community garden launched”. BBC News, 25

July 2011, https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-14251564

Taylor, John R., and Sarah T. Lovell. "Urban Home Food Gardens in the Global North: Research Traditions and Future Directions." Agriculture and Human Values, vol. 31, no. 2, 2014, pp. 285-305. ProQuest, https://search-proquest-com.ezproxy.usd.edu/docview/1508630333?accountid=14750, doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.usd.edu/10.1007/s10460-013-9475-1.

Zingale, Nicholas C., and Deborah Riemann. "Coping with Shrinkage in Germany and the United States: A Cross-Cultural Comparative Approach Toward Sustainable Cities." Urban Design International, vol. 18, no. 1, 2013, pp. 90-98. ProQuest, https://search-proquest

com.ezproxy.usd.edu/docview/1272011284?accountid=14750,

doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.usd.edu/10.1057/udi.2012.30.