The Perception and Degree of Adoption by Urbanites towards Urban Farming

Abstract

Malaysia is not shielded from the issues of food insecurity. Despite economic progression over the past few years, food insecurity is continuing to affect several vulnerable groups (Orang Asli, elderly, students, B40). It is a growing concern that should not be taken lightly, especially with the recent rise in food prices coupled with low income among vulnerable groups and the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. As cities develop and expand, they stretch out and occupy former farmlands forcing farms to stop operating or move further off from the city centre. New trends like urban farming are slowly emerging, which have the potential to be a solution to the developing crises of food insecurity. This research aims to determine how relevant each of the factors, ‘confidence’ (CF), ‘societal’ (SC), ‘pleasantness’ (PL), and ‘naturalness’ (NT), are towards adopting (AD) the idea of urban farming and, if relevant, among which has the most positive impact. A mixed-method approach was used to obtain quantitative and qualitative data. One hundred and thirty-three responses were recorded and used (a significant sample size according to the G-power software). The validity and reliability of the data were also tested to affirm their quality and relevance according to the factors. The main findings revealed that ‘pleasantness’ and ‘confidence’ were strong factors for adopting urban farming, in line with Cohen’s R Square of more than 32%, which signifies a high impact toward influencing adoption. In addition, qualitative analysis shows that while positive outcomes complemented the quantitative study, practical constraints were highlighted. These constraints were space, time, supply chain, resources, tools, community and government support. Hence, this study provides two significant contributions to regulators and policymakers on urban farming (further explained in the discussions section).

Assessment of the Status of Rooftop Garden, Its Diversity, and Determinants of Urban Green Roofs in Nepal

“…highly significant at less than 1% LOS suggests that at least one or at the most all the explanatory variables have significant effect on adoption of RTG. R 2 value greater than 32 represents high impact on dependent variables [ 37 ]; i.e., all the used explanatory variables have impact on adoption of rooftop garden.…”

Global Landscape of Urban Agriculture and Covid-19 Research: A Bibliometric Analysis

“…Ghezeljeh et al (2022) discussed the policy on food security and urban agriculture in Canada, the barriers, and the effective strategies and planning for improving urban agriculture. In addition, the studies in this group focused on the factors involved in adopting the concept of urban farming and the barriers to its practice (Ivascu et al, 2021) or the perceived value and problems of practising urban agriculture (Sylvester et al, 2022). This information is crucial for policymakers to understand how to promote suitable policies that support urban agriculture.…”

Consumer Perception and Acceptance Across Different Scales of Vertical Farming in Klang Valley

“…The aspect of urban farming emerged with the transformation of human and health requirements (Muhammad et al, 2020). The population of the globe has rapidly expanded over the course of the last century, reaching over 7.7 billion individuals in 2019, with projections indicating that this number will reach 9.7 billion by the year 2050 (Ivascu et al, 2021). Urban agriculture is a type of agriculture resource used to cultivate food and other crops in urban areas.…”

“…The number of urban farming sites in Malaysia increased significantly in the years after the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic in 2020, reaching 17,320 places as opposed to just 735 locations in 2019 (Murdad et al, 2022). Start-ups such as CityFarm Malaysia, Plant Cartridge, UrbanFarmTech, Urban Hijau, and Sunway XFarms are also pioneering the initiative on a commercial scale and earning recognition (Ivascu et al, 2021).…”

“…Urban farming is to be considered a cohesive method that not only does it provide healthy and nutritious food crops, but also provides the opportunity to increase economic development, environmental sustainability, and social integration (Muhammad et al, 2020). Klang Valley is one of Malaysia's significant urban clusters, where the region encompasses Kuala Lumpur's capital city as well as its surrounding cities and urban areas in the state of Selangor (Ivascu et al, 2021). In Klang Valley, 16 urban farming community organisations have been founded that comprise a leader and residential members who worked together to mobilise the urban agricultural programmes where relevant authorities, such as the Dewan Bandaraya Kuala Lumpur (DBKL), Putrajaya Corporation (an agency under the Ministry of Federal Territories), and the Malaysian Department of Agriculture (DOA), oversee monitoring the success of these urban agricultural communities (Muhammad et al, 2020).…”