New Report: Public Harvest

Posted by on April 30, 2012

Summary and highlights of SPUR’s “Public Harvest” Report

Urban agriculture has captured the imagination of San Franciscans in recent years. More than 20 new urban farm and garden projects have launched since 2008, and in 2011 the city changed its zoning code to permit urban agriculture in all neighborhoods. City gardens and farms provide greenspace, recreation, education about fresh food, cost savings and ecological benefits. But the city will not fully capture these benefits unless it responds to the growing interest and energy behind the issue.

The demand for more space to grow food is strong. In most neighborhoods, residents must wait more than two years for a community garden plot. The current amount of land dedicated to urban agriculture is insufficient, funding is down from its peak 10 years ago and support from city agencies is largely uncoordinated, understaffed and, as a result, inefficient. SPUR offers 11 recommendations to expand and coordinate the city’s institutional support, increase funding and provide more access to public land.

Read the report at: http://www.spur.org/publicharvest

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Highlights
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• The first accounting of funding that has gone toward urban agriculture projects on city-owned land during the past five years.  Averaging around $580,000 / year (with an upward trend in recent years) which is less (adjusted for inflation) than what the city put toward urban agriculture in the late 90’s

• The first comprehensive inventory of urban agriculture sites on public land throughout the city, including an interactive map of urban agriculture sites in the city: http://g.co/maps/skzhk

• An analysis of the benefits of urban agriculture to the city

• A comparison of SF’s funding of urban agriculture relative to programs in Seattle, Chicago, and New York. On a per-site basis, SF spends 55% of what Seattle spends, is about equal with Chicago, and spends more than NYC

• Recommendations for how the city can better support urban agriculture going forward