Urban Agriculture Toolkit from The United States Botanic Garden
These tools can be flexibly used or adapted to support the development and operation of urban agriculture programs that fit the unique needs and interests of public gardens, their partners, and their local communities.
This toolkit is designed to support public gardens and other organizations interested in initiating, expanding, or adapting current urban agriculture programs. Developed in collaboration with Chicago Botanic Garden’s Windy City Harvest, it uses Windy City Harvest as a case example to illustrate key concepts in urban agriculture program development and operation. The toolkit addresses institutional, physical, and programmatic considerations relevant to urban agriculture, and describes a range of audiences and purposes that urban agriculture programs can serve.
Throughout the toolkit, readers will find example lesson plans, standard operating procedures, program outlines, farm site layouts, funding resources, and other reference materials. These tools can be flexibly used or adapted to support the development and operation of urban agriculture programs that fit the unique needs and interests of public gardens, their partners, and their local communities.
Contents:
Urban Agriculture Programs
Community gardening
Youth development
Transitional job training
Technical training
Urban agriculture business development
Nutrition
Building Effective Partnerships
Community relationships
Partnership growth and evolution
Building trust
Partnership management
Farm Design and Operation
Location and site considerations
Recordkeeping
Good Agricultural Practices, Good Handling Practices, and food safety
Sales targets and crop planning
Staffing
Fundraising for Urban Agriculture Programs
Meeting funder expectations
Collecting data for fundraising
Cultivating support
Potential sources of public and private sector support
Social enterprise and earned income
Program expansion and growth
Communications and marketing
Program Evaluation
Role of demographic data
Programmatic data collection
Production and sales data
