Urban farming: Knowledge Management and Impact “ Lessons from twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad

Abstract

Urban farming is now seen as a way to nutritional security of the burgeoning city masses and a means to daily sustenance. Most of the population in the cities have started practising agriculture on the spaces available to them. Urban agriculture is catching up in most of the Indian cities such as Chennai, Bangalore, New Delhi, Mumbai and Pune etc. In Hyderabad as well, increased access to information and extension advisory services of the Urban Farming Division (UFD) of Horticulture Department, Hyderabad have induced most of the urbanities to practice agriculture. Urban farming has a positive impact on both the practitioners and the city. In view of this, a study was taken up on Urban farming: Knowledge management and impact – Lessons from twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad to understand information sources for urban farming practitioners and impacts of urban farming on cityscape. The study revealed that online content and virtual knowledge were found to be the most important sources of agricultural knowledge. A variety of ICT services were used by the urbanites for sourcing the information, which include Facebook groups, online agri store, WhatsApp groups etc. In the same way, neighbours with similar interests were one of the major sources for crop production knowledge. The study further observed that Urban Farming is capable of recycling the wastes, restoring the urban ecosystem and stabilising the health of both human and urban city scape. It is believed that the results of the study would help the scientific community, general public, extension functionaries to understand the importance of urban farming as well as to upscale good practices.