Food policy networks are usually designed, in principle, to provide equitable representation among stakeholders within the target food system. The guiding logic often aims to maximize participation, as in this example: “A membership base that is as broad as possible is desirable because it enables food policy groups to draw knowledge and experience from across the food system, and to have as wide an influence as possible” (Halliday, 2015, p. 228). However, food policy councils, as with all governance networks, face many challenges with equitable representation. First, a formal food policy council may not exist for every city region or may operate at a scale that does not match that of the city region. Second, food policy councils frequently overrepresent certain sectors and groups, especially those with more resources and time, while underrepresenting others (Schiff et al., 2022). This may result in “a lack of ideological diversity, an inability to address issues of equity, and a limited understanding of community needs” (Levkoe et al., 2021, p. 51).

In the US, for instance, many food policy councils have been critiqued on equity grounds for failing to adequately include marginalized ethnic and racialized communities (Sands et al., 2016; Packer, 2014). Examining five different regional food policy groups in England, Halliday (2015, p. 236) found that the private sector (i.e., farming and food businesses) was frequently under- or unrepresented in food policy groups, which may partly explain inaction in “prompting major change in the over-all food system configuration.” Moragues Faus (2016, p. 26) further argues that people in more precarious socioeconomic positions are generally underrepresented: “in very few cases do the people who directly suffer the negative consequences of our food system participate in (food policy councils), such as, for example, people who use food banks or workers who have precarious employment in the food chain.”¹ The JUST GROW framework recognizes this perennial problem in representative democratic governance and centers reflection and response to issues of inclusion and exclusion as a matter of procedural justice (discussed below).

The JUST GROW framework adopts the city region as an appropriate domain for governing urban agriculture and a promising scale at which to catalyze transformational action toward sustainable and resilient food systems (Verhoeven and Wiskerke, 2018; Nelles, 2013; Bohn and Tomkins, 2024; Proksch, 2016). A city region refers to a loosely defined geographic area centered on a dense urban population and including nearby suburban, exurban, and rural areas. City regions extend beyond traditional political or administrative boundaries, encompassing a wider variety of stakeholders and values in the urban planning and governance process (Sheikh et al., 2023). Critically, decisions that impact city-regions are driven by factors that may not always be within the purview of formal public planning strategies (Vinge, 2018). To bring the otherwise fuzzy boundaries of a city region into sharper focus, Forster et al. (2015) conceptualize city region food systems (CRFS) as “a regional landscape across which flows of people, goods and ecosystem services are managed.” This hybridization of geographic space with economic flows aligns well with a food systems lens (see also FAO, 2025), and the material emplacement and practice of urban agriculture within real space and real supply chains.

In order for city planners, policymakers, and communities to make informed decisions, they need access to timely, trustworthy, and accurate evidence on the state of their city region’s UA mosaic and how it is changing over time. As Corburn and Cohen (2012, p. 1) advise, “Ongoing measurement and evaluation is one critical aspect of moving toward more healthy and equitable cities because what we measure often matters for whether and how we act.” For this reason, there is a robust literature and many established communities of practice devoted to defining indicators for the health, equity, and sustainability of CRFS (Cirone et al., 2023; Lowe et al., 2022; Pineo et al., 2018; Petralli et al., 2014; Corburn and Cohen, 2012; Holden, 2006; Specht et al., 2025). An indicator can be defined as “a variable with characteristics of quality, quantity, and time used to measure, directly or indirectly, changes” in a situation of interest (Corburn and Cohen, 2012), e.g., a city region food system. Indicators are generally conceptualized as the primary tool for program evaluation and monitoring progress toward explicit goals. Health indicators feature heavily in the UN “New Urban Agenda,” designed to help cities reach the UN Sustainable Development Goals (United Nations Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development, 2017). However, indicators are not neutral—they are socially constructed tools that reflect particular values, priorities, and power dynamics. As such, the choice of what to measure and how to measure it can either reinforce existing inequities or help redress them.

The UN FAO has also published an indicator framework for city region food systems comprising 210 individual indicators aligned with 21 “desired directions of travel… that characterise a more sustainable and resilient city region food system” (Carey and Dubbeling, 2017, 11). These indicators should “Establish baselines and monitor changes resulting from (future) policy and programme implementation” (Carey and Dubbeling, 2017, 4). Importantly, in order to arrive at this list, the report authors describe an iterative narrowing and refining process beginning with identifying overarching objectives (i.e., policy priorities), moving to defining specific positive outcomes that would achieve those objectives (i.e., “desired direction of travel”), then to deciding upon “key issues to be measured,” and finally to constructing specific indicators that can represent the status of progress on those key issues (Carey and Dubbeling, 2017). None of these steps are simple, and none can be taken unilaterally—this is a deliberative process that requires substantive dialogue and representation from diverse stakeholders. Pineo et al. (2018) formulated a set of good practice guidelines, recommending that designers prioritize indicators that are: succinct, co-designed with end users, credible, compelling, relate directly to policy priorities, presentable in an accessible and preferably visual format, commensurable with a systems approach, and that can be transparently verified and validated. The WHO further describes a “good indicator” as “measureable, feasible, valid, timely, replicable, sustainable, relevant, and comprehensive” (PAHO and WHO, 2018). Some of these priorities conflict—e.g., the need to be both succinct and to give a comprehensive account—reinforcing the need to apply principles of knowledge and procedural justice. Indicators must not only be “good,” they must also be just, i.e., arrived at through open, inclusive, democratic deliberation to determine an appropriate balance across these desired characteristics.

Clearly, choosing and crafting a concise set of indicators that still provide a whole-system perspective on progress toward city region food system equity and sustainability is a substantial undertaking. However, this is only half of the battle. As Holden (2006) argued, while indicators abound, ensuring that they are actually used to guide city decision-making remains an elusive goal due to three challenges:

The first challenge may be addressed by highlighting the importance of data infrastructure. For our purposes, the concept of data infrastructure refers to the technologies (real capital), personnel (human capital), and processes (institutional capital) that are required in order to collect, verify, clean, format, curate, and share information about the state of city region food systems. A hypothetical example specific to CRFS might be a municipal registry of active urban farms. This is the font of data from which metrics, and hence indicators, are built.

Data infrastructures incur upfront and ongoing costs plus significant time to establish, so most discussions of city region indicators emphasize using existing data (Pineo et al., 2018). However, this is a problematic assumption. Assuming that the available data is a fixed, exogenous variable in CRFS governance both disempowers city regions and unnecessarily limits the range of what could be known, and therefore what can be managed. For this reason, the JUST GROW framework underscores how city regions should consider what actions they might take to mitigate or correct the “deplorable state” of data (Holden, 2006). Clarifying the relationship between data infrastructure and indicators helps city regions recognize the need to strategically invest in technologies, personnel, and processes if they want access to quality, up-to-date, appropriate data. City regions will generally need to weigh tradeoffs in where and how to invest in data infrastructure.

The second challenge, conceptual confusion, may be partially resolved by distinguishing indicators from metrics. While both concepts connote measurement, they differ in complexity and purpose. An indicator is a constructed variable that provides key information about a given situation or the state of a system that is needed to guide decision-making (PAHO and WHO, 2018; Walz, 2000). As Walz (2000, 1) explains, “In order to derive clear statements, a great deal of observations, data, and knowledge have to be systematically ordered and condensed” in order to produce an indicator. In contrast, metrics are simpler, directly represent the underlying data, and are subordinate to indicators, i.e., “the actual quantitative or qualitative data that is used to populate the indicator” (Corburn and Cohen, 2012, 2). For example, in the context of food security, the INDDEX Project cites an indicator, “national fruit and vegetable availability,” as “an indirect measure of the nutritional quality of the food supply” that can be expressed via a metric using the units grams per capita per year (Data4Diets, 2023). Another way to conceptualize the distinction is that metrics derive from what is feasible to measure, while indicators derive from what is desirable to measure: both are crucial links in the process of systematically tracking a situation. Figure 2 visualizes the role of data infrastructure, metrics, and indicators in linking those responsible for action to the actual state of UA in the CRFS.

Within the JUST GROW framework, a policy is a written plan to implement a collective decision (by an authoritative entity such as a governmental body or a powerful organization) about the CRFS. These decisions impact the allocation of authority and resources (including to support data infrastructure), but also serve to legitimize or render invisible certain priorities and aims for UA. A policy comprises both a purpose and a mechanism of implementation to achieve that purpose. There are many kinds of policy instruments, including setting and enforcing rules or standards (rule-based policies), providing economic incentives such as tax breaks or fees (incentive-based policies), or disseminating information and knowledge (information-based policies) (Vedung, 1998). These types of policy have a source (i.e., the decision-maker) and a target (i.e., those who must follow that decision) and operate over a given domain and at a given level defined by their purpose. Some scholars also distinguish a fourth type of policy, direct action, in which a powerful organization directly provides goods, services, or infrastructure (Pal et al., 2020).

A policy landscape refers to the many interwoven policies that together shape a given CRFS. Most city regions govern the many dimensions of UA relevant to distributive equity in an independent or siloed fashion. Few city regions have a comprehensive UA plan, especially one that is equity-focused. Hence, utilizing the framework necessitates a process of mapping, or piecing together, policy landscapes (see Wissmann et al., 2022). The mapped policy landscape can be compared against distributive equity indicators to determine where and under what authority each indicator is covered by or absent from policy.

Policies can establish rights, authorities, mandates, entitlements, incentives, and sanctions to act, but cannot act in and of themselves. Policy requires human agency to implement. Likewise, human agency must form and set policy in the first place. To conceptualize the human agency that sets and implements policies and acts within and upon policy landscapes, the JUST GROW framework centers governance networks (see above). To recap, governance networks comprise the various interrelated stakeholders active in “steering” CRFS.

Governance networks have been critiqued for being too diffuse, opaque, and mutable to be held accountable for the outcomes of their members’ actions (Harlow and Rawlings, 2007; Papadopoulos, 2005). Complex governance networks can blur the distinction between the public and private sectors, potentially decreasing transparency and raising the risk of conflicts of interest, sparking deeper concerns over their democratic legitimacy (Sørensen and Torfing, 2003; Sørensen and Torfing, 2005; Klijn and Skelcher, 2007). These concerns parallel those about the representativeness of food policy councils discussed above. As Hajer and Versteeg (2005, p. 341) argue, while public sector institutions in classic liberal democracies derive legitimacy from professionalism, science-based rationality, and democratic representation (e.g., through elected officials), “governance networks break with that logic.” Without clear roles, boundaries and accountability, entrenched powerful interests might simply ‘colonize’ and subvert networks, for example by manipulating funding to ‘starve’ oversight bodies or by manipulating the criteria for including or excluding members (Steen et al., 2018). An equally worrisome pitfall is that governance networks will fail to act by allowing their members to avoid responsibility, i.e., if everyone in the network is responsible, then in effect no one is (Willmes and van Wessel, 2021). This raises a critical question: how does a governance network function—or in the case of JUST GROW, proactively act on indicators to advance just transformations in CRFS—without a fixed constitution and a transparent organizational structure?

Despite the aforementioned pitfalls and criticisms of governance networks, The JUST GROW framework posits that governance networks in CRFS can be effective in constructing positive responsibility for action. Our framework hypothesizes that an inclusive and regionally adaptive citizen engagement model can catalyze high-quality co-creation.

There are a variety of ways in which a governance network can engage citizens, and this should be arrived at according to a region’s capacities and needs. In a review of citizen participation practices in the governance of local food systems, Affre et al. (2024) found five major types of local food system citizen participation programs that have emerged across regional, municipal and neighborhood levels. Citizen working groups, for their ability to focus on a specialized topic (i.e., urban agriculture), position an inclusive set of participants as experts, and bring forth appropriate recommendations to decision-making bodies (Huttunen et al., 2022; OCED, 2021). “These groups often lead to transformative and empowering experiences, allowing participants to articulate personal experiences, identify mechanisms of oppression, and foster deep ties of support and solidarity” (Affre et al., 2024, p. 7). In like manner, participatory workshops can foster inclusive, safe and welcoming spaces, enabling participation among more vulnerable communities (Leclerc et al., 2011; Levkoe and Sheedy, 2019; Lourival and Rose, 2022). Workshops have been successful in facilitating practical experiences, which can lead to more open conversation, project ownership and strategy development.

Sørensen and Torfing (2005) argue that governance networks function through continual negotiation of the public purpose amongst interdependent actors in horizontal relationships. Hajer and Versteeg (2005) affirmed that actors in network governance must perform governance, first building up mutually intelligible identities and systems of meaning to reach a shared understanding of purpose, roles, and obligations. This does not mean that the formation of legitimate and effective governance networks must be spontaneous: governance theorists have explored the potential for deliberative design of collaborative governance platforms through which diverse stakeholders can proactively co-create solutions to pressing public problems (Ansell and Gash, 2018; Lee, 2023). Critically, such platforms should at a minimum provide a transparent public arena in which to convene, allow an open process in which anyone may step forward to identify problems in need of resolution, include those who are most affected and those who are most relevant for addressing the problem, follow a deliberative process of engagement across difference, and finally enable joint action in response to the problem (Ansell et al., 2021). Ideally, focusing on positive co-creation can lead governance networks to not only empower “weak and vulnerable individuals or groups to participate” but help foster their democratic capacity and influence (Ansell et al., 2021, p. 356).

We note that academic researchers can help foster co-creation, as well. The Community Engagement Continuum (Key et al., 2019) outlines pathways for academic researchers to progressively activate engagement in citizen governance groups. The continuum also embeds mechanisms for knowledge and procedural justice, including evaluating the progress of collaboration, decision-making authority, communication, reciprocity and mutual benefit (Ellison and Eatman, 2008). The creators of the CE Continuum predict that by following these principles, more inclusive knowledge generation and decision making will occur, leading to community-ownership of research questions, data analysis and interpretation and knowledge co-creation over time (Barnes-Najor et al., 2024).

While participation, inclusion, and deliberation are thus critical, those aspects of governance networks must also be balanced against networks’ functionality to effectively address real problems facing CRFS. Specifically, for co-creation to work, we need to understand how responsibility emerges (or fails to emerge) from network relationships.

Uzzell et al. (2012) argued that responsibility is discursively constructed in governance networks through overlapping causal, moral, and role mechanisms. Causal responsibility is tacitly assigned to those who are expected to have the power, or capacity, to cause change. Moral responsibility refers to when an actor is perceived to have a choice between right and wrong actions and is assigned to actor groups based on their intentions, or motivations, for taking action. Lastly, role responsibility is assigned to actor groups based on their authority to act, as defined in law, policy, or professional affiliation. Whether responsible action happens depends on the discursive confluence of these three tacit forms of assigning responsibility (Uzzell et al., 2012).

The interaction of causal, moral, and role responsibility echoes the “triangle of responsibility” concept from the fields of psychology and law, in which responsibility arises from alignment among identity, events, and prescriptions: “When an actor is linked by his or her or its identity to certain prescriptions, and those prescriptions are applicable to a specific event, then responsibility can be assigned to that actor in relation to that event.” (Willmes and van Wessel, 2021, p. 4). When extrapolated from the individual level and flipped from past culpability to “responsible future conduct,” Willmes and van Wessel (2021) demonstrate how to adapt the “triangle” model for governance networks. The relevant identities become stakeholder roles or positions, events become contributions to reforms (of the social domain being governed), and prescriptions become the institutions that incentivize or motivate behaviors (such as rules or norms).

For the JUST GROW project, we reconceptualize the triangle around the three ways of assigning responsibility—moral, causal, and role—identified earlier. Specifically, the framework allows analysis of where within the governance network we can observe actor groups with motivation, capacity, or authority, respectively, for each dimension of distributive justice and indicators thereof (Figure 3).

Responsibility for action arises when authority, capacity, and motivation to act all align within the governance network. Importantly, the theory of network governance suggests that authority, capacity, and motivation do not need to be unified in a single group—responsibility for action may be achieved by a tightly linked cluster of actors within the network that possess complementary attributes and can form a like-minded coalition (Hajer and Versteeg, 2005). This may look like, for example, a scenario in which one passionate actor group motivates an authoritative actor group to delegate to a third actor group with the capacity to make a real change on the ground. Recall, however, the role of dynamic “weak ties” to draw in diverse perspectives beyond those in the like-minded coalition, which can help correct for potential blind spots (Levkoe et al., 2021).

Our framework views responsibility for action as a characteristic of governance networks that can be evaluated collaboratively. By identifying the relationships among individuals and groups in the network, city regions can open up a conversation about who is positioned where and with what influence within the network. This process can be diagnostic as well as prescriptive, for example revealing opportunities for a community-based organization to motivate a city council to use its authority to direct a municipal transportation department to add new bus lines connecting residences with community garden sites.

The extent to which food systems provide nutritious food and ultimately good health is commonly conceptualized as food security, defined by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) as, “when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life” (ESA, 2006). These conditions are often summarized as the “four pillars”—availability (how much nutritious food there is), access (can people get the nutritious food), utilization (do people have the means to safely consume the food, e.g., clean water), and stability (continuous, uninterrupted access). Recent scholarship drawing on food justice and food sovereignty movements adds agency to this list,² which refers to the capacity of individuals and groups to exercise control over their own circumstances (e.g., self-determination or autonomy) and to provide meaningful input into governance processes. Agency means, in other words, the power to choose one’s own version of food security free of unreasonable restrictions (Clapp et al., 2022; Chappell, 2018). In the context of the JUST GROW framework, indicators for the food security domain should help city regions assess whether, to what extent, and for whom urban agriculture improves availability of, access to, and local control over healthy and culturally appropriate food, particularly for residents of the city region who experience the highest levels of food insecurity.

Land access is a prerequisite for all urban agriculture and therefore shapes all other distributions, including food security, livelihoods, environmental impacts, and cultures. Exclusion from land is among the most commonly cited sources of injustice in UA (Santo et al., 2024; Black Yield Institute and Farm Alliance of Baltimore, 2021, p. 11). Land access is more than just property rights, land ownership, or land tenure. Rather, land access is a socio-legal construct comprising the rules, customs, and practices by which individuals, organizations, and communities claim and realize the capacity to cultivate and harvest food (Ribot and Peluso, 2003). Understanding this construction therefore demands a study of the legal instruments that guide access, transfer, rights, and obligations relating to land as well as the social practices that structure access, exclusion, distribution and use. Formal dimensions of land tenure can be observed by examining lease arrangements, relevant property law (rules of resource allocation and/or distribution, rights and obligations related to land) (Calo et al., 2023), planning obligations, debt relations, and land titling registrars. Informal dimensions of land tenure can be studied by analyzing access mechanisms, landlord tenant relations (Calo and De Master, 2016), land quality assessments, speculative interests in land, perceptions of security, or observed distribution. Indicators for the land access domain should help city regions assess whether, to what extent, and for whom urban agriculture allows city region residents to benefit from land by claiming and realizing the capacity to produce food.

Urban agriculture also has the potential to provide economic opportunity, which we refer to as livelihoods to emphasize a fuller meaning of dignified and fulfilling work beyond simply employment or wage. Often, the foodwork of UA appears undervalued, with common positions ranging from unpaid volunteer work to highly routine wage labor. As in other sectors of modern economies, neoliberal policies and institutional structures prioritize market-driven approaches and individual responsibility, leading to precarious working conditions and limited social protections in UA (McClintock, 2013). There is limited research on labor conditions and policies for UA workers, even on basic labor statistics such as working hours, wages, safety and health provisions, and security. In part, this lacuna results from lack of a coherent vision of what a dignified livelihood means both among researchers and within the alternative food movements that champion urban agriculture (Klassen et al., 2023). For some, work in the food system should be hard yet rewarding. For others, the ideal of the yeoman farmer obscures racialized, gendered, and classed agricultural work while propping up the managerial work of the proprietor farmer (Calo, 2024). Toward this end, Klassen et al. (2023) shared a set of values that, if realized, may lead to what they called “good work”; these included tangible facets of dignified livelihoods such as fair pay, occupational safety, and career advancement opportunities, but also less tangible facets such as being recognized as a valued and skilled member of the community. Klassen et al. (2023) also called for ensuring equal opportunity employment, freedom of association and right to organize, and agency in determining the conditions of work. These principles are a strong starting point towards the broader meaning of “good” agricultural work yet may still be limited to making exploitative work less pernicious rather than actively promoting dignified livelihoods.

Social reproduction theory offers insight into another dimension of labor that is missing from the “good work” discourse, namely the generally uncompensated daily labors of care such as of healthcare, child care, and food preparation needed to sustain an agricultural workforce (Bhattacharya, 2017; Becot et al., 2024), labors that are also typically heavily gendered, racialized, and classed (Swan and Perrier, 2019). The extent to which this social sphere of care is subordinated to or exploited by the productive sphere is a key indicator of justice. Food work is directly related to care work—it nourishes human bodies, is produced by farmers caring for soils, plants, and animals—and relates to human value of livelihoods (Swan and Perrier, 2019). Indicators for livelihoods should help city regions assess whether, to what extent, and for whom urban agriculture provides fairly compensated, safe, secure, and dignified employment and livelihood opportunities across the full spectrum of foodwork.

The concept of environmental impact captures not only the consequences, positive or negative, of human activities on the natural world and its ecosystems, but also the ways in which those consequences in turn affect human health and well-being (Finnveden and Potting, 2014). As Rebitzer et al. (2004) suggest, “All activities, or processes, in a product or service’s life result in environmental impacts due to consumption of resources, emissions of substances into the natural environment, and other environmental exchanges (e.g., radiation).” This observation also holds true for the production of food in UA. The field of environmental justice has extensively documented the ways in which the human toll of that consumption and those emissions is distributed inequitably along racialized, classed, and gendered, as well as disproportionately on residents of the Global South (Agyeman et al., 2016). For example, numerous case studies show that some UA models enhance green space in cities, although the attractiveness of that very environmental amenity may catalyze gentrification that pushes out low-income residents who most need the benefits of UA, i.e., ecogentrification (McClintock, 2018). In contrast, some controlled environment agriculture models may require significant inputs of energy and water, which could strain a city’s overall supply of these resources and reduce access among lower-income communities (Engler and Krarti, 2021).

Although the science of indicators on environmental impacts from agriculture is robust, it is important to understand what environmental risks and benefits of UA are most meaningful to city region stakeholders. For example, midpoint indicators that measure emissions (e.g., greenhouse gases) are attractive for scientists, because they provide a basis for quantitative modeling that allows for controlling biases and quantifying uncertainties. However, context-dependent environmental impacts (e.g., light pollution or urban heat island mitigation) may be more meaningful for other stakeholders (Orsini et al., 2024). In the context of the JUST GROW framework, indicators for environmental impacts should help city regions assess whether, to what extent, and for whom urban agriculture enhances positive environmental quality and ecosystem services and minimizes negative environmental impacts (e.g., pollution) in city regions.

UA as “green infrastructure” can provide critical socio-cultural benefits and cultural ecosystem services for cities (Ilieva et al., 2022; Giacchè et al., 2021; Evans et al., 2022). UA is also embedded within, and can help sustain, broader food cultures. The burgeoning field of food studies has shown how social identities—for individuals, families, communities, ethnicities, even nations—along with place-making and sense of belonging, are formed in part through how people interact with food and the social relationships that revolve around food (Albala, 2013; Ashley et al., 2004). Taken together, patterns of behavior, belief, tradition, spiritualism, art, and value expressed in or supported by UA produce—and reproduce from day to day and generation to generation—food cultures. Urban farms and gardens can serve as sites for the genesis (e.g., Dobernig and Stagl, 2015; Maurer, 2020; Lyson, 2014) and revitalization of cultural identity and expression, growing and sharing knowledge about the preparation of a greater diversity of species of plants in general and varieties of the same plant. For example, urban home gardening plays a key role in the preservation, adaptation, and transmission of cultural foodways and traditional ecological knowledge—particularly for immigrant households—and must not be overlooked (Taylor and Lovell, 2015; Taylor et al., 2017). Such urban foodscapes express the interwoven eco-cultural narratives of nature-human interactions.

The food cultures that UA reproduces are also entangled with the natural and built environment: land use, geography and topology, form, function, and infrastructure. Agriculture can also therefore be central to the formation and reproduction of cultural landscapes. The value of cultural heritage in landscapes varies significantly by context. For example, in Germany, cultural landscapes or “Kulturlandschaft” are described in the 1976 Federal “Nature” Conservation Act, in Norway the 2009 Nature Diversity Act, while in Japan in the 2004 Cultural Properties Protection Act. In addition, since 2012 Japan has established the Japan Important Agricultural Heritage Systems, which recognize and support traditional agricultural systems as living heritage, thereby complementing the legal framework of the Cultural Properties Protection Act (Nath et al., 2024). Custom and convention are central to organically evolved cultural landscapes, which according to UNESCO have formed through long-term use and occupancy to become part of communities’ collective identity and play “an active social role in contemporary society closely associated with the traditional way of life” (UNESCO World Heritage Centre, 2008). These include heritage agricultural landscapes (Luengo, 2013). Specifically, preserving traditional agricultural land uses is often instrumental in producing and maintaining biocultural diversity in such landscapes (Houfková et al., 2015; Arnaiz-Schmitz et al., 2018; Agnoletti and Rotherham, 2015). While heritage agricultural landscapes may frequently be associated with more rural forms of food production, this idea can apply to urban agricultural landscapes, including those still in formation. According to Engelhardt (2017), heritages should not be isolated, but neither should they be relativized to the wider environment, society, and history. Dynamic authenticity captures the idea of multi-layered value systems in the same area. Many layers including but not limited to geology, a variety of land-management styles, transformation and innovation can all be valued (Kanki et al., 2015).

The cultural services provided by food systems becomes an issue of justice when differences arise in whose foodways are valued and supported, and whose are ignored, devalued, or undermined. Indicators for environmental impacts should help city regions assess whether, to what extent, and for whom urban agriculture supports diverse, valued, and vibrant cultural services, foodways, and landscapes.