Community gardening and health-related benefits for a rural Victorian town

Abstract

Community gardens are growing in popularity as a strategy to effectively deal with population health at a local level. There is a need to gather information about the health-related benefits of community gardens for people living in a rural locale. This paper discusses the health-related benefits of rural community gardens. We adopted a qualitative approach to examine these issues. Ten participants, eight females and two males, aged between 50 and 82, who have participated in a community garden located in South Gippsland, Victoria, for a minimum of 12 months, took part in this study. Semi-structured interviews that lasted between 30 and 60 min were conducted to explore the perspectives and lived experiences of the participants. Thematic analysis was utilised to analyse the data. We situate our discussion in this paper within the therapeutic landscape theory. Findings indicate that there is a range of health-related benefits associated with participation in rural community gardens, including physical, nutritional, social and psychological. Despite these benefits, the participants wished to see some improvements that could attract more people in rural areas to participate in community gardens. Given the paucity of research available regarding rural community gardens, future research should continue to develop an understanding of these rural sites, especially given the ever-growing popularity of community gardens Australia-wide.

Keywords:

• Community gardens
• rurality
• lived experience
• health and well-being
• qualitative research

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the participants who took part in this research.