| Urban agriculture is a modern agriculture which is located in the cities and thestretch zones; it relies on the advantages of science, technology, talent, capital, marketof the cities; it provides special, excellent, new agricultural products to the domesticand aboard market, and provides a good ecological environment to the residents of thecity. Urban agriculture is an essential component of urban huge complex ecosystem. Itis a new agriculture which has the diversified functions, and it characterized byintegration of urban and rural, modern intensivism and high open. It can compensatefor the loss of agriculture in the modernization process to keep city sustainabledevelopment.From the integration of urban and rural life to today’s binary structure, rather thandevelop agriculture in the metropolitans, we could look for the best mode to integratethe agriculture into the city. Small towns are the connection of metropolitan and ruralarea, which has natural advantage to develop urban agriculture. The land resources inChina are limited. Compared with the small towns, big cities have more pressure onland-use and the higher land prices. The small town has more potential on urbanagricultural development. Therefore, developing urban agriculture with the planningand development of the small town has the strong practical significance.This paper is composed by7parts.1st part is the brief introduction of urbanagriculture.(1) The paper introduces a new method to solve some severe global issueslike population growth, land scarcity, and food problem and so on. Urban agriculturecan provide the safe, clean and diversified food; it can clear the city garbage, recyclethe kitchen and city waste to make agricultural production more clean and harmless; itcan provide more job opportunities; it can reduce the "food mile" to save a lot oflabors and resources and reduce traffic pollution; it can increase the income by thedevelopment of tourism, sightseeing, leisure and other model industries; it canpromote gender equality through the positive participation of women. And the papershows urban agriculture has economic significance, social and culture significance,ecological significance and academic significance.(2) Through a large number offoreign literature collection and collation, according to economic geography andeconomics, sociology and agriculture (food) science, urbanism and ecology,architecture and landscape planning, the paper summarizes the developmentprocedure and the current research situation of urban agriculture and lists the existing research results. At present, mainly research of urban agriculture in China are focusedon background, concept, meaning, characteristics, functional roles, industrial patterns,development models, development strategies, regional empirical analysis and so on. Icollected lots of papers about urban agricultural articles from China NationalKnowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), more than88%of which were from theperspective of the agricultural economy. However less than1%paper are related tothe disciplines of architecture and urban planning, which are including3Phd’sdissertations,10Master’s dissertations and27journal papers, which are almost thesethree years of researches.(3) The paper summarizes the definition of urban agricultureand small town by domestic and foreign experts and scholars to clear the researchscope and research objects. The scope of urban agriculture in this article not onlyincludes the agriculture in the city but also includes the suburban agriculture inperi-urban areas. Small towns in this article refer to the transition settlements betweenrural and urban, which scale is less than the cities. They are including towns, satellitecities, industrial and mining areas of the towns, county towns and market townsaround the small cities, large and medium-sized cities.(4) The paper highlights theexisting problem in the research of urban agriculture in China. It is lack of the studyon the urban agricultural development in small towns; it is lack of a comprehensivetheoretical system; it is lack of guidelines in practice.(5) The paper proposes theinnovation points, which is the first time to combine the development of urbanagriculture into the planning of small towns; the establishment of a comprehensiveevaluation system of urban agriculture of small towns; building the land-use mode ofoptimal allocation to develop urban agriculture in small towns; proposing the contentsof urban agricultural planning establishment.2nd part is the research about the theory and practice of urban agriculture. Firstly,the paper elaborates the current theory-the Thunen sphere theory. At present, we canstill find the mode of Thunen sphere surrounding the big cities such as Beijing,Shanghai, etc. In the recent years, with the rapid development of internationalresearch in the field of urban agriculture, the new theory about urban agricultureplanning has appeared such as Food Urbanism, Continuous Productive UrbanLandscapes (CPULs) and Food-Sensitive Planning and Urban Design (FSPUD).Secondly, through the comparative analysis of urban agriculture practice in Europe,Asia and other developed countries and regions as well as several big cities in China;the paper summarizes several development models of urban agriculture. They are agricultural spheres model, agricultural regional model, agricultural production andoperation model, agricultural tourism model. Thirdly, the paper points out urbanagriculture has diversified space layouts, multifunction, high degree ofindustrialization and mercerization, intelligent and information technology andsustainability. Finally, the paper summarizes the development types of urbanagriculture according to the existing and layout methods based on the research anddevelopment status in various areas. According to integrating the urban land, it can bedivided into community garden, city park, attached nursery, citizen farm, family farm.According to integrating the building space, it can be divided into rooftop planning,indoor planting, underground space, surface planting, vertical farming.3rd part is about the development analysis of urban agriculture in the small towns.Firstly, the paper introduces the development of urban agriculture in small towns isstill in initial stage, the development level is extremely uneven, and it has noorganization and planning. And the paper analyzes urban agriculture has the greatsignificance and the inherent advantages in the development of small towns, and itcan promote the development of small town. Secondly, the paper presents SWOTconcept, analysis process, and the practice and significance in urban agriculturalplanning. Secondly, the paper analyzes the strength, weakness, opportunities andthreats of the development of urban agriculture in small towns through SWOTanalysis method. The strengths are good location conditions, abundant labors, lowcost-benefit ratio, the technological level increased gradually, and the favorableagricultural industrialization configuration. The weakness are that the employees havelow quality, agricultural workers have low-income, water resource is serious polluted,the transport capacity is limited; agricultural information level is not high, localcharacteristics are lack, and the level of industrialization is imbalance. Theopportunities are that there is greatly improved space in land-use, there is greatlydevelopment space in agricultural tourism, there is greatly development space in theprocessing of agricultural products, and there are favorable policies. The threats theland resources are continuous reducing, the ecological environment pressurecontinues to increase, the funds of agriculture are shortage, and there are lack ofappropriate policies and regulations. Finally, according to the result of SWOT analysis,proposes the suggestion on the development of urban agriculture in small towns. Weshould strengthen the comprehensive utilization and protection of agricultural land;maintain the sustainable development of ecological environment; increase the capital and investment in science and technology; strengthen the infrastructure construction,and to develop the agricultural tourism industry; emphasis on and enhance the qualityof the talents of urban agriculture; draw up the regulations and policies, and tostrengthen the planning and management; and excavate the local characteristics ofurban agriculture.4th part is the research about the comprehensive evaluation system of thedevelopment of urban agriculture in small towns. First of all, the paper elaborates thereasons of the establishment of evaluation system; proposes the principles of integrityand hierarchy, comprehensive and representative, scientific and operability, andcomparability and identity; introduces the Delphi method, Replacement Cost method,and Analytical Hierarchy Process method. Secondly, the paper constructs thecomprehensive evaluation system based on land factors, economic factors, socialfactors and environmental factors through analysis of a lot of other disciplineresearches and referring to the research results of evaluation system on thedevelopment of urban agriculture so that we can analyze the development level ofurban agriculture in small towns. We choose27indicators from60primary indicators.Thirdly, the paper establishes the optimization model of urban agriculture in the citiesaccording to the urban infrastructure, social and economic factors, and environmentalfactors in the urban land layout to reasonably distribute the urban agriculture. Finally,by taking Delft in Netherlands as example, the paper figures out a layout plan ofurban agriculture to provide a discussion platform for the planning and decisionmaking of urban agriculture in small towns.5th part is about the introduction and analysis for the development status of urbanagriculture in3small towns around Beijing. First is the brief introduction and analysisfor the basic information and the development of urban agriculture of the3smalltowns. Secondly, the paper by SWOT analyzes the common strength, weakness,opportunities and threats in the development of urban agriculture in the3small towns.The strength are good location conditions and transport conditions, resource gathering,the abundant and good natural resources, rich water resources, the good traditionalagricultural foundations, the certain good cultural landscape and tourism resources.The weaknesses are that the employees are low quality and serious aging, theutilization of land resource is low, the market influence is low, the level ofindustrialization is low, and the capacity of tourist reception is backwardness. Theopportunities that the potential clients market is large, the potential of land resources is large; there is greatly development space in the processing of agricultural products,the improvement of road and traffic, and government support. The threats are that theecological environment pressure continues to increase, the waste of water resource isserious, and the regional characteristics of agricultural products are not obvious.Thirdly, the paper makes clear the function and orientation of small towns aroundBeijing. The urban agriculture of small towns around Beijing can provide the newchoice of leisure tourism for the residents in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei province. Itcan adjust the industrial structure, improve the agricultural production structure,update the agriculture management idea and development mode, and increaseresidents’ income. It can provide a new way for the rational utilization and protectionof natural and cultural resources. It can increase the employment opportunities. Thedevelopment of urban agriculture is bound to generate more jobs, especially theemployment opportunities of the tertiary industry. The urban agriculture can promotethe harmonious development of small towns. We should follow some principles suchas ecological priority, rational land-use, the overall development of urban and rural,and the principles of sustainable development. And paper summarizes thedevelopment types of the3small towns. Finally, the paper proposes the developmentstrategies based on the existing issues and analysis result. They are the overalldevelopment strategy, developing the feature industries, protecting the ecologicalenvironment, improving the quality of personnel, and multiple operation modes.6th part is the summary about the planning proposal of urban agriculture in smalltowns. First of all, the paper introduces the reasons, basis, principle and procedure ofurban agriculture planning in small towns. Secondly, it clarifies the planning contents,such as determine the planning model of urban agriculture in small towns, urbanagricultural land should be classified into urban construction land, establishing theseveral technical indicators and developing the relevant reward and punishment rules.Thirdly, it develops the diversified planning mechanism and emphasizes theengagement of planners, public, private sectors and other society sectors. Finally, itproposes the development direction of urban agricultural planning in small towns. Weshould adjust the scale of urban agriculture according to local conditions, andcombine with sustainable agriculture/landscape agriculture to develop urbanagriculture. We should protect the natural ecosystem. We should develop and use theeco-energy, such as solar energy, wind energy, and biogas. We should strengthen theconstruction of transportation system and public facilities, and make full use of water-saving system, rainwater collection system, sewage treatment, Water qualityenhancement system, and the greenhouse ecological sanitation systems. We shouldimprove the overall quality of labor, establish the mechanism of public participationand self-management, and develop coordinately rural and small town. We shouldRespect the geographical and cultural characteristics.7th part is the summary of the research process and future work. Althoughmore and more Chinese and foreign scholars are studying urban agriculture, but theduration of the research in the field is not long, especially the planning andconstruction field in our country, which has carried out only more than three years andeither practice or regulation are lack. Due to the limitation of the objective conditionsand ability, the author’s research may be lack on the width and depth. In the width,urban agriculture includes economy, society, culture, environment, space, technologyand other aspects of content, but the author simply analyze urban agriculture fromurban planning and architecture point of view, which obviously can’t complete coverthe whole concepts, so this paper focuses on the SWOT analysis and evaluationsystem of the urban agriculture of small towns. In the depth, because a lot of practiceis still in the phase of planning or weak integration between agriculture and urbanarchitecture space, it is lack of quantitative research.In the future research, the depth and width of research needs to be extended. Inwidth aspect, we need to further explore the way to fully include agriculture into theurban planning system, and explore the possibility of systematic planning of urbanagriculture and urban; we need expand the study scope from the small towns in thedeveloped region to small towns in underdeveloped regions and consider therelationship between urban and rural areas from agriculture perspective and inspecturban—agriculture—rural area from macro level. In terms of the depth, we need tofurther classify small towns to study the development of different types of urbanagriculture in small towns; In practice, through lots of field investigation and datacollection to quantize the research result, especially to study the related indicators inthe control regulations to further examine the pros and cons of the comprehensiveevaluation system of urban agriculture.Although the practice of urban agriculture in China’s cities has just begun, butthis kind of spontaneity, bottom up urban construction and participation mode isclearly valuable, are worth to encourage and guide. Along with the rapid developmentof small towns, urban agriculture development mode in small towns will become an important strategy to achieve the leap development of town. As a reflection on thetraditional development mode, the urban agriculture development model emphasizesrelying on agricultural resources and ecological environment, planning as a whole thethree industries, economically and efficiently allocating land resources, strengtheningthe association between urban and rural areas. With the deepening of the theoryresearch and practice activities, the development of urban agriculture in small townswill surely show its unique advantage; bring more vitality to the development of smalltowns. |
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