Data from: Complementing urban agriculture and green spaces is important for ecosystem functions and biodiversity in cities: A systematic review and meta-analysis
Data files
Jul 10, 2025 version files 46.99 KB
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README.md
3.85 KB
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UABioDataset.csv
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Abstract
As cities expand, they encroach on agricultural land, impacting food production and natural habitats. While urban agriculture could help address these issues, the impact of increased food production on ecosystem functions—particularly with regards to soil conservation, climate regulation, and biodiversity—remains poorly understood. To fill this knowledge gap, we conducted a meta-analysis to quantify the effects of urban agriculture on ecosystem functions (i.e., soil quality and climate regulation) and biodiversity (i.e., plants, birds, mammals, arthropods, and insect pollinators). We estimated ecosystem functions and biodiversity in urban agriculture by comparing them with other urban green spaces (e.g., parks, residential gardens, green roofs) and conventional rural farms. Our results overall showed that urban agriculture is in an intermediate state between the other urban green spaces and conventional rural farms in terms of environmental impacts. Urban agriculture had a positive effect on the studied ecosystem functions relative to conventional rural farms (+25%, CI95: +12% to +39%), but was equivalent in its provision of these functions to other green spaces. Urban agriculture also had a positive effect on biodiversity compared to conventional rural farms (+38%, CI95: -10 to +111%), but a negative effect compared to green spaces (-12%, CI95: -29 to +8%). Specifically, urban agriculture had 39% (CI95: -59 to -10%) lower plant diversity and abundance than that seen in other green spaces. Practical implications: Our results suggest that urban agriculture's contribution to urban sustainability requires complementarity with other green spaces to effectively support ecosystem functions and biodiversity in cities. We also detected substantial issues with the classification and characterisation of urban agriculture plots. Improving conceptual and methodological consistency will continue to be a crucial challenge for urban agriculture research.
Dataset DOI: 10.5061/dryad.2bvq83c31
Description of the data and file structure
We followed PRISMA guidelines to screen articles (2000–2024) on urban agriculture’s effects on biodiversity and ecosystem functions. Studies were selected if they: (1) involved soil/substrate-based urban farms/gardens (including hydroponics), (2) cultivated crops (excluding livestock-only systems), and (3) compared urban agriculture to green infrastructure or rural farms. We searched Scopus and Web of Science using terms like “Urban agriculture,” “Biodiversity,” and taxonomic groups (e.g., “Birds,” “Insects”). After removing duplicates, 1288 studies were screened; 21 met our criteria, providing 243 effect sizes for meta-analysis.
Files and variables
File: UABioDataset.csv
Description: This dataset compiles effect sizes from 21 studies (2000–2024) comparing biodiversity (e.g., arthropods, birds, plants) and ecosystem functions (e.g., climate regulation, soil conservation) in urban agriculture systems (e.g., collective gardens, individual plots) against two controls: green infrastructure (e.g., parks, urban greenspaces) and conventional rural farms. Data were extracted following PRISMA guidelines and include geographic coordinates, taxonomic groups, measured outcomes (means, standard deviations, sample sizes), and effect directions (positive/negative). The dataset supports meta-analyses on how urban agriculture influences ecological communities and services globally.
Variables
- Code: Unique identifier for each study.
- Study_ID: Author-year reference code (e.g.,
6_Wo= Wo et al., 2022). - Reference: Full citation for the study.
- Year: Publication year.
- Lat, Long: Geographic coordinates of the study site.
- Continent: Study location (e.g., Asia, Europe).
- Topic: Focus on Biodiversity or Ecosystem functions.
- Cat1: Specific category (e.g., Arthropods, Climate Regulation).
- UAT: Urban agriculture type (e.g., Collective Gardens, Commercial Farms).
- CWS: Control system: Green Infrastructure or Conventional Farms.
- Ind_Effect: Direction of effect:
+(positive),-(negative), or blank (neutral). - Mean_Exp: Mean values for experimental (urban agriculture) groups.
- SD_Exp: Standard deviations for experimental groups.
- SE_Exp: Standard errors for experimental groups (if SD not available).
- SD2_Exp: SD for experimental groups computed using SE when SDs were not available in the original studies.
- N_Exp: Sample sizes for experimental groups.
- Mean_Control: Mean values for control groups.
- SD_Control: Standard deviations for control groups.
- SE_Control: Standard errors for control groups (if SD not available).
- SD2_Control: SD for control groups computed using SE when SDs were not available in the original studies.
- N_Control: Sample sizes for control groups.
- ES_ID: Unique identifier for each effect size entry.
Explanation of NA Values in the Dataset
This dataset comes from a meta-analysis where:
- Some studies reported Standard Deviation (SD), which we converted to Standard Error (SE).
- Other studies directly reported SE (when SD was unavailable).
As a result:
- The SD column has NA values where only SE was originally reported.
- The SE column has NA values where only SD was originally reported (and later converted to SE).
- These NA values are expected and reflect differences in how the source studies reported their data.
Code/software
All the analyses were performed in R statistical environment (r-project.org/; R version 4.3.0). Main packages used were metafor (v4.4-0) and emmeans (v1.10.2),