Motivations for Urban Agriculture Policies: Evidence from Norway’s Largest Urban Areas

Abstract

Public policies for urban agriculture have lately been developer in several cities. This chapter investigates motivations for such policies in three Norwegian cities: Oslo, Bergen, and Trondheim. The motivations can be synthetized in five categories. They are much the same in the three cities but with different emphasis. First, urban agriculture is set into an urban “green” development discourse, particularly in Oslo and Bergen. “Green” not only means literally to make gray urban areas green by adding vegetation but also refers to an environmentally friendly urban development, increasing biodiversity and the amount of pollinator friendly plants. Second, food production and alternative food systems are important motivations, particularly in Trondheim and this municipality’s aim to couple urban agriculture to peri-urban professional agriculture. This aspect is also prominent in the policies in Bergen. Third, all cities underline the provision of social meeting places and local community building as a motivation for municipal support. Fourth, all cities consider urban agriculture as an important means for providing municipal welfare services, including work training, integration, health promotion, and spreading knowledge about growing. A fifth dimension is coupled to active citizenship and co-creation of city development particularly in Trondheim.

1 Introduction

Urban agriculture has become increasingly popular among citizens in many Norwegian urban areas, and a number of initiatives have been taken by local dwellers, see Chapters 6 and 7. Politicians and public authorities have also become interested in urban agriculture. The aim of this chapter is to describe the emergence of public policies and planning for urban agriculture with a focus on the motivations behind these. Why do Norwegian public authorities develop policies for urban agriculture? Norway is an interesting case, as an example of the Nordic welfare state, and the role urban agriculture can play in this context. The empirical focus is on the three largest cities in Norway, as they are among the earliest examples of public policies for urban agriculture.

More specifically the chapter discusses the institutionalization of public policies for urban agriculture in the three cities. It describes the actors involved, their patterns of cooperation and influence, and the formal and informal rules, measures, and plans they follow.

2 Background

From its start, urban agriculture has been based on citizens’ initiatives and activities (Buijs et al., 2019; Certomà & Tornaghi, 2015; McClintock, 2014). However, in later years, urban agriculture has also emerged as a domain of public policy. Some Norwegian cities have developed strategic plans for urban agriculture, and the national level government has adopted a strategic plan for urban agriculture (Norwegian Ministries, 2021). Given how deeply grounded urban agriculture is in citizens’ bottom-up activities, the idea of developing a public planning and policy for urban agriculture may seem counter productive. This chapter seeks to uncover the motivations for public authorities to support urban agriculture and the role of citizen activism in this.

Urban agriculture is a complex phenomenon and most often is driven by several motivations. This is also the case for urban agriculture as a public policy domain. Urban agriculture was early associated with an alternative, transformative, and radical activism (McClintock, 2014; Buijs et al., 2019). It was viewed as a means to increase food justice and secure nutritious, affordable food to people in need. It has also sought to provide an alternative to the dominant food systems through its support of small-scale farming and alternative food supplies systems (Simon-Rojo et al., 2018). Another radical stream has been connected to activism and public space reappropriation to secure the “right to the city,” giving everyone access to and actual influence over the cities’ public spaces (Certomà & Tornaghi, 2015), Rosol, 2010). Thus, urban agriculture has been closely associated with citizen activism and voluntary work based on local bottom-up initiatives. Rosol (2010) points out that while in the 1980s citizen groups had to “fight for their right to influence green public spaces” (p. 557), such initiatives are now encouraged and supported by politicians and administration, as we will show in this chapter.

However, urban agriculture has also been problematized as being co-opted and in fact serving neo-liberalization interests when stepping in when social security nets have been rolled back (McClintock, 2014). In case studies from Berlin, the acceptance of urban agriculture in public space can partly be explained by limited public funds for the upkeep and management of the urban landscape (Rosol, 2010). Urban agriculture has also been placed within neo-liberal traits in urban development and labelled as a “controlled space” (Brody & de Wilde, 2020 p. 243) and as being both neoliberal and radical (McClintock, 2014; Brody & de Wilde, 2020). On the other hand, a number of studies have tried to uncover the general benefits of urban agriculture, its contributions to integration (Christensen et al., 2019), and its possibility to offer companionship and build community (Firth et al., 2011) and provide locally available food (Simon-Rojo et al., 2018). Such benefits may form the background for the development of public policy.

The emerging policy realm of urban agriculture has been less studied than the actual growing initiatives. However, some studies exist. These underline the importance of local governments and planning authorities’ efforts to integrate urban agriculture into planning and to enable urban agriculture through appropriate regulatory measures (Thibert, 2012). Others have pointed at the importance of combining the top-down urban green space management with citizen activism (Buijs et al., 2019). The nature and quality of the cooperation between local authorities and the citizen’s initiatives have implications on the performance of urban agriculture projects. The more the nonprofit organization is included the higher the performance of the collaborative network (Uster et al., 2019).

This chapter contributes to this growing body of literature through an in-depth analysis of urban agriculture policies and plans. We focused on three Norwegian examples: Oslo, Bergen, and Trondheim. It has been noted that urban agriculture including its motivations as well as effect needs to be understood within its specific socioeconomic context (van der Jagt et al., 2017; Rosol, 2010). This is the case also for the motivation of public planning and facilitation of urban agriculture. The empirical emphasis here is within a Nordic context, with a strong welfare state.

We ask: What are the motivations for developing municipal public policy for urban agriculture in Oslo, Bergen, and Trondheim?

The focus of this text is on the municipality level, but the empirical investigation will show that all three cities have worked in strong cooperation and networks with the agricultural department of their respective county governors. Municipalities in Norway are responsible for delivering a range of public welfare services, including kindergartens, primary schools, health, integration and social security, and management of green spaces. The county governor is the state representative in the county, ensuring implementation of national policies at a local level. In this case, it has been the department for agriculture of the county governor’s that has been involved. The networking between dedicated individuals in these departments across the country has been highly instrumental to the development of public policy for urban agriculture in all three cities, and their motivation for doing so will be addressed further in this text.

3 Theoretical Approaches: Policy Programs and Discourses as Motivations for Public Policy

Public policies for urban agriculture can have many different motivations. The motivations are being anchored in particular policy programs and discourses, being one of the four dimensions influencing policy domain (Arts et al., 2006). The other dimensions are the actors and their coalitions, power, and influence over the policy domain. In this chapter, we will investigate the first dimension, the rationale, or the discourses behind interest in urban agriculture as a public policy domain. The other dimensions are discussed in the following chapter.

Policy programs and discourses refer to the views and narratives of the actors influencing a policy domain. Discourses can be understood as an institutionally founded ways to think and communicate (Arts et al., 2006).

On a general level, the municipalities’s motivations to support urban agriculture are much the same as growers’ motivations. Frequently mentioned is food, and food production, as well as social side of communal growing. Municipalities may also have other motivations, such as knowledge building and social inclusion. The public interest in urban agriculture may also differ from sector to sector depending on their area of responsibility, for example, educational departments are foremost interested in education while social services departments focus on integration or public health.

4 Methods

In this chapter, interviews and content analysis of planning documents are the primary methods for an investigation of public policies and planning in Oslo, Bergen, and Trondheim, which are three largest Norwegian cities (Fig. 11.1). In 2019–2020, the researchers interviewed 18 people including municipal urban agriculture coordinators, employees of the county governor, individuals engaged in voluntary movement, represemtants of farmers associations, social entrepreneurs, and a developer. The municipal contact persons for urban agriculture in all three cities were the first to be interviewed. The following interviewees have been selected through snowballing method, where the interviewees have suggested further persons to contact. Since urban agriculture policies have been in a continous development over the last years, we conducted follow-up interviews in 2021 with the urban agriculture coordinators in the municipalities. Due to Covid-19, two out of three interviews were conducted online, recorded and transcribed.

Fig. 11.1

The location of the discussed municipalities of Oslo, Bergen, and Trondheim, in Norway (Source: Wikimedia Commons. The picture is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license)

Interviewees also provided us with documents they considered as critical to a better understanding of the policy linkages of urban agriculture. In Oslo, this included the social element of the municipal master plan, the municipal strategy for urban agriculture, and the strategy for green roofs. In Bergen, this included the municipal strategy for urban agriculture and, in Trondheim, the hearing document for the municipal plan for agriculture. These documents have been analyzed qualitatively, but the strategic plans in Oslo and Bergen have also been analyzed quantitively (Bratberg, 2020). The quantitative analyses show the frequency of mention of concepts within documents. The concepts have been chosen based on a literature review on the multidimensional benefits of urban agriculture. This included the emphasis put on food and food production, social issues, urban development, voluntary activity, social entrepreneurship, and relation to peri-urban agriculture. The researchers also used an “in vivo” model to extract key words and phrases from interviews and the documents as codes, such as innovation and commercial urban growing (Saldaña, 2015).

5 Empirical Studies: Motivations for Public Policy

5.1 County Governors

Across Norway, employees in the county governor’s departments for agriculture observed the early grassroot initiatives within urban agriculture, and in 2009, they formed a network based on their interest these activities but also on their potential for the wider agricultural sector (Forsberg et al., 2019).

In the beginning, it was not explicitly expressed in their mandate to address urban agriculture, but in some counties, there was an interest in the possibilities it offered. In the network they formed, they worked with this policy field in different ways and with different starting points (Forsberg et al., 2019).

The background for this interest was the production of ecological, local food often on the intersection between peri-urban professional agriculture and the evolving interest in food growing among the urban population. They watched what was happening on a grassroot level and observed the emergence of multiple bottom up urban agriculture projects. For these early initiators of public policy, the reasons for supporting urban agriculture were as follows: urban agriculture could support the reputation of professional agriculture and then indirectly also support the protection of farmland. In addition, the general interest in food production could increase the recruitment of future farmers, an issue of concern within the agricultural sector. In this way, urban agriculture could support traditional agriculture. These arguments need to be understood within the Norwegian agricultural production context. At the national level, only 3% of the land is arable with a topography and a cold climate making agriculture “difficult” and costly and requiring substantial public subsidies. Continued public support for agricultural subsidies is important to the sector. Food security and civil protection are also important, as Norway is dependent on agricultural import. During crisis, lately under WW II, urban agriculture was a necessity, and every possible green space—gardens and parks—and unused land were used for agricultural purposes. So, one of the the arguments was that knowledge about growing would also be important in a civil protection perspective (Forsberg et.al 2019). In addition to these aspects, an argument for engaging in urban agriculture was connected to its benefits to urban development, such as enhancing attractiveness and biodiversity of green urban spaces and parks; and having positive impacts on climate change adaptation. Another important argument was related to health and social effects of urban agriculture, such as the facilitation of physical activity, creation of social meeting places, and social integration. Arguments related to economy emphasized aspects such as the innovation potential of urban agriculture, value creation, and social entrepreneurship (Forsberg et al., 2019).

6 The Cases: Urban Agriculture in Three of Norway’s Largest Urban Areas

The three cities vary with respect to size and are situated in very different regional contexts and relation to agriculture and food production (Table 11.1).

Table 11.1 Some characteristics of the three cities

6.1 Oslo

6.1.1 The Social Element of the Municipal Master Plan: “Municipal Societal Plan”—Motivations

Oslo is the only city among the three examined ones that mentions urban agriculture explicitly in the social element of the municipal master plan, further referred to as “the municipal societal plan.” The municipal societal plan is a formal high-level strategic planning document that sets out the city’s main priorities. For the period 2018–2040, mentions of urban agriculture suggest a clear political signal that urban agriculture is something the city wants to develop. The definition used in the plan is as follows:

Urban agriculture is animal husbandry and food production in the city—for example, in allotment gardens, private gardens, green lungs, backyards, and window sills, at visiting farms and on roofs. Often, social relations and meeting places, education, health, integration, entrepreneurship, food culture, biological diversity, and protection of farmland and green areas are more important than food production (Oslo municipality, 2019a p. 82).

This citation presents a wide spectrum of motivations, and it also states that these may be more important than food production. Urban agriculture can be a means to achieve something else, such as health, integration, meeting places, etc. This is also evident in the societal plan, where food and food production are hardly mentioned.

However, urban agriculture and circular resource management are an important part of the discussion on the “green city” (Oslo municipality, 2019a p. 18). In addition, urban agriculture is an important part of the development of “green meeting places,” which are “free and can offer peace and stillness are made on the inhabitants’ premises and adapted to the values of the local community” (Oslo municipality, 2019a p. 21). So, even if urban agriculture is at its core about cultivation, food production does not appear to be a central argument in the policy. Still urban agriculture is a central part of the development of “the green city” together with many other means to reach environmental goals and to create green meeting places.

At the time of writing this chapter, the formal municipal land-use plan has not been updated, so the effects of the stated interest in urban agriculture on land-use are not yet clear. However, Oslo has developed a separate strategy for urban agriculture and a guide for developers concerning the use of green roofs, addressing the potential for urban agriculture to be housed on rooftops.

6.1.2 Strategic Plan for Urban Agriculture: Motivations

The city councilor commissioned the Agency for Urban Development to produce a strategy for urban agriculture, adopted politically in 2019, emtitled. “Sprouting Oslo – Room for everyone in the city’s green spaces. A Strategy for urban Agriculture 2019-2030” (Fig. 11.2).

Fig. 11.2

Front page of Oslo’s strategic plan for Urban Agriculture. The picture shows Losæter- a center for urban agriculture in Oslo (Source: https://www.oslo.kommune.no/getfile.php/13398183-1614956203/Tjenester%20og%20tilbud/Natur%2C%20kultur%20og%20fritid/Urbant%20landbruk/BYM_SpirendeOslo_engelsk_A4_digital.pdf)

The strategy follows up on the ideas embedded in the municipal societal plan, with emphasis on the green city and the social aspects of urban agriculture. The first goal in the strategy is “a greener city” (Oslo municipality, 2019b p.4). The document acknowledges that there is competition over space and land availability for urban agriculture may be a challenge. However, the general need for green space, including finding green space for growing, is underlined. The second main goal is “short traveled food” (p. 9) where urban food production can contribute to national self-sufficiency. Also, commercial urban agriculture is mentioned, that is, hydroponics and possibilities for larger-scale production in connection to professional agriculture. The third goal, “sprouting meeting places” (p. 13), underlines the social aspects and the positive effects of urban agriculture for public health. The fourth goal underlines “green arenas for learning” (p. 17) in schools and kindergartens, The fifyh goal a “co-operating knowledge city” (p. 21), underlines the potentials for urban agriculture related innovations and new technologies for commercial growing, it also points out the objective to maintain and further develop cooperation with entrepreneurs and research institutions.

6.1.3 Green Roofs

The strategy for green roofs in Oslo recently developed by the city’s planning and building department (2022) is meant as guidance for developers when proposing new development. The document underlines four functions for green roofs: nature, water, energy, and health (Oslo municipality, 2022). It further elaborates on how green roofs are important for climate change adaptation by retaining water and increasing urban biodiversity, also pointing out that they are areas for renewable energy production, and offer potential spaces for recreation, mostly private but also public. This multiplicity of goals for green roofs reflects the competition for space in cities. Urban agriculture is mentioned as a part of the strategy but plays no big role in it.

6.2 Bergen

6.2.1 “Cultivate Bergen-Strategic Plan 2019–2023”: Ideas and Motivations for Urban Agriculture

The division for agriculture in Bergen municipality initiated the preparation of this strategic plan (Fig. 11.3). They previously administered a financing scheme for urban agriculture and they saw the need for more explicit political signals for the use of these means (Interview 9). Based on this, they suggested a strategic plan, which was approved politically. The division for agriculture developed the plan in close collaboration with growers, the division of agriculture in the county governor’s administration, and farmers’ associations. The process involved two well-attended public workshops for interested individuals and organizations (Bergen municipality, 2019). The plan was well received by the politicians and accepted without any changes in the text (Interview 9).

Fig. 11.3

Front page of the strategic plan for urban agriculture in Bergen. “Dyrk Bergen” (Cultivate Bergen). (Source: https://www.bergen.kommune.no/politikere-utvalg/api/fil/bk360/4816303/Dyrk-Bergen-Strategi-for-urbant-landbruk)

Urban agriculture in Bergen is firmly grounded within an urban development discourse. The city council wants Bergen to be “the greenest city in the country” as expressed in their political platform (Bergen municipality, 2019 p. 3). Urban agriculture is among several means to make the city “greener” and more “beautiful.” Urban agriculture is also a future-oriented means for reaching goals in climate and environment (ibid.s 3) and an important means to plan for the future smart city and to enable a climate-smart society. The city council’s vision is that Bergen shall be an active and attractive city enabling an environmentally friendly lifestyle (ibid. p. 3). The strategy connects urban agriculture to the UN sustainable goals (ibid. p. 5). The vision is:

Bergen is a sustainable city that shall be the greenest city in the country through enabling its citizens to cultivate their own food and to increase their knowledge about food production from soil to table. (Bergen municipality, 2019 p. 7)

When moving to more concrete goals for urban agriculture, food and social aspects become most prominent. The first main goal is that Bergen will protect agricultural land and improve food distribution systems and also biodiversity (ibid. p. 7). The subgoals include urban agriculture in parks and public spaces, allotments, pollinators friendly and edible plants in municipal green space management, protecting farmland, and establishing communal gardening in cooperation with professional agriculture. The second goal is to create social meeting places across different groups of the population with a number of subgoals (p. 8).

Urban agriculture is also described as a means in welfare provision, thus a means to reach internal goals for other departments in the municipality. The strategy mentions inclusion and language training, institutions dealing within care and social sector, and refers to the goal of improving life conditions in areas with low score on socioeconomic factors.

In addition to the need for political signals, the motivation for the strategy is also to organize further work. This includes “the need to work across the various sectors and departments within the municipality itself, but also to map out how to work with external partners” (p. 6). It is also acknowledged that cooperation with growers is essential to implement the prioritized actions.

6.3 Trondheim

6.3.1 Steering Logic and Choice of Planning Instruments: Networking and Co-Production

The municipality of Trondheim has not adopted a strategy for urban agriculture but has included urban agriculture in their plans and policies for agriculture in general. The interviews we conducted provide insights into the motivations for doing so. Lack of strategic plans has not hindered urban agriculture becoming popular, with a number of initiatives. The steering logic applied by the city is networking and co-production of policies. The main point for Trondheim municipality has been to ask the inhabitants for directions for development of policies and practice in supporting urban agriculture initiatives.

Don’t think about what the municipality needs, but rather what the inhabitants want. This is not a question of «participation» which in practice is only a meeting. The inhabitants should give directions to policy and practice. The important thing is to elucidate what the inhabitants want, not what is best for the municipality. This strategy has worked very well for us (Interview 10).

Indirectly there are some underlying goals. Urban agriculture has in its start been connected to inner-city urban space development. However, the experiences are that this has not been the direction urban agriculture has taken. There are hardly any initiatives in inner-city locations in Trondheim. On the contrary, the experience is that people want to grow where they live, in more suburban or indeed peri-urban locations (Interview 10). This also shows in the distribution of support for the financing scheme, where housing cooperatives, housing co-ownership, or neighborhood associations are the main receiver of grants.¹

6.3.2 Planning Program for Agriculture

Trondheim is about to develop a thematic municipal plan for agriculture, for the next ten years. The aim is to describe goals and strategies for municipal agricultural policy and the steps to be taken. However, the first step required by the planning law is to make a “planning program” setting out the main purpose of the plan. This “planning program” is meant for public scrutiny, to solicit peoples’ views on important elements that should be incorporated in the plan, as well as views on the planning processes. The thematic municipal plan targets ordinary, professional nonurban agriculture. However, it includes urban agriculture under the theme of Education, communication, and knowledge sharing. Interestingly, in this “plan-before-the-plan” document, urban agriculture is closely linked to citizen involvement, “co-producing” the city, traditional agriculture and “the green city.”

The document states the following goal: “The co-produced city: to investigate further how to make agriculture more visible through urban agriculture and make Trondheim visible as the green city” (Trondheim municipality, 2020 p. 9).

Trondheim municipality wants to stimulate cooperation between traditional and urban agriculture for knowledge sharing, promoting, and improving the standing of agriculture. Furthermore, the municipal actors acknowledges that urban agriculture secures social meeting places and spaces for citizen activism. The city has set in motion an initiative called Trondheim 3.0, with the aim to enhance citizen involvement, and urban agriculture is set into this discourse, as seen in the following citation.

The city council wants an increased citizen involvement. This necessitates new meeting places where allotment and community gardens, natural meeting places and low threshold activities are vital to stimulate the activity in the local community (Trondheim municipality, 2020 p. 9).

The document also calls for the establishment of low-threshold meeting places to enhance interaction and activities between people in the local community. There is also a clear intention to develop the urban populations’ ties with ordinary agriculture. This could be facilitated through an involvement of urban population in growing initiatives on farms (cooperative farming) or by stimulation of new forms of professional “urbanized” growing (market gardens), which are intensive gardens in or near urbanized areas with the main purpose to sell produce to the city’s population.²

The municipality wants small scale production and distribution to develop and identify measures available. (Trondheim municipality, 2020 p. 9).

Availability of land is also an element in the plan program, with the objective to identify possible areas for cooperative farming and market gardens. (Trondheim municipality, 2020 p. 9)

7 Quantitative Analysis of the Strategic Plans of Agriculture in Oslo and Bergen

We conducted a quantitative assessment of the strategic planning documents where we measured the frequency of appearing of selected concepts. These were chosen from state-of-the-art literature on the multidimensional character of urban agriculture. The analysis revealed an emphasis put on food and food production, social issues, urban development, voluntary activity, social entrepreneurship, innovation and commercial urban growing, and relation to peri-urban agriculture (Table 11.2). However, the content analyses and the interviews clearly indicated that urban agriculture is also considered as a means for achieving goals in other municipal sectors, including education, health, integration, and work training.

Table 11.2 Quantitative analysis of frequency of themes in the planning documents in Oslo and Bergen

7.1 The Content Analysis

The content analysis shows the high number of themes that urban agriculture is connected to (Table 11.3). The first clear motivation is that urban agriculture contributes to urban development, more specifically the Green city urban development. This is the case for both Oslo and Bergen where this goal figures at the top among all others. However, the quantitative analysis shows that this green city discourse is not mentioned as frequently as others. This seems reasonable since the documents do not discuss urban development per se, but the role urban agriculture plays in urban development. Green city can have a double meaning. On the one hand, green means being environmentally friendly, focusing on the provision of ecosystem services such as strengthening biodiversity, increasing the mount of pollinating plants, improving water retention, and general access to green areas. On the other hand, this means also literally “green” and refers to adding vegetation to the city. Since the Trondheim planning program only concerns agriculture, it is not surprising that urban development is not a topic for discussion.

Table 11.3 Overview over the main discourses and motivations in the planning documents

The second motivation is that all cities also frame urban agriculture within a food and food systems discourse, and the quantitative analysis clearly shows this. However, it should also be added that the societal plan for Oslo puts other motivations as perhaps more important. All cities refer to the aim of producing alternative channels of food distribution. However, the strongest connection to ordinary agriculture is found in Trondheim, where an important aim is to enhance the visibility and improve the image of traditional, nonurban agriculture, through the experiences of urban dwellers engaged with their own growing activities.

The third important dimension is urban agriculture as social meeting places as shown in the quantitative analysis. This is ranked high among the goals in both Oslo and Bergen. Urban agriculture increases social life in public spaces through providing social meeting places. It is underlined in both strategies that these should be meeting places across diverse groups of citizens.

The fourth dimension is the extended welfare dimension. Urban agriculture can also contribute to reach goals for the welfare state, by providing working opportunities for youth, an arena for language training and integration, by reaching goals in education about growing and plants as well as animal husbandry.

A fifth dimension is the role of citizens as actors in urban development, in other words, their active citizenship. According to Oslo policy documents, urban agriculture means that the inhabitants change their role in public space from being spectators to active participants. The Trondheim documents, in their very short sentences about urban agriculture, clearly say that urban agriculture can also further the politician’s ambitions to improve citizen involvement from participation into “co-creation” of the city. Thus, urban agriculture is also motivated by the desire to strengthen active citizenship.

8 Conclusion: Multidimensional Motivations for Public Policies for Urban Agriculture

What are the motivations for developing municipal public policy for urban agriculture in Oslo, Bergen, and Trondheim? And which discourses do the motivations expressed in each municipal context connect to? In this discussion, we will focus on Oslo and Bergen, since they have clearly expressed their motivations in urban agriculture-centered strategic plans that have been adopted by the respective city council. Trondheim has not formulated a clear strategy, but their “planning program” for a thematic municipal master plan gives some indications for their motivations. There were differences also between Oslo and Bergen’s policies. Oslo’s strategy does not include references to specific measures, focusing instead on setting broader goals, while Bergen’s included both aims and actions.

The analysis of the policy documents shows that support for urban agriculture has several motivations, following from the multidimensional character of urban agriculture: (i) urban “green” development, (ii) food production and food systems, (iii) social meeting places, (iv) means to attain goals in municipal welfare services, and (v) active citizenship. Despite limitations due to the differences across municipalities, our study shows that the motivations are the same, with some different weighting.

Urban agriculture is clearly embedded in a discourse about future city development, and this is particularly evident in Oslo and Bergen. In their strategies, it is the first goal (Oslo) and the whole framing for discussions of urban agriculture in Bergen: Bergen as the “greenest” city. A “green” city in this context can have different interpretation, “green” as environmentally friendly or “green” as enhancing the presence of vegetation in built environments, either as green structure or as integrated in buildings. The discussion in the strategies shows both interpretations, but particularly Bergen underlines the advantage of bringing more vegetation in the city, particularly in existing gray areas, also for aesthetical reasons (Grønnere og skjønnere (Greener and more beautiful)). This theme is also present in the strategy for green roofs in Oslo.

By definition, urban agriculture is about food production, and this forms an important part of the discourse on urban agriculture in cities. This is less evident in Oslo’s “Societal Plan,” which discusses whether other motivations may be more important. The food emphasis in urban agriculture is strongest in Trondheim. Here, the relationship to food production is a clear motivation for urban agriculture. As urban agriculture is a part of a plan of agricultural production more generally, this is not so surprising. Yet this also reflects the city’s location in one of Norway’s main areas for agricultural production. This also reflects the active role that farmers organizations play as providers of knowledge and the existence of financial mechanism in support of peri-urban agriculture.

All three cities are concerned with the social side of urban agriculture with emphasis of its role as a meeting place across groups, such as in Oslo with the emphasis on “green meeting places” in their strategy. Oslo, Bergen, and Trondheim have also been concerned with extending urban agriculture in the provision of municipal welfare services, in care facilities, in integration, or in the form of knowledge and education. This is shown not only in the planning documents but also in projects and to some degree in financial mechanisms (see Chapter 12).

Urban agriculture is also set into an ongoing discourse about co-creating the city, as shown particularly in Trondheim.

Most of these motivations are known from earlier literature, but it is interesting to note the emphasis on strengthening welfare service and on urban development. The municipalities are responsible for providing welfare services, as well as the wider urban development, and they clearly see a role for urban agriculture in these tasks. The activist element in urban agriculture is also appreciated in the form of enabling active citizenship and co-creation of the city.