Horticulture has a wide range of benefits in several different areas of our world, including for our health and well-being, for urban areas, the environment and the economy.

In terms of health and well-being, horticulture can improve our lives greatly:

• Parks and other green spaces provide space for people to get out into the fresh air and to have space for outdoor exercise
• If there is green space near your home, it reduces stress, anxiety and mental health issues
• For those who garden in community gardens, there is improved social skills, better mental health, a sense of community and, if fruit and vegetables are grown, they also help provide a healthy diet
• Children who have access to parks/green space have better self esteem. If their school has green space within or around it, cognitive development is improved
• Eating more fruit and vegetables, whether grown at home or produced on farms and sold in the supermarket, is always good for your health, helping to reduce the likelihood of diseases like cardiovascular disease and cancer

In urban areas, the green space available can help in improving social cohesion, with trust, belonging and acceptance between members of the community enabling social interactions to take place.

Environmentally, horticulture can have a large impact through the provision of urban green spaces:

• Urban green spaces reduce the surrounding temperatures of the area that they sit within-grass can reduce the surface temperature by twenty four degrees Celsius, while trees can reduce the surface temperature by around nineteen degrees Celsius when compared with a concrete surface
• Reduce flood risks. The more green space there is (and this includes our gardens too), the more water gets absorbed into the ground, meaning there is less water running over roads and pavements into the stormwater system.
• Filter out air-borne particulate matter
• Provide habitat and food for wildlife
• Filter pollutants from water
• Deactivate chemical compounds in the soil

All the benefits above are brought about through our parks and green spaces being well maintained and cared for by good gardening staff. This can often be the area that lets us down, as all of the above can save money in the long term, by reducing the use of the healthcare system for example, but in many countries the amount spent on park maintenance has reduced. To me, that is false economy when there can be so many benefits. This is especially true when horticulture adds to a nations GDP.

Contributions to the economy do include all money made from sales of fruit and vegetables and garden nursery sales (whether plants or gardening tools). All horticultural sector workers, whether farmers, gardeners, designers or retail staff in nurseries all pay taxes and spend their wages in the rest of the economy, further aiding it. Tourism also contributes as many people, whether national or international garden visitors will pay to visit high profile gardens.

While there are downsides to horticulture (which will be covered in a future post), there are many benefits to the industry too. We can all enjoy plants in some form and the way we do this may vary, but I think that is a positive too as variety is healthy.

Cameron, R. W. F., Hitchmough, J. D. (2016) Environmental Horticulture: Science and Management of Green Landscapes. Wallingford: CABI. Chapters two and three.

 Chalmin-Pui, L. S., Roe, J., Griffiths, A., Smyth, N., Heaton, T., Clayden, A., Cameron, R. (2021) “It made me feel brighter in myself”- The health and well-being impacts of a residential front garden horticultural intervention. Landscape and Urban Planning 205: 1-12 [online]

Dadvand, P., Nieuwenhuijsen, M. J., Esnaola, M., Forns, J., Basagana, X., Alvarez-Pedrerol, M., Rivas, I., Lopez-Vicente, M., De Castro Pascual, M., Su, J., Jerret, M., Querol, X., and Sunyer, J. (2015) Green spaces and cognitive development in primary school-children. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA 112, 7937-7942

Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (2022) Horticulture Statistics-2021 [Online] http://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/latest-horticulture-statistics Accessed 16/10/22

Dobson, J., Harris, C., Eadson, W., Gore, T. (2019) Space to Thrive [Online] https://parksforLondon.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/HLF-space-to-thrive-2019-a-rapid-evidence-review-of-the-benefits-of-parks-and-green-spaces.pdf. Accessed 10/11/2022

Eadson, W., Harris, C., Parkes, S., Speake, B., Dobson, J., Dempsey, N. (n.d.) Why should we invest in Parks? [Online] https://www.heritagefund.org.uk/publications/parks-people-why-should-we-invest-parks [Online] Accessed 10/11/2022

Finlay, J., & Ward, M., 2020 Food security: What is it and how is it measured? House of Commons Library [Online] https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/science/environment/food-security- what-is-it-and-how-is-it-measured Accessed 09/11/2022

Jennings, V., &Bamkole, O., (2019) The Relationship Between Social Cohesion and Urban Green Space. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 16: 452-466 [Online] https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/16/3/452/htm Accessed 12/11/2022

Nam, J., & Dempsey, N., (2019) Place-keeping for Health? Charting the Challenges for Urban ParkManagement in Practice. Sustainability 11 (16): 4383 [Online] https://doi.org/10.3390/su11164383 Accessed 13/11/2022

Office for National Statistics (2019) UK Natural Capital: Urban Accounts [Online] https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/environmentalaccounts/bulletins/uknaturalcapital/urbanaccounts. Accessed 15/11/2022

Oxford Economics (2018) The Economic Impact of Ornamental Horticulture and Landscaping in the UK [Online] https://www.oxfordeconomics.com/recent-releases/3b5ce883-cc72-4cf9-910e-be267fe93f46. Accessed 15/11/2022

Wenqi Lin, Yu Ting, Xiangqi Chang, Weijia Wu, Yue Zhang, (2015) Calculating cooling extents of green parks using remote sensing: method and test, Landscape and Urban Planning, 134: 66-75.

All photos are my own.