Re-conceptualizing urban agriculture: an exploration of farming along the banks of the Yamuna River in Delhi, India Jessica Cook • Kate Oviatt • Deborah S. Main • Harpreet Kaur • John Brett Accepted: 5 July 2014 Ó Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2014 Abstract The proportion of the world’s population living in urban areas is increasing rapidly, with the vast majority of this growth in developing countries. As growing popu- lations in urban areas demand greater food supplies, cou- pled with a rise in rural to urban migration and the need to create livelihood options, there has been an increase in urban agriculture worldwide. Urban agriculture is com- monly discussed as a sustainable solution for dealing with gaps in the local food system, and proponents often high- light the many social, environmental, and economic ben- efits. We argue that the sustainability of urban agriculture should not be assumed. There is a need for research to take a bottom-up approach, exploring the influence that city- level conditions have on livelihood decisions by farmers and how this shapes the practice of urban agriculture. This paper uses a case study for an in-depth look at urban agriculture in Delhi, India to understand from the farmers’ perspective how urban agriculture is practiced and what factors influence farmers’ livelihood decisions. Using a team-based, multi-method Rapid Assessment Process, data were collected through preliminary key informant inter- views, field observations, semi-structured interviews with urban farmers, and geographic information systems mapping. This research provides an in-depth description of market-oriented urban agriculture in a developing country, explores how farmers’ livelihood decisions are embedded in the urban context, and discusses the potential of urban agriculture as a sustainable city-system. Keywords Urban agriculture Á Developing countries Á Local food system Á Rapid Assessment Process (RAP) Abbreviations BOD Biochemical oxygen demand DDA Delhi Development Authority GIS Geographic information system RAP Rapid assessment process Introduction The proportion of the world’s population living in urban areas is increasing dramatically; as of 2007, more people live in urban than rural areas (UNFPA 2007). It is predicted that by 2030 the worldwide population of urban dwellers will be nearly five billion (UNFPA 2007), with approxi- mately 92 % residing in developing countries (UNICEF 2009). This trend towards urbanization has important economic, social, and political implications. Spurred by economic growth, cities can provide increased access to employment, education, healthcare, goods and services, and cultural and intellectual development. Conversely, rapid urbanization is often associated with a number of social and environmental challenges: cities may not have adequate infrastructure to keep up with expanding popu- lations creating social problems related to poverty and J. Cook (&) Á K. Oviatt Á D. S. Main Department of Health and Behavioral Sciences, University of Colorado Denver, Campus Box 188, PO Box 173364, Denver, CO 80217-3364, USA e-mail: jessica.a.cook@ucdenver.edu H. Kaur School of Environmental Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, India J. Brett Department of Anthropology, University of Colorado Denver, Denver, CO, USA 123 Agric Hum Values DOI 10.1007/s10460-014-9545-z