Urban Agriculture as a Sustainability Transition Strategy for Shrinking Cities? Land Use Change Trajectory as an Obstacle in Kyoto City, Japan

• Published in: Sustainability Vol. 10; no. 4; p. 1048
• Main Authors: Oda, Kimisato, Rupprecht, Christoph, Tsuchiya, Kazuaki, McGreevy, Steven
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Basel MDPI AG 02.04.2018
• Subjects: Agricultural land; Cities; Food processing; Food production; Land use; Population decline; Satellite imagery; Sustainability; Sustainable agriculture; Urban agriculture; Japan
• DOI: 10.3390/su10041048
• ISSN: 2071-1050

Can shrinking cities harness population decline to improve their sustainability by repurposing land use, for example, for localizing food production? Whether such a transition is feasible depends on the pre-shrinkage state of urban agricultural land use, including ongoing trends in local land use change. This study examined agricultural land use from 2007-2017 in Kyoto City, Japan. Kyoto is on the brink of a large projected population decline (~190,000 or ~13% until 2040) and serves as a representative for a large number of regional Japanese cities in a similar situation. Analysis was based on a public 2007 land use data set, aerial and satellite imagery and ground truthing. Results showed a decline of 209 ha or 10% in agricultural land use over ten years, but also highlight the diversity of ongoing agricultural land use types not captured by standard categories. The main post-agricultural land uses were residential (40%) and vacant land (28%). These results have implications for planning and policy. Kyoto City is currently not set to benefit from the projected shrinking process through localizing food production, despite a tradition of vegetable production. Future research should analyze drivers of change for observed agricultural land use.