Urban Farms as Social and Resiliency Spaces in San Juan, Puerto Rico Following Hurricane Maria

Bibliographic Data

ID21373769
AuthorsAna Zepeda (University of California, Davis, corresponding author), Maria C Ortíz-Rivera (Universidad Ana G. Méndez), Clare E B Cannon (0000-0002-5507-5312, University of California, Davis), Arthur Crump (0000-0002-9710-2956, University of California, Davis)
Year2026
Volume78
Issue1
Pages69-76
Publication date2026-01-02
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe Professional Geographer (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0033-0124 • E-ISSN: 1467-9272
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/00330124.2025.2569073
OpenAlexW4415525137
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited16

Puerto Rico imports most of its food. In 2017, it was estimated the archipelago imported 90 to 95 percent of its food (Carro-Figueroa Citation2002; Robles and Ferré-Sadurní Citation2017). As a result, the few urban farms (huertos urbanos) provide some of the only locally produced fresh produce for Puerto Ricans. In 2017, Hurricane Maria struck the island of Puerto Rico and devastated agricultural production, including urban farms. In this article, urban farms are conceptualized as social infrastructure to analyze their significance in communities. This research, conducted in July 2019, investigates how women experienced the impacts of Hurricane Maria on their urban farms. Social infrastructure theory influenced the way we analyzed data and feminist standpoint theory informed the methodology used in our research. The findings demonstrate that many women enjoy urban farming and that it provides fresh and healthy produce for their families and communities. Almost all the women farmers experienced a decline in participation of volunteers a few years after the establishment of the huertos urbanos and even more after Hurricane Maria. Many women, however, described the huertos urbanos as very important for the community—as a space for food cultivation and production as well as community gathering

Geographer · Hurricane katrina · Livelihood · Natural disaster · Urbanization · Urban Agriculture and Sustainability

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