By Emily Willox
While sustainability has been a hot topic for a couple of years now, many may not be aware of just how simple some practices can be in helping to push our world closer towards meeting the UN’s global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Although not legally binding, the beauty behind the SDGs lies in their interconnectedness. This means that achieving one goal will cause a positive spillover into another, and so on, increasing sustainability as more goals are met.
The nature of these knock-on effects encourages society to think and act with sustainability at the forefront of its decision-making processes. In doing so, positive externalities will simultaneously seep into the various other aspects of life. Whether this is through improved health, increased equality, sustainable economic growth or reducing climate change, the Sustainable Development Goals offer us a globally recognised pathway towards a more sustainable future.
Whether you are a beginner, intermediate or advanced gardener, you have the ability to contribute more than you may realise towards achieving the SDGs, and we’re going to tell you exactly why.
A Brief Introduction to the SDGs
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were adopted by all 193 United Nations Member states in 2015, as an urgent call to foster peace and partnership between societal stakeholders to promote prosperity between people and the environment. Combined, all 17 of these goals set out to cover the social, economic and environmental dimensions of sustainable development. By integrating major social players from different sectors, including governmental agencies, private companies, and civil society, everyone was offered a seat at the table to discuss new sustainable frameworks, ensuring that no one was left behind in the journey to sustainability. Although this is a universally recognised agenda, the global success of the SDGs can only be as successful as those that are completed at a local level, hence the reason for this blog.
Why Gardening Matters
As a rewarding and practical way to contribute towards a healthier environment, the importance of gardening for sustainable development can often be overlooked due to the local level at which it is practised. Actions that may seem small and localised in terms of wider environmental initiatives may, in fact, lay the groundwork for societies to become greener. This is particularly true in the case of urban settings where green spaces are already limited.
In densely populated cities, reduced access to outdoor spaces for either recreational or gardening purposes has a serious impact on the surrounding biodiversity and nearby ecosystems. The flow of nature is constrained, local wildlife face additional threats with temperature increases, there is a lack of natural food & water sources, and there are less opportunities for sustainable consumption and production.
Gardening has been identified as a strong argument for reducing the impacts of agriculture intensification and urbanisation, with findings showing an improvement in human health, food quality, ecosystem resilience and biodiversity conservation as a result. So, what exactly can your garden do?
How Your Garden Can Help
Gardening intersects across several Sustainable Development Goals – Zero Hunger, Good Health and Well-being and Responsible Consumption and Production. With the SDGs, it is important that each goal’s positive externalities feed into another. For instance, in order to reach Zero Hunger, frameworks implemented in responsible consumption and production may underline more sustainable practices within the agricultural activities.
For instance, to reach Zero Hunger (SDG 2), frameworks could be implemented that encourage Responsible Consumption and Production (SDG 12) i.e., reducing waste within the agricultural sector. In turn, this will invite more sustainable practices to be adopted, thus reducing stress and improving Good Health and Well-being (SDG 3) through increased food security.
In horticulture, an approach that enacts this interconnected way of thinking is a technique called closed loop gardening. The primary purpose of this practice is to use all by-products from everyday life, taking any waste outputs from one process and using them as an input for another. Ultimately, this eliminates external inputs other than those that nature provides.
This technique holds a similar ethos to that of the circular economy, a practice that Caledonian Horticulture are proud to champion through the recycling of green waste into high-quality, peat-free products that help nourish new growth. We believe in pushing progress through our practices, production and products keeping sustainability at the heart of what we do.
Closed loop gardening creates a self-sustaining ecosystem where waste is recycled back into the garden and used as a resource, this could be as simple as rainwater harvesting, using no-dig techniques, taking kitchen scraps for compost or even saving and replanting seeds. The idea is to use what you are growing and ensure any by-products are put toward a new resource, thus creating a cycle of sustainable gardening.
Not only is this rewarding as a gardener in being able to accumulate more for less, but it also deeply empowers individuals through their ability to take a hands-on approach in directly mitigating climate change and enhancing biodiversity by turning their personal spaces into ecological solutions. The benefits of gardening in meeting our SDGs go one step further, offering a wealth of positive effects on the environment, and better yet linking to improved health and well-being in gardeners – both mentally and physically.
Building Sustainable Habits, Inside and Out
It has been found that even direct visual contact with flowers, green plants and wood alone can have positive effects on brain activity. Gardening has been connected to heightening human resilience, improving emotional regulation, increasing confidence and physical activity.
Contact with nature in home gardening directly influences our ability to handle stressful situations, with evidence showing that we become more adaptable to adverse conditions or unexpected changes as a result. Influencing more than just effects on the environment, gardening strengthens mental health and our ability to deal with complex or uncertain situations in life. This is particularly crucial as we currently live in such a turbulent period, with climate change challenges becoming more apparent by the day.
Our ability to nurture solutions that prioritise bottom-up solutions begins with collaboration, clarity and a resilient mindset. Particularly when addressing modern challenges like climate change to ensure we enact frameworks that prosper long term sustainability, creating a safe environment for future generations.
Gardening for a Sustainable Future
Life is inherently interconnected, which is why this is such a critical feature of the SDGs. They represent the importance of collaboration through global initiatives seeking to fight for a sustainable future and the importance of supporting this movement at a local level – and we’ve found gardening to be one of the easiest, most enriching ways to embody this.
Intersecting across various SDGs from zero hunger to health and well-being, it is clear that gardening not only seeks to encourage sustainable practices through waste reduction and responsible agriculture, but it also aids the resilience and mental capacity of those carrying out these activities.
Sustainability is a way of life, not a trend, and it’s certainly a process not going anywhere. It doesn’t take perfection; it takes practice, and the sooner you realise your garden has a larger role to play in the fight for a sustainable future, the better.
Follow along on our journey:
