Environmental Sustainability and Food Safety of the Practice of Urban Agriculture in Great Bandung
Sunardi Sunardi, Ismail Ghulam, Nadia Istiqomah, Kabul Fadilah, Kinanti Indah Safitri, Oekan S. Abdoellah
Abstract
Urban farming activities is markedly increasing with expectation to strengthen the food security in the cities, however, the crop safety and the environmental sustainability of farming activities is questioned.To address environmental sustainability, examination of river water quality and pesticide residue both in the water and crop production in periurban areas of Great Bandung were carried out.STORET index were used to identify the quality of water source with reference to Indonesia Ministry of Environment as well as the biodiversity index to ensure the health of aquatic ecosystem.The results showed that the urban farming practices had utilized clean and uncontaminated water sources to irrigate the land.The good quality of water sources could be maintained even after urban farming activities.The diversity of plankton and macrozoobenthos were relatively increasing, with low-medium level of diversity (H' index = 0.3 -2.9), even in the downstream areas after farming land.None of pesticide residues were found in the crop products.The crops from peri-urban farming of the Great Bandung were safely consumed.Meanwhile, the sustainability of urban farming in the peripheral areas of Great Bandung might be lasted so far as the upstream river pollution from the city could be well-maintained.