Integrating agriculture into European urban landscapes matters: A systematic assessment

Urban agriculture has emerged as a pathway to enhance food security, improve urban resilience, and reduce the environmental impact of food systems. However, its potential across cities remains underexplored. This study offers a systematic evaluation of the potential for low-tech, open-air, soil-based urban vegetable production in European cities, examining its role in meeting local food demand and contributing to sustainability goals. Leveraging geospatial, demographic, and climate data, we assess the availability of rooftop and ground-based urban spaces suitable for cultivation across 840 cities in 30 European countries for 2018 under three land-use intensity scenarios. We estimate that 4551–7586 km 2 of urban land could be allocated to vegetable cultivation, yielding 11.8–19.8 million tons annually, equivalent to roughly one-third of the reported vegetable production in the analyzed countries. Our findings reveal substantial opportunities to integrate vegetable production into urban landscapes, with pronounced spatial variation driven by differences in urban density, land availability, and climatic conditions. Our results highlight both the potential and the structural limits of urban agriculture as a complement to existing food systems and underscore the importance of spatially informed policy interventions to support sustainable urban food planning across Europe. • Urban agriculture can supply 28% of the vegetable demand for 190M European residents. • Rooftop and ground-based cultivation areas vary across city sizes and densities. • Up to 20 MT of vegetable demand in Europe can be met through urban agriculture. • Climate and urban structure control production and self-sufficiency potential.