Rooftop farming in Ecosystem Service

 Rooftop farming a part of Urban farming is considered to be of utmost importance in the present context. Rooftop gardening is also a high demand approach in urban terrain due to limited land. The benefit of rooftop/ urban farming is highlighted nowadays in terms of ecosystem services. Ecosystem services mainly include food supply, daily nutritional requirements, greenery in the environment, support in the food chain in case of small home garden practices in an urban area.

The sequestration of atmospheric carbon dioxide by the plants in the urban area is also providing support in climate change as an adoption strategy. A recent study in Pokhara revealed that carbon sequestration value was found to be $97 ha^-1.[1] Also the improvement in air quality, food quality. Rooftop farming nowadays has been taken as a part of sustainable agriculture for a sustainable environment.

This technique of utilizing a low amount of area for farming helps to solve food security problems in urban areas. If we focus on the management of farms with the present situation on food security problems like on corona outbreak. Rooftop farming is quite beneficial for management and utilization. Also, daily requirements are being fulfilled by our roofs. The cost of a rooftop farm establishment is also not high. An average $20-$50 is on average to maintain the roof in the Nepalese context.

The ecosystem services of the neglected and unaware rooftop have a potential role to solve food security problems and meet the daily nutritional requirements. In present days, I am working on creating awareness regarding urban farming (rooftop farming) by studying the statement of the problem in the study area and factors affecting to establish a rooftop farm. Our study reported that lack of training and occupation of respondents were to be affected in rooftop farming. The majority of the respondents have fear of roof damage and a heavy load to the roof is preventing the installation of rooftop farms [2].

Thus we are creating awareness about the rooftop farm and highlighting its importance in the present context of coronavirus attack and country lockdown situation, as its potential to provide nutritional support.

I hope this might be useful and we all should aware all of us around us in promoting rooftop gardening as a solution to an urban food security problem.

 (numbers in the parenthesis corresponds to references)

References

[1]        J. R. Kumar, B. Natasha, K. Suraj, S. A. Kumar, and K. Manahar, “Rooftop Farming: an Alternative To Conventional Farming for Urban Sustainability,” Malaysian J. Sustain. Agric., vol. 3, no. 1, pp. 39–43, 2019.

[2].     S. Thapa. Survey on people's attitudes and constraints of rooftop                farming in Dhulikhel Municipality, Nepal. date of survey 12^th Feb-             13 March. (unpublished).