Sustainable gardening

[1] Included within this are those home gardeners, and members of the landscape and nursery industries, and municipal authorities, that integrate environmental, social, and economic factors to create a more sustainable future.

Benefits of sustainable gardening also include improved access to fresh foods and biodiversity in cities.

Using the United Nations Brundtland Report’s definition of sustainable development as a model, it defines sustainability as:[4] ...design, construction, operations and maintenance practices that meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs by attempting to: ...protect, restore and enhance the ability of landscapes to provide ecosystem services that benefit humans and other organisms.There is no uniform national standard for a sustainable landscaping project in the USA.

Because sustainability is such a broad concept the environmental impacts of sites can be categorized in numerous ways depending on the purpose for which the figures are required.

As currently applied the environment is usually given priority over social and economic factors which may be added in or regarded as an inevitable and integral part of the management process.

A water collector at the EVA Lanxmeer housing development in Culemborg , Netherlands
Compost heap at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
An example of a property using xeriscaping . This method reduces the need for water which is often in limited supply in arid regions . [ 6 ]