Present Scenario and Problem Confrontation of Rooftop Gardening and its Efficacy in Ambient Environment Reclamation in Khulna City

Abstract

In the urban area there is scarce of land for planting trees and cultivating agricultural crops. Rooftop gardening might be an alternative to overcome this land problem. The study was conducted to identify the present scenario of rooftop gardening in Khulna city, problems related to this sector and its effects on the ambient environment. Sixty respondents were selected randomly from the study area viz. Nirala and Sonadanga of Khulna City in Bangladesh. Data were collected during March to April of 2018 on nine selected characteristics of the respondent as age, educational qualifications, family size, experience in rooftop gardening, organizational participation, annual income, extension contact, cosmopoliteness and knowledge on rooftop gardening along with a dependent variable as problem confrontation in rooftop gardening. Information on present scenario of rooftop gardening in Khulna city were collected on the parameters such as year of initiation of rooftop gardening, total roof area, suitable roof area for gardening, roof area under gardening, total production, gross and net income from the garden, total expenditure, purpose of rooftop gardening, types of plants grown, intercultural practices, infestation and control of insect and diseases and fertilizers applied. Environmental reclamation of rooftop gardening was determined on the basis of temperature CC), relative humidity (0/0) and light intensity (lux) in the rooftop under gardening. Highest proportion (41.67%) of the respondents initiated rooftop gardening recently (i.e. during 2010-2015). The roof area under gardening is small (fl 000 ft2) in most of the cases (65%). The rooftop gardeners get very poor economic benefit from the garden compared to bearing large expenditure for it. Most of the respondent prefer rooftop garden as a hobby (98.3%) and aesthetics (90%), but, more than half (51.7%) of the respondents considered it as an aspects Of ecological balance. Vegetables (16.6%) and flowers (12.5%) are the most dominating plants in the study area for rooftop gardens. Main intercultural operations are being practiced in rooftop garden includes irrigation, weeding, training/pruning and control of insects and diseases. Common insects found are ant, mealy bug, and green leaf hopper with the diseases of die back, viral disease, leaf curling and leaf scorching. Common fertilizers used in the study area were cow dung, compost, urea muriate of potash and sesame cake. Excessive heat (91.7%), lack of proper nourishment (87.1%) and roof load (72.9%) were the most severe problems. Among the 9 selected characteristics only age of the respondents showed significant positive relationship with problem confrontation. Besides, weather parameters showed positive impacts in case of green roof than empty roof. Thus the overall results indicate great contributions of rooftop gardening in urban areas in terms of environmental reclamation.