In South Korea many people subsidize their diet by planting their own crops in small parcels of soil near their homes.
South Korea is an amazing example of high density housing development intermixed with intensive agriculture. Crops are often planted where westerners would plant grass. These gardens are planted continuously. Fast growing greens are soon replaced with sesame or onions. Rice fields are lined with corn crops. Peppers often are found in 10’by 10’ gardens along with gourds, beans and greens. Within days of harvest crops are replaced with a new crop. In the interval between the harvests and the replanting of the land, the soil is maintained with plastic sheeting or netting. The soil is not rich here; the rusty color indicates its alkaline nature. They are maintaining the soil they have, and utilizing small urban spaces to sustain themselves. But this trend is changing. Rural places have diminishing populations, and the new generations are more interested in technology than they are in agriculture. Like the rest of the world, the next generation of Koreans may lose much of the information that their parents and grandparents were dependent on.