Abstract
Amidst the global discourse on the identification of strategic land, there has been a growth
in planning support systems aimed at assisting policymakers in unlocking the value of strategic land.
Despite planning support systems’ immense benefit of aiding planning, there are limited planning
support tools to aid communities in marginalised areas to unlock the value of land. Therefore, this
study adopts a GIS-based approach to develop a planning support system to identify, quantify and
visualise an index for urban agricultural land in a marginalised area. The proposed solution utilised
Greater Orange farm, a marginalised area in the City of Johannesburg, as a case study to inform spatial
planning for emerging economies. Using the Charrette visioning process, indigenous knowledge
systems were incorporated in formulating the criteria, weights, and rulesets. The results reveal spatial
sites ranked through an index where sustainable investment in urban agriculture infrastructure should
be targeted. The developed index identifies suitable locations for urban agriculture infrastructure
and supporting programs. Furthermore, the solution builds from the existing reservoir of PSS
in Southern Africa by demonstrating the potential for planning support systems as sustainable
data-based decision-making tools to inform spatial planning. Lessons emerging from this study
are that there is an inseparable existential connection between indigenous knowledge systems and
contemporary sustainability planning, which is critical for ensuring sustainable development