Abstract

Although global awareness of environmental challenges is increasing, modern healthcare systems marginalize nature-based healing practices. This paper advocates for a renewed integration of healthcare and the natural world by highlighting the cultural, historical, and scientific foundations of natural healing. Through a multidisciplinary synthesis spanning ethnobotany, public health, and ecological psychology, we examine how home gardens serve as practical embodiments of an eco-surplus culture—a worldview that positions nature as foundational to human well-being and planetary sustainability. Home gardens offer measurable health benefits, such as stress reduction, immune enhancement, biodiversity conservation, and climate resilience. Drawing on diverse case studies—from Indigenous land-based healing to immigrant communities preserving ethnomedicine—we show how gardening fosters physical, psychological, and cultural health. The paper concludes by proposing integrative care models that align biomedical treatments with nature-based interventions and calls for policy innovations that recognize gardens as essential health infrastructure. Reimagining home gardens in this way opens new pathways toward more holistic, equitable, and sustainable approaches to wellness.