In her bright pink shoes and elegant black trouser suit, Margarita Koledzinskich looks out of place among the potatoes and marrows of her vegetable patch.

But three times a week she drives out from her home in the industrial city of Chelyabinsk in Russia's Ural region to tend to her potatoes and the marrows, as well as her tomatoes, peppers, pumpkins and leeks, along with apple and cherry trees.

Ms Koledzinskich and Yevgeny Usov, her husband, are among increasing numbers of urban Russians who are responding to the country's economic crisis by turning to vegetable growing for the first time. They are joining seasoned gardeners who are increasing their output to feed their families and sell the surplus in markets or roadside stalls

The rush to the land is a traditional response to economic crisis, which is far more familiar to Russians, Ukrainians and other east European than to westerners. East European have only to go back to the 1990s to remember the habits that can help poorer people survive difficult times. Most west Europeans would have to reach back to the second world war and Americans to the 1930s.

As Russia's economy contracts, garden centres across the nation report sharp increases in sales of vegetable seeds - and a significant decline in turnover in flower seeds, as growers switch from peonies to potatoes.

"We decided we didn't have enough money. Yevgeny lost his job and I have not been paid since February. There is a crisis, so you have to do something," says Ms Koledzinskich, who works as an accountant at a security company. She is particularly concerned about making the loan repayments for her new Volkswagen Passat. "It's the best car I have ever had. In the past, I have always driven girls' cars - a Polo and a Jetta. But this is a real man's car."

Along with half of all Russian urban householders, Ms Koledzinskich and Mr Usov own a dacha - a plot of land on the outskirts of a city, often sharing a site with hundreds of similar plots. In wealthy places, dachas are almost entirely given over to weekend houses, sometimes with tennis courts and swimming pools. Elsewhere, modest wooden chalets and lawns are common. But poorer people often use much of their land to grow food to supplement meagre salaries and pensions.

Ms Koledzinskich's plot is one of about 1,000 on Chelyabinsk's Sputnik dacha site, which is wedged between a highway and a railway line. Prime property it is not. But for the dacha owners, it provides some living space outside their often cramped city flats. Some plots are marked by tidy rows of potato plants and fruit trees. Others are a jumble of fences, canes and creepers. Ms Koledzinskich says some owners have long grown vegetables, notably pensioners who remember going hungry during the second world war and its aftermath. But others, like her, have only just started.

"It was funny. When we first dug holes to plant potatoes, we had no idea. So we put five seed potatoes into each hole instead of one to grow more. My parents laughed when I told them. Let's see what happens," says Ms Koledzinskich. She says she likes the work and is determined to produce as much fresh food as possible for her disabled nine-year-old son. Normally, Sputnik is a peaceful place, save for the sounds of the road traffic and trains. But for a few hours on Wednesdays, Saturday and Sundays - the times when the water supply is switched on - there are crowds around the stand pipes, which supply Sputnik with water, as the dacha owners queue to water their plots before the taps are turned off.

The proportion of dacha owners growing food has risen from 72 per cent in 2005 to 81 per cent, this year, according to the Russian Public Opinion Research Centre, a polling company. Olga Kamenchuk, the company's international relations director, says newcomers to vegetable growing are mostly to be found in smaller cities and towns and not in Moscow or St Petersburg. But everywhere, including in Moscow, people who were already growing vegetables are growing more.

"Hobby growers are now growing to feed themselves and their families and sometimes to produce to sell because of the crisis," said Ms Kamenchuk.

In the Kemerovo coal-mining region, in western Siberia, Aman Tuleev, the governor, has announced that he is planting potatoes this year and has urged his citizens to follow suit. Those who do not have land can apply for a free plot. Vasily Zacharyashev, a national MP, has urged Dmitry Medvedev, Russia's president, to respond to the economic crisis and extend the free land policy across the whole country.

In Kazan, central Russia, Vladimir Mazo, the head of Dacha World, a garden centre company, says that last year only seasoned growers were buying seed potatoes and leek seeds. "Now, these goods are in general demand," he says. The company estimates that seed potato sales have jumped 2½ times since last year. Leek seed sales have doubled.

In St Petersburg, the Orchard and Garden store reports "significant increases" in vegetable seed sales and a 20 to 30 per cent decline in turnover in flower seeds. "Many people are not going for beauty when they don't have enough money for food," says a spokesman.