Editorial: Balancing the Positive and Negative Health Impacts

Karen Lock & René van Veenhuizen

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

Urban agriculture can have both negative and positive effects on the health and environmental conditions of the urban population. Previous reviews or studies of health issues have tended to highlight the health risks of urban and periurban agriculture (e.g. Birley and Lock 1999). This has served to reinforce the perceptions of many governments and municipal authorities that urban agriculture is a (marginal) activity that has substantial health risks and should not be supported.

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Mitigating the Health Risks Associated with Urban and Periurban Agriculture

Karen Lock & Henk de Zeeuw

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

This article focuses on the discussion from the UPA, Health and Environment session of the E-conference. The effects of UPA on the environment were also discussed but will not be included here.

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Mitigating the Health Risks Associated with Urban and Periurban Agriculture.pdf	274.61 KB

Food Policies are Essential for Healthy Cities

Robert M. Pederson & Aileen Robertson

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

Food production and its retail sales are increasingly perceived to be presenting risks to society in Europe. Consumers are concerned, and have lost trust and confidence in their food supply. Policies are therefore needed to limit the risks and to promote the assets of different means of food production and distribution, as well as to restore consumer confidence.

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Designing a Research Agenda on Malaria and Agriculture

Designing a Research Agenda on Malaria and Agriculture

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

During the last several decades, a considerable investment of financial resources has been directed towards the development of curative drugs and vaccines against malaria, and to the evaluation of chemical insecticides for mosquito control. Historically, the agricultural dimension has received little attention from the research community, despite its importance as a contributory factor to malaria transmission risks and its inherent opportunities for paradoxically minimising such risks. The incorporation of a relevant health component in agricultural research could contribute to the identification of opportunities for minimising malaria risks through agriculturally-based interventions, both in rural and in urban and periurban settings. The CGIAR system-wide initiative on malaria and agriculture (SIMA) co-ordinated by IWMI (see Networking Section in this issue) has taken up this challenge.

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Pesticide Soil Contamination: a Case Study from Perth, Western Australia

Andrea Gaynor

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

The safety of food produced in urban agriculture depends on a number of factors, including the history of persistent toxic chemicals applied to an area. Using the application of organochlorine pesticides in Perth, Western Australia as a case study, this article examines the problems that can arise when urban agriculture is scattered throughout a metropolitan area, and carried out by people who often have little detailed knowledge of how land in the area has historically been treated, and therefore what kinds of soil contamination might be present. The article concludes with recommendations for health and local government workers, which could help to ensure that households are aware of the potential health risks associated with food production in urban areas, and are able to act to minimise those risks.

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Supporting Farmers towards Safe Year-round Vegetables in Periurban Manila

J.R. Burleigh & L.L. Black

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

Manila typifies the best and the worst of Asian cities. Affluent residential areas with functional sewerage and regular waste collection border squalid areas of cardboard shacks with no amenities. High-rise office and apartment buildings in the municipality of Makati stand in contrast to the squatter areas in Taguig, Muntinlupa, and Mandaluyong.The collapse of the Payatas garbage dump in August 2000 and the deaths of at least 220 squatters who lived at the dump site to scavenge discarded refuse are symptomatic of urban blight and poverty which threaten civility, governance and life itself.

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Zoonoses of Dairy Cattle, with Reference to Africa

Pia Muchaal

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

Zoonoses are infections naturally transmitted between vertebrate animals and humans, either directly or indirectly through the consumption of contaminated foods. Traditional zoonotic diseases for which effective control measures and cures are available in affluent countries, are still a cause of morbidity and mortality in humans and animals in developing countries (Wastling et al. 1999, Cosivi et al. 1995). Increasing urbanisation, the growth of livestock production in close proximity to humans, the rising rate of HIV, inadequate hygienic practices, and cultural customs and beliefs exacerbate the transmission, persistence and impact of zoonotic diseases in these regions.

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Public Health Issues of Wastewater-fed Aquaculture

Peter Edwards

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

Farming fish in ponds fertilised with urban wastewater or sewage is not widespread although it does benefit millions of people, particularly in China, India and Vietnam. It provides food and employment, particularly for the poor, and more general environmental benefits such as low-cost wastewater treatment, stormwater drainage and provision of green areas or "lungs" which improve the health and well-being of urban residents.

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Reducing Health Risks of Urban Organic Solid Waste Use

Christine Furedy

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

Whereas health concerns received little attention at the beginning of the thrust to promote urban and periurban agriculture in the past five years, progress has been made in articulating the health issues in developing countries. This paper comments further on one aspect related to the issue of health and urban agriculture: the risks of urban organic solid waste re-use. The focus is the relation of health risk management to informal or community-based practices, which are seen as a major challenge for agriculture in the city. Because the capacity of governments to intervene is currently limited, gradual progress in self-regulation or self-limitation of risks is necessary. International projects and experts can assist in developing appropriate standards, research and practical measures.

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Reducing the Health Risks of Using Wastewater in Agriculture: Recommended Changes to WHO Guidelines

U.J. Blumenthal, D.D. Mara, A. Peasey, G. Ruiz-Palacios and R. Stott

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

In many areas of the world, urban agriculture depends on water supplies for irrigation. Water is often extracted from rivers, and these may be contaminated with wastewater, discharged into the river with little or no prior treatment. In some areas, untreated wastewater is used for irrigation directly. Use of both can increase the risk of gastro-intestinal diseases for farm workers and their families, and for the consumers of the crops. Policy makers and farmers need to know what quality of water they can use, and what forms of wastewater treatment (or other health protection measures) can be employed. As the water available for irrigation often does not meet national standards or international guidelines for wastewater reuse, this poses a challenge to the safe development of urban agriculture.

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The Use of Wastewater for Urban Agriculture: the Example of Dakar, Nouakchott and Ouagadougou

Ndèye Fatou Diop Gueye and Moussa Sy

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

Though seemingly trivial, this statement is pertinent as we realise how difficult it is to satisfy all water needs, encompassing domestic needs, agricultural activities, residential and recreational needs. This competition is especially tough in dry climates of the Sahelian zone, such as in Burkina Faso, Mauretania and Senegal

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Periurban Irrigated Agriculture and Health Risks in Ghana

Moïse Sonou

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

In Africa, more than one-third of the population already lives in urban cities, and over the next 25 years, the rapid urbanisation of Africa could lead to increasing food insecurity in the cities. In Ghana, the urban population is growing at an estimated annual rate of 4.1% compared with the overall population growth of 3%. Among major urban problems are those related to unemployment and under-employment, as well as high food prices especially due to the high costs of marketing food products. The growing demand for fresh and perishable agricultural produce in the major cities is driving the development of peri-urban agriculture. This demand is not seasonal, necessitating year-round production, heavily dependent on irrigation.

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Ecological Sanitation: Closing the Loop

Steven A. Esrey and Ingvar Andersson

In: UA Magazine 3 - Health aspects of urban agriculture

Ecological sanitation, through urine diversion, may contribute to food security, less pollution, better resource management of water, nutrients and soil. It is likely that it can also contribute to health and well-being in two direct ways: less transmission of disease, by killing pathogens at the source, and increased food security, by increasing nutrient intake. It is far more feasible financially and ecologically than conventional approaches, not only by reducing inputs into the system, but increasing savings throughout urban economies. It results in decentralised systems, empowering people, providing for local livelihoods, and enhancing community cohesion. It can be made safer than conventional sanitation approaches and less polluting, reducing urban expenditures for health care and environmental clean-up as well as potentially increasing tourism dollars.

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Colophon

Urban Agriculture Magazine
Volume 1, No 3
March 2001

The UA-Magazine is published by the Resource Centre for Urban Agriculture (RUAF), a Programme executed by ETC Netherlands and financed by DGIS, The Netherlands and IDRC, Canada. It is published 3 times a year. The UA Magazine is translated into French and Spanish, and distributed in separate editions through regional networks.

Editorial Board

• Ms Marielle Dubbeling, Urban Management Programme-Latin America and the Caribbean, Ecuador
• Ms Ndèye Fatou Gueye, Institut Africain de Gestion Urbaine (IAGU), Senegal
• Ms Dagmar Kunze, FAO Regional Office for Africa (RAF), Ghana
• Mr Luc Mougeot, IDRC, Canada
• Mr Shingirayi Mushamba, Management Development Programme - East and Southern Africa, Zimbabwe
• Mr Gordon Prain, CIP- Sustainable Initiative on Urban and Peri-urban Africulture (SIUPA), Peru
• Mr Frits Penning de Vries, IBSRAM, Thailand
• Mr Jac Smit,TUAN, USA
• Mr Henk de Zeeuw, ETC - Resource Centre on Urban Agriculture and Forestry (RUAF), Netherlands

Editors No. 3

This issue has been compiled by René van Veenhuizen (Responsible Editor), together with Karen Lock (Guest Editor). Inputs have been received by Marianne Lindner of ETC-Crystal.

Resonsible web edition

Wietse Bruinsma

Administrations

Bernie Coenders

Design and Layout

Jan Hiensch, Leusden

Language Editor

Amunda Salm, Wageningen

Printing

Koninklijke BDU, Barneveld

Subscriptions

The editor
ruaf@etcnl.nl

Address

Urban Agriculture Magazine
P.O. Box 64
3830 AB Leusden, The Netherlands
Visitors address: Kastanjelaan 5, Leusden.
Tel: +31.33.4943086
Fax: +31.33.4940791