First Pages

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Contents

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Foreword

Dinesh Mehta
Coordinator, Urban Management Programme, UN-Habitat

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

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Preface

Henk de Zeeuw
Director RUAF Foundation

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

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Introduction

René van Veenhuizen

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

Attention to urban agriculture has increased markedly during the last couple of decades. The number of activities to promote urban agriculture at international, national and local level has grown, but urban farmers in many cities in the world still struggle to get their main survival strategy recognised by city authorities. The demand of policy makers and local practitioners for inspiring examples of successful policies and actions in cities is therefore growing. Urban agriculture contributes to a wide variety of urban issues and is increasingly being accepted and used as a tool in sustainable city development. Currently the challenge is its integration into city planning and facilitation of its multiple benefits for urban inhabitants. This book seeks to present the current state of affairs regarding urban agriculture and sustainable urban development.

Sustaining Urban Agriculture Requires the Involvement of Multiple Stakeholders

Marielle Dubbeling and Gunther Merzthal

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

Urban agriculture relates to a variety of urban issues, like urban poverty, land use planning, waste management, food securiy, economic development, public health, and community development. Many stakeholders can be identified who play a role and who (should) have a say in planning and development of urban agriculture and related activities, like input provision, vegetable production, aquaculture, livestock production, processing and marketing. To increase the contribution of urban agriculture to sustainable urban development requires involvement in planning and policy making of these different stakeholders. Multi-stakeholder processes dealing with urban agriculture are of recent nature. The lessons learned in the International Network of Resource Centres on Urban Agriculture and Food security (RUAF) are described.

Integration of Agriculture in Urban Land Use Planning

Takawira Mubvami, Shingirayi Mushamba and Henk de Zeeuw

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

Urban agriculture is a relatively new urban issue, in which different sectors and institutions are involved. It requires the development of new planning practices, or the adaptation of existing ones, and supportive policies. The preceding chapter argues that participatory and multi-stakeholder processes and tools are required in this process. This chapter elaborates on this argument by focusing on urban land use planning. It takes a South East African perspective and analyses the different paradigms, approaches and tools towards urban policy making and planning related to urban agriculture. Major issues and challenges include the distribution, control of and access to the use of land and other resources, conflicts between uses and users and the regulatory framework for urban agriculture. The chapter ends with a discussion on planning tools and techniques which can be used to integrate urban agriculture into urban planning and development.

Financing and Investment for Urban Agriculture

Yves Cabannes

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

Financial support can make a significant difference to poor urban families. Many of the increasing group of urban dwellers who live around the poverty line are (informal) micro-entrepreneurs, involved in a diversity of activities such as waste collection and recycling, trading, having a shop, transport and farming. These entrepreneurs require access to working capital, but most of them face limited access to credit and investment schemes. Important lesson can be drawn from rural micro-finance programmes. The challenge now is to further build on these experiences, including (partnerships with) the private banking sector and rural innovative micro-finance institutions. This chapter reviews lessons learnt from studies in the urban setting.

Gendering the Urban Agriculture Agenda

Alice J. Hovorka and Diana Lee-Smith

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

Urban agriculture has been embraced and promoted by the international development community as a means for urban dwellers to achieve sustainable livelihoods and socio-economic advancement. Many low-income households who farm in the cities gain a more consistent source of food and better nutrition. They can also earn or free up cash for non-food items. Advocacy for urban agriculture was initially focused on the policy agenda, but has moved recently into the realm of municipal development. Now that municipal authorities increasingly recognise this pivotal activity, it is easier for urban agriculture practitioners to integrate it into planning and decisionmaking mechanisms at the city level. This chapter seeks to make clear why this trajectory must be conceptualised along gender lines, since
gender dynamics are central to the form, function, organisation and structure of urban farming.

Urban Agriculture and the Building of Communities

Jac Smit and Martin Bailkey

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

The worldwide practice of urban agriculture has shown itself to be anoften-successful model for the inclusion of different urban subcommunities into an intentional social organisation typically focused on producing the necessary resource of food. But the general value of urban agriculture as a means of achieving several other community objectives – in building community capital – is of equal significance. This chapter suggests how community capital is composed of seven dimensions, each of which is commonly addressed in some way through the practice of urban agriculture. The multi-faceted character of successful community-based urban agriculture examples is based upon the addressing of one or more of these seven dimensions to create a place-based form of grassroots community development, while also involving representatives of often-marginalised subgroups, such as women, youth and the poor.

Local Economic Development and Marketing of Urban Produced Food

George Danso and Paule Moustier

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

This chapter deals with the socio-economic impact of urban agriculture on income generation, poverty alleviation, urban food supply, livelihoods, as well as indirect costs and benefits for society including environmental externalities. Two levels of analysis are considered to assess this impact: the household and the city. The assessment of social and economic impact at the city level suffers more from lack of data than is the case at the household level. A main question is whether urban agriculture should be seen as an informal, residual, subsistence activity or as one that can shift from simple to enlarged reproduction of urban food, by making the best of its proximity to urban consumers and sustaining incomes in the long run.

Recycling of Urban Organic Waste for Urban Agriculture

Olufunke Cofie, A. Adam-Bradford and Pay Drechsel

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

Sustainable management of solid waste is a major challenge being faced by municipal authorities across the world, both in the North and the South. In developing countries, urban waste remains a serious problem that causes contamination of soil and water bodies and endangers human health and the environment. Much of the solid waste consists of organic matter that can be recycled into a profitable input (compost) for urban agriculture. Composting the large quantities of organic matter provides a win-win strategy by reducing waste flows, enhancing soil properties, recycling valuable soil nutrients and creating livelihoods, but there remain several constraints that explain why this opportunity is seldom exploited. This chapter discusses the benefits of constraints to composting and presents a framework for analysis and planning of composting interventions. The arguments and models contained in the chapter are supported with case study material from Ghana, Philippines and Kenya.

Wastewater Use for Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture

Stephanie Buechler, Gayathri Devi Mekala and Ben Keraita

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

Wastewater is a resource of increasing global importance, particularly in urban and peri-urban agriculture. Wastewater is used for crop production, which includes fodder grasses, vegetables, cereals, ornamental plants, trees and flowers, timber crops and fruit trees, as well as for aquaculture and is often the only source of irrigation available. Wastewater use for irrigation generates livelihoods for farmers, agricultural labourers, produce transporters, market brokers and produce vendors. Consumers also benefit by obtaining access to fresh and cheap produce due to low transportation costs. To prevent potential negative impacts on human health and the environment, the importance of wastewater reuse in urban and peri-urban agriculture has to be recognised and clear policy guidelines for reuse need to be established. Careful research and awareness raising needs to be stimulated. Women play a key role in this context both as producers and in food preparation. Wastewater use in urban, peri-urban agriculture is a cross-sectoral issue that requires a multi-sectoral and multi-actor approach to research and planning.

Participatory Technology Development for Sustainable Intensification of Urban Agriculture

Gordon Prain

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

The urban setting offers special advantages for food and animal production, but also presents particular challenges. Urban agriculture needs to be highly innovative in competing and adapting to new situations. Urban and peri-urban agricultural systems exhibit even higher levels of complexity than rural upland systems and call for a wider range of participatory methods. This chapter discusses participatory agricultural research and its relevancy for the urban setting. A sustainable urban livelihoods framework is discussed, which enables to better understand and define the multi-sectoral, institutional and policy aspects of urban agriculture in order to identify appropriate interventions. Specific participatory methods are discussed for urban horticulture and livestock to help urban producers adapt agriculture to urban realities.

Urban Horticulture

Philippe Tixier and Hubert de Bon

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

Although crops have always been grown inside the city, urban horticulture is expanding and gaining more attention recently. Horticultural products include a large variety of vegetables, cereals, flowers, and trees. Vegetable production provides regular and high incomes to the various actors in the commodity chain and provides food to urban dwellers. Many specific techniques have been developed or adapted specifically for urban areas. If well managed, urban horticulture can play an important role in reducing socio-economic and environmental problems in cities. Urban authorities should collaborate with urban producers to strengthen the role of urban horticulture in waste recycling, community building and creating sustainable food systems.

Livestock keeping in urbanised areas, does history repeat itself?

Hans Schiere, Barbara Rischkowsky, Eric Thys, Jaap Schiere and Francine Matthys

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

Livestock keeping in and around cities is a practice that can be traced back to ancient times. The functions and forms of urban livestock have changed over time, and after decades of neglect, the roles of urban livestock are now being recognised again by urban officials. This chapter reviews the categorisations, relevance and logic of urban livestock keeping in past and modern society. It stresses that animals can be both a nuisance and a benefit, serving several direct and indirect functions in urban ecosystems, each with different priorities at household, city and national level.

‘For want of a nail the war was lost …’ - ancient story

‘The city requires an awful lot of countryside to be able to breathe’ - Geert Mak

Urban Aquatic Production

Stuart Bunting, David Little and William Leschen

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

The status of urban aquaculture is assessed in this chapter and the most important literature and knowledge sources are discussed providing a comprehensive overview that highlights challenges facing decision-makers, planners and stakeholders in developing policies, programmes and management strategies that facilitate sustainable, equitable and safe urban aquaculture. The prevailing characteristics of existing urban aquaculture activities are described and the associated benefits are discussed. The recognised constraints and emerging threats to urban aquaculture are then presented. Following this assessment important knowledge gaps and challenges facing planners, managers and other stakeholders are identified and potential approaches to deal with the issues raised are proposed.

Urban Forestry for Multifunctional Urban Land Use

Cecil Konijnendijk and Michelle Gauthier

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

The contributions of forests, trees and other urban green areas to the quality of urban life and the environment can be significant. When existing good practices are built upon, urban forestry has shown significant contributions to the quality of urban life and the environment, together with other types of comprehensive green-space planning and management concepts. Through agroforestry systems, for example, urban forestry and urban agriculture join forces in supporting livelihoods. A review of the current status of urban forestry research and development, policy-making, implementation and education across the globe shows that advances have indeed been made. Urban forestry has been developed in response to the call for innovative, comprehensive concepts that promote the multiple benefits of urban green space. Sometimes named urban and peri-urban forestry, the concept encompasses the planning and management of forests and other tree resources in and close to urban areas and thus integrates different parts of urban green structures.

List of Acronyms and Abbreviations

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

List of Figures, Tables and Boxes

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

The Authors

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

The Cases

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

RUAF Partners List

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

General Resources

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

Publishers

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities

Back page

In: Cities Farming for the Future - Urban Agriculture for Green and Productive Cities