E. Craig, L. Falco and L. Sabatte

In: UA Magazine 7 - Economic Aspects of Urban Agriculture

The horticultural and ornamental plant production sector of the district of Moreno in Buenos Aires, Argentina, is strategically located in an urban area with direct access to the major markets of the country. Horticultural producers predominantly belong to the Bolivian colony, with scarce income, using own labour, living in extremely substandard housing. They have recently established a Local Commercialisation Market with the institutional support of the Moreno Municipal Institute of Local Economic Development (IMDEL). Growers of ornamental plants are mostly from the Japanese (herbs) and Italian (trees and shrubs) communities, who are capable of undertaking larger capital investments in their operations. They have established a local association and in 2001 organised the first Exhibit of Plants and Cut Flowers of Moreno. Both groups of producers have benefited from the National Employment Emergency Plan. IMDEL offered the producers micro-credits at low rates. The experiences are described here.

Rob Small

In: UA Magazine 6 - Transition to Ecological Urban Agriculture: A Challenge

South Africa is being pulled into the global economy. Still there is a great need for locally produced food, as is shown in this story about the Cape Flats bio-zone. The Cape Flats townships, low-income settlements to the northeast of Cape Town, are vast encampments at the city gates. While the majority of government agricultural development funds are being poured into the conventional, often large-scale farm movement, the general organic movement is alive and well. Abalimi Bezekhaya (Planters of the Home) is an NGO focusing consistently on direct poverty alleviation through micro-organic vegetable gardening among the poor.

Mario A. Cepeda Villegas, Eulalio Venegas González and Ma. Eugenia Rangel González

In: UA Magazine 6 - Transition to Ecological Urban Agriculture: A Challenge

Family agricultural activity growth in the Mexican regions of Xochimilco, Milpa Alta, Tlalpan, Texcoco, Azcapotzalco and Tláhuac has improved the diets of many families, who, due to their depressed economic situation, have few opportunities to buy vegetables (Canabal 2000). Urban agriculture further creates employment and may lead to improvement in the environment when utilising organic inputs and recycling water and waste. The Opciones de Autosuficiencia Familiar (Family Subsistence Alternatives) project working to facilitate the contribution of urban agriculture is described here.

Esther Roycroft-Boswell

In: UA Magazine 6 - Transition to Ecological Urban Agriculture: A Challenge

This shortened version of an earlier published version describes the historic background of why organic and urban agriculture were seen as important by the Cuban Government. Large tracts of land were switched from export-oriented cash crops to food crops. Government incentives encouraged unemployed people in large urban centres to move back to work on the land. This created, almost overnight, a new urban gardening culture. Organic agriculture was specifically promoted by the Cuban Organic Agriculture Organisation, which linked government researchers and extension workers.

George Danso, Pay Drechsel and Simon C. Fialor

In: UA Magazine 6 - Transition to Ecological Urban Agriculture: A Challenge

A typical phenomenon of urban agriculture is its specialisation in perishable products. In Kumasi, Ghana, as in other cities in sub-Saharan Africa, vegetable market production takes place on inner-city lowland areas, close to stream and drains or in the periurban environment, where high amounts of seeds, manure/fertiliser and pesticides are used. Research is undertaken into biological production methods and to risks reducing options beyond the farm level, i.e. at markets and households, but it shows that the adoption rate of biological farming methods remained very low among vegetable growers. How to convince urban farmers and consumers?

Graeme Sherriff and Joe Howe

In: UA Magazine 6 - Transition to Ecological Urban Agriculture: A Challenge

The term "permaculture" is derived from Bill Mollison's vision of permanent agriculture. Permaculture is about producing food in an environmentally sound way. It is concerned with people growing their own food on their own land and using it for themselves, their immediate family and possibly the local community. This is the impression gained from examining permaculture food projects in Britain. Since its inception permaculture has developed and diversified. It is essentially an approach to designing productive whole systems, through the maximisation of the interconnectedness of elements, which has an ethical foundation in sustainability and a scientific basis in ecology. The key characteristic is that it sets out to maximise beneficial relationships through the effective placement of elements.

Guillermo Travez with a text-box by Eric Goewie

In: UA Magazine 6 - Transition to Ecological Urban Agriculture: A Challenge

Consumers are increasingly calling for safe and healthy food and have more knowledge about this. Once convinced, they are more likely to accept higher prices for such food. Producers should therefore thriving to prove that the quality and safety of their commodities is to consumers' standard. Labelling is a strong tool to do so. But what is labelling? And how to certify that the label does what it promises? Certification is the answer to this.

Giovanni Galanti

In: UA Magazine 6 - Transition to Ecological Urban Agriculture: A Challenge

This paper is based on a project proposal to set up urban organic gardens in Thailand. The author takes the Cuban experience as a starting point and gives his ideas on the "transition process".

Eric Goewie

In: UA Magazine 6 - Transition to Ecological Urban Agriculture: A Challenge

There are several judgements about "Organic Production": it is typically an invention of the rich in Western Europe, projecting their loss in nature and biodiversity onto developing countries." or "organic production as a notion has too many definitions: What is the difference between organic, biological, ecological, biodynamic, integrated or agroecological production?" or yet again "it is too complicated for poor people to quickly understand," Scientists and policy-makers however, encounter evidence that organic production does make sense. Pretty (1999) shows that organic production provides sufficient and healthy food in developing countries. Developments in Cuba show that organic production raised more advantages than was accepted before. Evidence from Western Europe demonstrates that organic production is profitable indeed. However, it is still problematic to understand exactly what falls under the notion "organic production". One thing is clear: organic production has strong potential for drawing consumer response. This article explains the discrepancy between judgement and reality concerning organic production.

Aminuzzaman Talukder, Saskia de Pee, Abu Taher, Andrew Hall, Regina Moench-Pfanner and Martin W. Bloem

In: UA Magazine 5 - Methodologies for UA research, policy development, planning and implementation