Zhang Feifei, Cai Jianming and Ji Wenhua

In: UA Magazine no. 19 - Stimulating Innovation in Urban Agriculture

Beijing is a city faced with a shortage of water. Less than 600 mm of rain falls per year; but this figure is highly variable and actual rainfall has been lower than average in the past eight years. Less than 300 cubic metres of water is available per person per year; this is one eighth of the average volume per person available in the country as a whole and one thirtieth of the world average. Because of the downward trend in rainfall, surface water is gradually drying up and the level of ground water is declining.

Zhang Feifei, Cai Jianming and Liu Gang

In: UA Magazine no. 18 - Building Communities through Urban Agriculture

Migration to cities has increased rapidly since reforms took place in China. It has been estimated that
over the past 30 years, more than 300 million people have successfully transferred their residence and have found a job in one of the rapidly growing cities of China; and it is expected that this trend will continue in the coming 15-20 years (Feng, 1996). Quite a number of migrants stay in the periurban areas and turn to urban agriculture for their livelihoods.

Feifei Zhang, Guoxia Wang and Jianming Cai

In: UA Magazine 17 - Strengthening Urban Producers' Organisations

In 1978, China started to dismantle the commune system and the socalled “eating from the same big pot� that existed for decades, i.e. absolute egalitarianism whereby everyone gets the same benefits
irrespective of his/her performance. Village land began to be contracted to peasant families on a 30-year basis in most cases and a system of “household contract responsibility� was introduced that set farm output quotas for each household and linked remuneration to output.

CAI Jianming, LIU Shenghe, YANG Zhenshan, YUAN Hong and JIANG Fang

In: UA Magazine 16 - Formulating Effective Policies on Urban Agrilculture

This paper presents the main points of the draft policy guidelines for development of urban agriculture in Beijing. These guidelines are currently awaiting final approval by the Beijing People’s Congress
and will be an important milestone in the development of urban and periurban agriculture in the city of Beijing in the coming decades.