Keynote wg5 wg6_van veenhuizen_resilient cities

Urban and peri-urban agriculture (UPA): an important strategy to building resilient cities ?!

The Role of Urban Agriculture in building resilient citiesConference UPA, Monrovia, Liberia, 14-15 February 2013

René van Veenhuizen, RUAF Foundation

Urban and peri-urban agriculture• Agricultural production (crops, trees, livestock, fish) in and around urban areas for food (vegetables, eggs, milk, meat, ..) and other products (e.g. medicinal and aromatic herbs, fodder, fuel, flowers and ornamental plants, water storage, a/o)….

• And related inputs supply, transport, processing, marketing and support services…

• Often combined with other functions (recreation, urban greening, recycling of wastes, capturing CO2, etcetera), as part of the urban system

ECOLOGICAL (Healthy City) SOCIAL

(Inclusive City)

ECONOMIC (Productive City )

Multiple Benefits

Multiple LevelsAnd Actors

Rehabilitate Resilience

Transformation

Variety of urban farming systems

a) In the urban spaces used

b) in main line of production

C) in level of technologies used

d) in degree of formality, organisation and marketing

Nothing New?- Urbanisation- Urbanisation of Poverty

- Food Insecurity / Prices

- Depleting Resources

- Climate Change

Urban Population is projected to double from 300 – 600 Million in the next 25 years

70 % living of less than US 2 per day

A healthy diet would cost cost almost all of its income of the poor

Cities not ready for changing climate: -Ecologically unfriendly configuration-Often lack effective waste management

City Region Food Systems African Green Urbanism (UN Habitat)

Renewed interest

- RUAF, Resource Centres on Urban Agriculture and Food Security

- Urban Harvest (CGIAR)- FAO, Food for the Cities, - IWMI (CGIAR), International Water Management Institute:

resource recovery- START, Climate Change Adaptation and UPA- UN Habitat, Cities and Climate Change Initiative- ICLEI, Resilient Cities- UNEP, UPA and Environment- AFSUN, Africa Food Security Urban Network- USAID, EU, IDRC, Sida, GiZ, SDC, etc…..

ACTUAL URBAN CHALLENGES; CAN URBAN AGRICULTURE MAKE A CONTRIBUTION?

1. Growing urban poverty and social exclusion

2. Growing food insecurity and malnutrition in cities

3. Growing need to enhance resilience of the cities and reduce climate change/disaster risks and ecological foot print

4. Growing waste management problems

5. Growing need for green spaces and recreational services for the urban population

Is UPA contributing to reducing urban poverty and social exclusion?

• UPA is an important primary or secondary source of income for large numbers of poor urban people (RUAF, FAO)

• In market oriented UPA often good net returns to capital invested are realised (table) … (ODI, FAO Studies)

• UPA stimulates SME’s in compost production, food processing, marketing and agro-tourism (green jobs)

• UPA is often used to facilitate social integration of newcomers and disadvantaged groups and community development

Integration in employment generating strategies •Exploring the potential of green jobs: UPA as a driver for job creation in clean energy production through waste re-use...

...and productive decentralised waste management

Or micro- enterprise development

One job per 110 sq. meter (FAO)

• About 15-20% of the world’s food is produced in urban areas; For perishable products this may rise to 60 % or more (table)

• poor urban households produce 20-60 % of their food themselves (e.g. East Jakarta 18 %, Kampala 50 %, Harare 60 %) •….. AFSUN, RUAF studies ……

• Producing households are less vulnerable to economic crisis and increases in food prices than non-producing households (RUAF)

•The costs of supplying food from distant sources are rising rapidly; often only limited cold storage transport facilities availableWhile < 10 % of SSA homes have refrigerator

Is UPA enhancing urban food security & nutrition?

In Africa • 70 % of urban poor households normally

source food from the informal sector, of which 31 % do so on a daily basis (informal markets, street foods, small shops)

• 22 % of households obtain food from their own gardens (on home plot or on public land) but only 8 per cent get food from this source at least once a week.

• 40 % of urban residents are engaged in some sort agricultural activity, including production of staple crops, vegetables, fruit, milk, etc.

• In Nairobi, Kibera, 11,000 households have “sack gardens”, which provide food and sales to cater for monthly rent.

(sources: AFSUN, FAO, RUAF)

Is UPA contributing to disaster reduction and cities’ adaptation to climate change?

• UPA reduces the urban energy consumption (less transport, cooling, packaging)

• UPA reduces floods and land slides by keeping flood plains free from construction, reducing erosion and run off and facilitating water infiltration and -storage

• Productive reuse of urban organic wastes in UPA reduces methane emission from landfills & use of fosile minerals

• UPA improves the urban micro-climate (wind breaks, shade, reduction of urban heat, dust and CO2) and conserves biodiversity.

• Urban wastewater and organic wastes contain large amounts of nutrients with high economic value• 14-17% increase of water supply for irrigation in agriculture is needed by 2030 to meet dietary needs; but fresh water availability is quickly declining.• Productive reuse of urban wastewater and organic wastes will:

a. enable year round production close to the consumers, b. reduce the pressure on freshwater resources without hampering food productionc. reduce the need for artificial fertilisers and methane emissions from landfillsd. Contribute to cost recovery of investment in Sanitation and treatement

Is UPA contributing to reducing urban wastes and fresh water problems?

*) Service Orientation….By creating value*) Source Separation and Re-use

*) Productive Sanitation

*) Urban and Rural Linkages in Food Production

Cagayan de Oro, PhilippinesImproved production (12% higher yield, earlier flowering, greener leaves (palm, mango) and healthier crop stand) when urine applied

Ouagadougou, Burkina FasoA market for Human manure is being developed.- Community gets improved sanitation and pays for collection of waste- Farmers pay for fertilizers at market prices- Willingness to pay is high with farmers, but does not cover transport

*) Multiple Use of Water (MUS)

Health and Environmental risks• Contamination of crops with pathogens due to irrigation

with contaminated water or unhygienic handling of food• Diseases transferred to humans by rodents and flies

attracted by agriculture (tick born diseases) or scavenging domestic animals

• Contamination of crops: due to a: overuse of agrochemicals (occurs mainly in areas with many years of intensive horticulture) and b. due to air, soil and water pollution by industry or heavy traffic.

• Contamination of groundwater due to excessive use of agrochemicals or nitrate-rich manure or wastewater.

• Non-farming neighbours may complain of visual untidiness, dust, smell and noise created by the urban farms

Regulation, Risk minimisation, Safety Guidelines

•Drip and furrow irrigation•Sedimentation ponds•Cessation of irrigation•Filter•Low water & soil splash•Improved water fetching•Increased retention time•On-farm treatment

SOME STRATEGIES THAT CITIES APPLY TO PROMOTE URBAN AGRICULTURE AND CITY RESILIENCE

Creation of an enabling policy environment (recognition, policies and legislation, institutional home

Reducing health and environmentl risks (coordination, zoning, awareness, active source pollution control)

Enhancing access to land and use security (mapping, zoning, tax incentives)

Support to Farmers in organisation, access to land, finance, marketing (support organisation, access to credit, extension support, value chain development, farmers markets).

Multi Stakeholder Platforms in Greater Monrovia, Tubmanburg and Gbarnga

Liberia

UPA – including farmer markets – as part of greening of Monrovia

UPA in New Ordinances of Tubmanburg and Gbarnga

Land use maps and develop zoning and negotiations with the farmers in Greater Monrovia and Tubmanburg

Urban Farmer OrganisationFLUPFA

Curriculum Development

Zoning and allocating low lying areas and valleys for agriculture to reduce impacts of flooding, storm water runoff is reduced, and excess water is stored and infiltrating in these green open spaces

Political agreement brokered by Freetown Urban and Peri Urban Agriculture Platform (FUPAP)

Freetown/ Western Area Rural District, Sierra Leone

•Min. of Lands maps and demarcates the areas;•Local authorities sign agreements with farmers groups;•Min. of Agriculture provide extension services and inputs;•Finance and Credit Institutions accept as collaterals•FUPAP: Conflict Mgt + Monitoring Impact

1. Protection of 450 hectare of wetlands within the built up city as horticulture cum ecological area (against pressure of building companies)2. Provision of vacant land, seed, tools and water to groups of urban poor for small scale horticulture3. Establishment of “short chain” marketing schemes (producer2consumer)

Cape Town, South Africa

The Peepoo value chain in Kibera

2Women micro-entrepreneurs

3

Personal Home Toilet

School Toilet

4Drop-points with refund

1 Local semi-manual production

5Processed into commercial fertiliser

Bag gardens

Colombo, Sri Lanka1. Integration of urban agriculture as part of slum and lane upgrading

(beautification, drainage, shade, consumption) 2. Housing design and plot regulations take into account micro-farming

requirements (growing on walls and window sills, location with regards to solar access; limiting maximum built-up area)

3. Diffusion of “low space” technologies

Lima, Peru

1.Participatory design of multi-functional “productive parks”

2.Reuse of wastewater to irrigate parks and urban forests (greening; recreation; income generation through community nurseries)

3. Electricity company is leasing land under power lines to groups of urban poor to prevent illegal building on these strips

Belo Horizonte, Brazil

• Major urban agriculture programme (as part of national Zero Hunger policy)• Promotion of small scale organic urban horticulture (technical assistance, credit , certification, farmers’ markets)• Support to associative food enterprises• Local food procurement by government offices and social programmes)

Almere, The Netherlands

Urban agriculture as part of the city food strategy: is it possible to produce in Agromere 20% of the daily food basket of future Almere with 350.000 inhabitants?

Design Agromere: 180 ha urban farming (88 ha animal husbandry; 25 ha fruits and vegetables; 62 ha arable farming; 5 ha horticulture)

What would be the climate impact due to production of fresh food close to city (less transport, cooling, packaging processing) ?

Reduction:

-16 million km transport-Energy use of 11.000 households-GHG emission of 2.000 Dutch inhabitants

Almere

Agromere

Thank you

www.ruaf.org

RUAF• International network of 8 Resource centers on Urban Agriculture and

Food security• Working in and around 20 cities in 17 countries • City partners and local and international partners

City Programmes including:

Facilitating a Multi-stakeholder Forum MPAP Strategic Action planning and Integration of urban

agriculture in land use planning, institutional programs and budgets

Knowledge generation and disseminationStrengthening (poor) urban producer groups and enhancing their capacity to innovate their

production systems; Enhancing access to local financingNational Policy LobbyingProductive re-use of water and waste waterAdaptation to Climate Change

City Percentage of urban consumption met by urban agriculture

  All vegetables

Eggs Poultry Milk Pork

La Paz (2000) 30        

Dakar (2000) 70-80   65-70    

Dar Es Salaam (2000)

90     60  

Accra (2003) 90        

Nouakchott (1999)  90        

Shanghai (2000) 60 90 50 90-100

50

Hanoi (2000; 2004) 30-75(seasonal)

40 50   50

Vientiane (2004) 20-100 (seasonal)

     back

City Typical monthly net income in US$ for irrigated peri-urban vegetable production

Accra 40-50

Bangui 320 (producers), 140 (retailers)

Brazzaville 140-170 (producers), 120 (retailers)

Cameroon 69

Lagos 120

Ouagadougou 25-100 (70)

Yaoundé 34-67

Ho Chi Minh City 40-125 (80)

Jakarta 30-50 back