This study is an overview intended to help develop an approach to food supply and distribution systems (FSDSs) focusing on the consumer as autonomous actor. Following a brief discussion of the lack of attention to African urban consumers in policies, programmes and research on African FSDSs, Chapter 1 offers an analytical framework that takes into account the variety of cultural, sociological and economic affecting the urban consumer in French-speaking West Africa. In Chapter 2, the consumer is considered in relation to some features of households and consumption models. Factors governing the shopping behaviour of the various urban social categories are then reviewed in Chapter 3: on the one hand, factors related to physical availability and financial accessibility of food and, on the other, those bound up with relations between consumers and traders.
Chapters 4 and 5 are devoted to discussing the impact of urban consumer behaviour on FSDSs, as well as likely future changes in urban life and their effects on the attitudes of the urban population. The concluding chapter deals with four aspects of the issue: improving knowledge of consumers as actors, strengthening consumer associations, the need for hygiene and nutrition education for consumers and traders and improving state quality control services.
