There is a growing attention for agroecology in debates around urban food strategies and policies. Already for several years, this is considered a promising policy area, and agroecology was even already mentioned in the Milan Urban Food Policy Pact signed in 2016 as one of the relevant approaches within policies for food production in and around cities. There is, however, little experience and practice on how to operationalise such agroecological policies. What are the reasons and bottlenecks for this? And what are possible strategies to move forward with agroecological urban food policies? In this seminar these questions will be discussed to learn from experiences that have pioneered agroecology as a public policy.

The webinar that will take place in English with Spanish simultaneous interpretation, is part of a series of Conversation towards an Agroecological Urbanism which we will explore the contours of a transformative agenda for urban agroecology. In the course of these webinars, concrete ways in which cities need to change if they were to become supportive environments for an agroecology-based urban food systems transition will be explored.

The webinars are part of the Urbanising in Place project which looks at agroecological food growers as stewards of the food-water-energy nexus. Urbanising in Place seeks to break with the logic of urbanization that destroys soils and soil life, marginalizes farmers, and makes urban dwellers dependent on linear and highly commodified food supply chains. Working with communities of practice in London, Brussels, Riga, and Rosario, the project defined a programmatic agenda for agroecological urbanism in the form of 8 building blocks that identify points of articulation between the separate worlds of agroecology and urbanism.

Webinars will start from synthetic presentations of some of the strategies explored within the project. These will be followed by a debate with invited guests pioneering work of inspiration for building agroecological urbanism.