In collaboration with FAO Office of Asia and Pacific, the Food for the Cities multi-disciplinary initiative organized on November 17-18 in Bangkok, despite of the continuing floods in some part of the city, a regional workshop on Resilient Food Systems in Asian Cities. More than 60 participants from 13 countries, UN agencies, FAO member countries and relevant institutions attended.

The Food, Agriculture and Cities position paper has been distributed to all the participants and was used as background document to work on the basis of some expected outputs described in the concept note of the workshop.

Opening Session

• Welcome Address - Mr. Hiroyuki Konuma, Assistant Director General / Regional Representative, FAO RAP
• The Food for the cities multidisciplinary initiative  - Mr. Paul Munro-Faure, Chairperson of FAO Food for the Cities, Rome

• Introduction of participants

(for high resolution picture, click here)

• Meeting objectives and expected outcomes - Shashi Sareen, Senior Food Safety & Nutrition Officer, FAO RAP, and  Julien Custot, FAO Food for the Cities facilitator, Rome
• Keynote Address: Importance of urban food security to its various dimensions - J. Jackson Ewing on behalf of Prof. Paul Teng. RSIS, Singapore

Session One:  Food supply and distribution systems in cities

• Role of food processing and post-harvest management in improving food and nutrition security in cities – Rosa Rolle, Senior Agro-industry and Post-harvest Officer, FAO RAP
• Role of informal sector in urban food supply: traditional market and street vendors –  Indira Chakhravarty, India
• Urban planning for urban food supply in Asia  - Mariko Sato, Chief, UN-HABITAT Bangkok

Session Two:  Ensuring availability and access to  food for all urban population

• Food security for the urban poor: Mitigating the impact of food price volatility – Sumiter Singh Broca, Policy Officer, Economic, Social and Policy Assistance Group, FAO RAP
• How do we feed Asian cities - specifically the relation with climate change and its impacts - Brian H Roberts, Emeritus Professor, University of Canberra (co-editor of "urbanization and sustainability in Asia" - 2006) 

• Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture in post-crises situation, the Yogyakarta earthquake  –  Ageng Setiawan Herianto, FAO Indonesia
• Assisting urban populations in crisis and emergency situations (natural and manmade disasters) - Carla Lacerda, WFP
• Thailand's experience in crisis and emergency situations - activities in response to current flood situation - Suree Wongpiyahon, Director of Bureau of Food and Water Sanitation, Department of Health, Thailand

Session Three: Panel Discussion by Partner Countries/ Agencies

1. What policies, technical & other interventions are needed to improve food security in cities
2. Opportunities for investments in food security initiatives
3.  How importing countries contribute to food security in the region

Session Four:  Ensuring health and nutrition security in cities

• Nutritional education for the rural-urban migrational population - LU Zhengly, Director, Tianjin Municipal Food and Nutrition Advisory and Steering Committee Office, China
• Ensuring food safety and quality for the urban population -  Shashi Sareen, Senior Food Safety and Nutrition Officer, FAO RAP
• WASH and Nutrition: Ensuring a child's best start in life - Kit Dyer, Emergency Specialist WASH, Asia-Pacific Shared Services Centre (APSSC), UNICEF

Session Five:  Role of different actors and policies

• Role of local authorities, policies and strategies in developing resilient food systems in cities – Dr. Subrata Mukherjee, Minister, Public Health Engineering Dep. Government of West Benga
• Role of consumers in ensuring urban food and nutrition security –  Anni Mitin, the Secretary General of ERA Consumer Malaysia
• Role of women in ensuring urban food and nutrition security – Lily Yuliani, Indonesia Small Business Exporters Consortium (ISBEC), Indonesia

Working groups

Using common guidelines, working groups have identified challenges and priorities:

• by country
• By topics (identified as cross cutting issues by the different country teams)
  

  

  • Urban-rural linkages
  • Agriculture production
  • The informal sector
  • Crisis and emergencies
  • Goverance and planning

Conclusions and recommendations

A document has been drafted using the outputs of the different working groups and then discussed in a final plenary session in order to come out with shared conclusions and recommendations.

During the worshop, IRIN - humanitarian news and analysis - has published an article on "Boosting cities' food resilience"