Foro Global sobre Seguridad Alimentaria y Nutrición (Foro FSN)

Dear FSN Moderator

Congratulations to the first draft. In the attached file, I have included a comment by Prof. Johan Six, Sustainable Agroecosystems, ETH Zürich. Prof. Six is the pricipal investigator of the project "The Rural-Urban Nexus: Establishing a Nutrient Loop to Improve City Region Food System Resilience (RUNRES)"  that aims to set a key step in the transformation towards a circular and more sustainable agriculture and waste management. The project is funded by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation. I fully share the comments of Prof. Six and believe that a case study, (to be eg. provided in a seperate box), on innovations to establish a circular bioeconomy in the urban and peri-urban food system would add value to the report.

Dr. Manfred Kaufmann, Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation

Dear colleagues at FAO

I congradulate you on availing this very comprehensive doc….. Having reviewed it, I would like to reflect from the context of urban and peri-urban areas in developing countries of Africa… Below are some issues that can be emphasized more:

Street Vendors (p. 48….) are playing increasingly important role in ensuring food and nutrition security, affordable to low income earners…. Given the inflationary pressures in such areas, low (and even middle) income people, especially those salaried people and other dependent on fixed incomes, are increasingly resorting to utilizing such facilities. As such vendors are quite busy, morning to evening. … Yet, they also face challenges, as the regulators try to promote formalization. … Their informality also mean that they have little or no access to essential services like health standards, food safety, space for operation, access to finance, etc, which greatly limit their ability to meet the growing demand for their services.

This sector is dominantly run by women, and young people (including those school drop-outs) and inability to operate them means great loss of employment opportunity, and loss of income to feed themselves as well as their dependents.

Behaviour change (p. 98… ) matters greatly… While availability of food, and ability to afford to buy it has been often emphasized, knowledge and awareness about which food to take has meaningful impact on food and nutrition security. Indeed, the use to which income is put is as important in determining poverty and welfare as the level of income itself -- increased income can be (and often is) gambled away. The assumption of a "rational consumer" is often unattainable. There is ample evidence suggesting that a good deal of the problem related to malnutrition among women. children, etc can be substantially reduced through sheer education without even the household’s income increasing. An earlier World Bank study suggests that malnutrition among children in Ethiopia can be reduced by more than 43% simply by educating mothers on nutrition (See: Luc Christiansen and Harold Alderman (2001): Child Malnutrition in Ethiopia; Can Mternal Knowledge Augment The Role of Income?) (attached)

The challenge on awareness and knowledge could be more pronounced among poor people in developing countries. …  Indeed advertising plays a pivotal role in informing consumers about food and shaping their choices, and efforts to transform food advertising could include promoting sustainable food in various public and private settings, ranging from public transport, schools, and healthcare facilities to television channels, events, advertisements, and social media. … However, these forums may not be easily accessible to majority engaged in the micro and small enterprise sector, and more suitable forums need to be explored. … The good news is that following the innovative group lending modality of Grameen Bank (Bangladesh) in early 1980s, there is a proliferation of such groups (whose members reportedly reached more than 200 million, according to the Consultative Group to Assist the Poorest) in many developing countries which adopted such modality, and such groups assemble people regularly (often monthly and even weekly), which provide a great cost-effective platform to creating knowledge and awareness to a congregation of (poor) people, which could otherwise be very difficult to reach in any other forums. … There are also savings and credit groups organized under Self Help Groups (e.g Village Savings and Loan Associations, V.S.L.As) of equivalent size to those in Grameen Bank style group lending…. The marginal cost of incorporating such awareness creation programmes is minimal ..…

I hope this helps

Regards

Getaneh ([email protected])

my contribution to this important issue is to identify important strategies for achieving the goal of strengthening urban and peri-urban food systems in the context of urbanization and rural transformation.

1- Create efficient and well-organized food supply chains that link rural farmers with urban market channels. This can decrease post-harvest losses, ensure timely delivery of fresh produce, and make nutritious food more available to urban consumers.

2- Encourage food processing and preservation facilities near urban regions This can support extending the shelf life of unpreserved produce, reducing food waste, and ensuring a steady supply chain of food during the year.

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There are several ways to strengthen urban and peri-urban food systems in the context of urbanization and rural transformation. One way is to promote sustainable urban agriculture, which involves using vacant land in urban areas for food production. This can help to improve food security by reducing transportation costs and increasing the availability of fresh, nutritious food. Another way is to promote local food markets, which can help to connect farmers and consumers and provide an alternative to large-scale, industrial food systems. 

Additionally, government policies can be developed to support the development of sustainable and equitable food systems, such as incentives for urban agriculture and regulations to protect local food markets.

Dear FSN-Moderator,

This is my contribution regarding Strengthening urban and peri-urban food systems to achieve food security and nutrition in the context of urbanization and rural transformation :

I have been working on agricultural development projects for more than ten years. I have noticed that small farmers and producers in the countryside face many problems, including climate change, which has negatively affected their production using the traditional methods they practice. It resulted in a significant food shortage. He must necessarily involve them in reversing their problems and developing proposals for solutions to them from their point of view, because they are the most knowledgeable about them, and the solutions proposed by them are certain to be the closest and most appropriate to them because the projects implement solutions from scientific and academic points of view at a higher level than their level of understanding. After empowering them, the countryside makes it possible for development and rural transformation to take place in gradual stages. The second point I suggest for development projects is to target the youth segment, especially the educated ones because they will contribute to the required change toward rural transformation more quickly

Can you take it or consider it if possible, otherwise leave it, feel free no problem.

Best regards

 Attika Marouf / SUDAN

Congratulations for this first draft. It is already a great instrument for discussion and advancing the FNS agenda in many localized agendas. 

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• Conceptual framework

• Do you find the proposed framework effective to highlight and discuss the key issues concerning urban and peri-urban food systems?

The proposed framework is effective and very insightful. An additional point could be considered as “sustainable” alongside the regenerative agriculture. The “mixed use of U-PU land” can also a sustainable measure able to allure the private sector support (technical and financial) under their ESG agenda. Most of the urban soil is under private ownership, however, some of them can be used for: sustainability, utilization, agency, and availability.

For example, in many cities of Sao Paulo Metro area (Brazil), under the high voltage transmission wires, organic gardens spring up abandoned land and expand agroecology. These lands are private and are not enough to change food systems, but can promote behavioral change towards food utilization (food and nutrition education of school-aged children on the city ground, for example), sustainability (put the land to productivity use instead of being use as garbage dumps); agency (smallholder farmers living in the U-PU area can use this land to produce small batch of fruits and vegetables); and availability (locally sourced food for local restaurants and markets).

https://www.brasildefato.com.br/2021/11/25/sp-embaixo-dos-fios-hortas-o…;

• Is this a useful conceptual framework to provide practical guidance for policymakers?

The conceptual framework is useful, but it does not dialogue a lot with the ESG agenda of the private sector, which is able to provide financial support, especially in the upper-middle and middle-income countries. Alignment with GRI indicators and nomenclature could me the private sector become interested in financially supporting the outputs of the HLPE. 

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Can you offer suggestions for examples to illustrate and facilitate the operationalization of the conceptual framework to address issues relevant for FSN?

• Are the trends/variables/elements identified in the draft report the key ones to strengthen urban and peri-urban food systems? If not, which other elements should be considered?

It is valid to mention the Small Island Developing States (SIDS). Fragile ecosystems, high vulnerability to climate change, natural disasters, external economic shocks, distance from global markets, and high rates of all forms of malnutrition and food-related diseases are just some of the challenges hindering the development process for SIDS. In São Tomé and Principe, for example, more than 60% of the population lives in urban areas, however, more than 50% of the daily food basket is imported at the same time the country exports cocoa. Applying the conceptual framework in lands with physical limitations and already highly urbanized can become a challenge to be noted by the HLPE.

https://jointsdgfund.org/programme/promoting-local-food-value-chains-and-equitable-job-opportunities-through-sustainable

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• Could you suggest case studies and success stories from countries that were able to strengthen urban and peri-urban food systems?

Add in a single environment information on sustainable rural development, tourism, environment and healthy eating, where any citizen can explore and discover the rural areas of the city. This is the goal of the Sampa+Rural platform!, idealized by the Municipality of Sao Paulo, Brazil. This initiative is complemented by studies on U-PU agriculture led by the Sao Paulo Food and Nutrition Security Observatory (ObSANPA).

Sampa+Rural seeks to connect rural areas to the city. It may seem surprising, but about one third of the territory of the municipality of São Paulo has rural characteristics. Concentrated in the southern, east and northern areas of the city, these areas have a huge potential for diversity. Simply put, you can find data on where to buy local products, who are the city's farmers and those who market these products. The platform also brings tourist attractions linked to nature and rural tourism, showing the environmental and economic characteristics of these regions. In addition, it is possible to find civil society and public power initiatives to make the city more connected to sustainable practices.

https://sampamaisrural.prefeitura.sp.gov.br/sobre

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Additionally, in the document there it is a mention to gender in Brazil.

“Gender disparities in food insecurity result from shocks and differences in education, income, opportunities, social networks, and entitlements.

Research in African and cities and Brazil indicate that although female headed households generally experience higher food insecurity than male headed households, when factors such as household income or education of household head are controlled for, this disadvantage disappears and sometimes even becomes an advantage (Dodson and Riley, 2020). This is in part attributed to women’s greater role in food purchase and consumption decisions despite lower income (Levin et al., 1999).”

In Brazil, for the abovementioned reasons, the Bolsa Família is transferred preferably to the female in the household.

https://repositorio.ipea.gov.br/bitstream/11058/8051/1/td_2331.PDF  

Congratulations for this first draft.  It is very rich and insightful !

This topic is so complexe that when reading this first draft, I kept questionning myself about some concepts that would enrich the existing framework:

1. Reinventing the notion of space : are we sure there are two spaces : rural and urban ? the complexity of interactions along food value chains, from rural or peri-urban areas to final consumers in cities, requires an integrated approach that goes beyond the dichotomy « urban » and « rural ». We should move from a unique urban or rural approach to a broader perspective that includes and displays the heterogeneity and also the interconnectivity of the territories and spaces that cover the different links of the agri-food system.  To facilitate decision making, I believe we should be able to think beyond the « existing borders » and consider how they merge as a third space, a new “rurbanity” where rural and urban spaces combine and complement one another.
2. Beyond food system: we need to think of food systems  in cities not only as a source of producing food but  also as a source of producing  services to the people and to the environment.  Thinking of a new definition of development where agriculture and food can no longer be reduced to simply producing and consuming nutrients. HOW food is produced, traded and consumed is as important as what is produced and consumed. The challenge is less about feeding cities, after all, urban agriculture has a limited production potential, than about reintroducing nature and agriculture into the heart of the city, while simultaneously rebuilding social ties between people and preserving the environment. The symbolic dimension should not be ignored. I believe urban agriculture has aims other than food security, including social cohesion, education, capitalizing on the immaterial and intangible traditional cultivation…
3. Intangible knowledge of traditional cultivation/food techniques in urban areas: this includes capitalizing on practices, representations, expressions, knowledge, skills – as well as the instruments, objects, artifacts and cultural spaces associated therewith – that communities recognize as part of their food cultural heritage. In the preindustrial era, urban layouts were heavily shaped by food, as witnessed by the city center locations of sites such as markets and slaughterhouses. Urbanization pushed food and farming out of the city, engendering a progressive distancing between cities and their food. This distancing encompasses many forms, at once geographical, economic, cognitive and political. It is high time to introduce the reappropriation of food policies by urban actors to create harmony and cohesion, value the immaterial heritage beyond food security. Immigrants have had a big effect on the food and culinary scene of host cities, making them more vibrant and full of different kinds of food. People who moved to the city from all over the world took their food traditions, flavors, and cooking methods with them. This changed many cities food culture and made them global culinary spaces.
4. The market : one of the rare places where city and food come together.  It is worth examining how markets continue to have a place in the urban areas bridging the gap between rural and urban spaces and shed light on this gap which is very relative though. This distancing between food and people is not taking place at the same pace in all parts of the world. In some cities, particularly in developing countries, the boundaries between urban and rural, producer and consumer, are almost non-existent. In Africa where I come from and in some Asian cities, people grow food, grind seeds, dry food and street-sellers cook in front of their customers and serve them directly ...In some developped countries, immigrants brought back their original food culture and this notion of street food to host countries. The best illustration is the street food booths in Manhattan in the heart of New York.

Some successful interventions in urban and peri-urban food systems :

Some cities have pioneered this drive to reconnect with their food.

• Toronto has been trialing innovative urban food policies since the early 1990s, setting up the Toronto Food Policy Council to represent views from all areas of the food sector. This led to the expansion of community gardens on vacant lots in districts that had been identified as food deserts. Today, over 300 North American cities have a Food Policy Council.
• Belo Horizonte, Brazil’s third city and the capital of Mina Gerais state, has also been extremely proactive in terms of its food policy.  Two municipal bodies dedicated to food security were set up during the 1990s: the Municipal Supply Secretariat (SMAB) and the Municipal Council for Food Security and Nutrition (COMUSAN). The aim was to supply the city with healthy farm produce in a win-win relationship. On the one hand, the city’s poor gained access to good quality food. On the other hand, rural and peri-urban farmers, who struggled to find buyers for their produce, had access to a larger market. 
• Havana is one of the rare cities to have developed an urban agriculture model that is focused on food self-sufficiency. In the early 1990s,  Cuba authorities decided to revise the food production system with the primary aim of being able to keep the capital supplied with food. Vacant open areas in Havana were transformed into kitchen gardens.

trends/variables/elements identified in the draft report the key ones to strengthen urban and peri-urban food systems? If not, which other elements should be considered?

I would suggest adding two focuses:

• the role of farming extension in urban Farming systems: farming recommendations that are usually applied in rural areas cannot easily be fully implemented in urban areas. The success of an agricultural development is also determined by the role of agricultural extension agents too and the way they manage the technology transfer.
• Promoting research and education in urban agriculture Urban AG is complex, diverse and dynamic and universities must contribute to exploring and testing sustainable solutions along with all the stakeholders. There is need for innovative research and extension partnerships to support the "urban farmers". Moreover, there is need for value creation of urban agriculture products, holistic urban planning partnerships, one health approaches for soil, water, energy and all the agro-ecological systems.  Urban AG needs to be supported by innovative, applied research and transdisciplinary researchers. Universities can play a key role in bridging this gap and creating value through applied research in a transdisciplinary approach.

I wish you every success in your endeavours and I am very grateful to have been associated with giving feedback about this insightful work.

Jamila Adani-EMBA

Director Farming Development

OCP Group/UM6P/Al Moutmir -Morocco

Congratulations on this great V0 draft! I am very much looking forward to following this team through the process and to the final report. Just two comments:

3/Are there any other issues concerning urban and peri-urban food systems that have not been sufficiently covered in the draft report?

- I was surprised to see "Agroecology" only mentioned a few times in the draft. I would encourage more engagement with the literature on urban agroecology if possible.

- I would also like to see more engagement with the literature on urban food movements. For a conceptual framing that might be useful, consider the concept of "urban agrarianism" https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03066150.2020.1803842

All the best,

Evan Bowness, PhD

Assistant Professor of Community Food Systems, Trent School of the Environment

Congratulations for a great zero draft. As for all “emerging” topics, HLPE reports are logically limited by the fact that available research has not been addressing them so far in a comprehensive way (which is why we definitely need to take stock of the State of the art but also to explicitly acknowledge gaps and limitations and needs for further research). It would be useful to relate this work to the work previously carried out by the CFS (OEWG Urbanization, Rural Transformation and Implications for Food Security and Nutrition), but also to the series of side events related to CFS, HLPF, UNFSS1and UNFSS2?

I would be happy to expand and discuss on the following issues if relevant

1.     Conceptual framework

Paradoxically I believe the approach followed is 1/ too urban centered and 2/ too SDG2 related for the CFS at this point in time.

The transformation of food systems is now acknowledged as a concrete means to bring together several SDGs. Nature-based solutions have been identified as an important dimension of sustainability and multi-level governance as a key issue. It is time to revisit development from a geographical perspective and reposition cities as key actors in sustainable territorial development and localization of SDGs.

Such an approach would in my view be more acceptable to both CFS members and the wider food and agriculture world, most of which have been reluctant so far to address urban issues, as they felt it would further increase the perceived bias towards urban areas and accelerate the marginalisation of rural areas. If instead we start framing the problem within an accountability perspective in which cities become responsible for more functional urban rural linkages, this could generate a behaviour change but also help to link the food security and nutrition agenda with other major agendas, such as climate change, social justice or more generally SDG localization.  

We should follow our environment colleagues and adopt a territorial or biogeographical perspective (usually cross-border) in which cities play a key role rather than food sheds that are by definition urban-geared and accelerate bias.

2.     The six dimensions of food security:

As FAO staff member from 1990 to 2013, I witnessed the evolution from national food security to the three pillars, then the addition of the 4th one and since I retired the further addition of two more. This in my view reflected the internal and external evolution of food and agriculture partners and theories (including governments, donors and academia) and the tensions within different technical approaches  often within the same organization. And then we spent most of a much needed energy to retrofit reality into a mould which has no logical basis, at the same time pushing development actors to accept the same mould.  So no I do not think this is of much use and if we could stop adding more and more jargon which needs to be translated and explained across cultures, we could have a chance to get more people around the table.

3.     Issues which would deserve more attention

The draft report should in my view pay more attention to right to food, social justice and environment (including recent CoPs on biodiversity and climate change). Cities and local governments were quite active and written material could be relevant.

 At a time when cities are besieged and their inhabitants are food insecure and malnourished, the report should definitely include a section on conflict.  Some information can be found at https://interagencystandingcommittee.org/iasc-reference-group-on-meeting-humanitarian-challenges-in-urban-areas

It might also be worth looking at culture, as food is a fundamental dimension of culture and cities are engaged in a variety of cultural initiatives, networks and programmes/projects.

The report mentions secondary cities. Increasing attention has been given lately to small and intermediary cities (e.g. OECD, UCLG). Is this the same?   

On more specific issues, the attention provided by the report to short food chains and markets is most appreciated. Re. wholesale markets, land costs are becoming a major issue worldwide and the whole distribution systems is in transition with the development of e-commerce.  Work on street foods (local and convenience foods) and the informal sector could add to this issue. Re. supermarketisation, it would be interesting to document the outcome of cash voucher programmes on purchasing practices and nutritional content of foods. The promotion of  green leafy vegetables in Kenyan Ushumi supermarkets (Bioversity International) or of pre-cooked quinoa in Perú would constitute interesting examples of promotion of traditional foods.  

Urban agriculture is also playing a key role in re-linking urban populations with nature.

More attention could be given to collective restauration: public procurement is one of the tools cities can use to transform food systems (and generate behaviour change) but the private sector (food services, HORECA…) are also active urban players.

Another issue is that of solidarity networks and urban-rural linkages, which as far as I know have not been explicitly researched and documented. For example strong linkages exist between urban households and communities of origin. Villagers send to their families in town (fresh) agricultural products and fuelwood. Urban families in exchange send sugar, flour, salt and other food products during the hungry season. This is particularly the case for rural-urban migrants and indigenous people .

Not enough attention to solidarity networks or related initiatives. The comedores populares movement in Latin America are a key example of women’s empowerment.  

The legal and regulatory challenges go far beyond taxation issues.

4.     Additional references

The team may have already reviewed and regarded the following documents or links

·      Promises and Challenges of the informal food sector in developing countries https://www.fao.org/3/a1124e/a1124e00.htm

·      On Street foods https://www.fao.org/fcit/food-processing/en/

L’alimentation des villes est aujourd’hui un front de recherche à la croisée des sciences sociales, techniques et agronomiques. Ce thème invite à dépasser les frontières habituelles entre politiques publiques sectorielles (agriculture, urbanisme, environnement) et entre disciplines scientifiques (Steel, 2009). L’alimentation peut en effet être un levier pour améliorer la durabilité des villes, en lien avec des enjeux de nutrition-santé, d’éducation, de développement économique, d’environnement et de cohésion sociale. Et réciproquement, les villes s’affirment progressivement comme des acteurs moteurs du changement et elles apparaissent comme des échelles pertinentes pour améliorer la durabilité de l’alimentation. Les questions alimentaires commencent à être prises en considération dans les politiques urbaines, notamment à travers les questions d’aménagement (Morgan, 2009 ; 2013). Dans les pays anglo-saxons, les enjeux alimentaires sont entrés depuis une quinzaine d’années dans les conceptions de la durabilité urbaine et dans les politiques d’aménagement, notamment au Royaume-Uni, aux États-Unis ou au Canada, qui disposent à la fois d’une communauté de recherche très structurée sur ce thème et d’expérimentations dans différentes villes (Blay-Palmer, 2010 ; Plantinga et Derkzen, 2012 ; Stierand, 2012). L’alimentation n’est plus un ovni dans les politiques d’aménagement urbain (Pothukuchi et Kaufman, 2000).

La pandémie de Covid-19 et sa cohorte de restrictions sociales ont mis en lumière la fragilité des systèmes alimentaires urbains, notamment ceux alimentés par des circuits longs.