Urban Food Actions Platform

Food production depends and impacts on ecosystem services and biodiversity, with spillover effects going beyond food. Urban and peri-urban agriculture and food processing can contribute to improving the resilience of territories in the face of climate change, natural disasters and disrupted suppy chains. Urban food consumption can also influence where and how food is produced. 

How can you optimize agriculture production while managing ecosystem services and biodiversity and improving resilience to climate change? Numerous examples are presented, explaining how to implement sustainable urban and peri-urban food production and processing; how these can mitigate the heat island effect, prevent floods, reduce the energy needed for cooling and heating buildings, improve social inclusion, (indirectly) raise awareness on combating food waste, or contribute to better access to healthy, diversified and fresh products. Resources on Urban and Peri-Urban Forestry are also available.

 

Related Resources

Food production and ecosystem management, Food loss and waste - Articles
This article explain step by step how a new urban farm, springing up on a former garbage dump in Chiang Mai (Thailand) has become a lifeline for the area’s urban poor communities. It is demostrated how vacant public land can be jointly managed by people and the local government for the...
Thailand (Asia and the Pacific)
2020 - Supawut Boonmahathanakorn
Sustainable diets and nutrition, Food production and ecosystem management - Reports & Case Studies
Urbanization is changing the face of malnutrition. The ways in which children and their families buy, cook, and eat their food are affected by the quality and influences of the physical, social, and economic conditions around them. Cities house the majority of the world’s population and are growing exponentially, particularly in...
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2020 - Coll.
Governance and planning, Food production and ecosystem management - Reports & Case Studies
In times of crisis, or a global pandemic, the need for quick, innovative solutions is ever-more pressing, as essential everyday systems such as our food supply chain become strained. These innovations can take many shapes, but it is the citizen-driven innovations radically challenging how we eat and produce food today. In...
(Europe)
2020 - Coll.
Food production and ecosystem management - Reports & Case Studies
The rapid expansion of cities in West Africa has implications for urban cropland.This study aimed to assess the dynamics of cropland in West African cities overtime and space, to identify key drivers, and to report the effects of changing cropland on farmers and farmers’ resilience strategies. Cities studied were Accra...
Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Ghana, Mali (Africa)
2020 - Karg H, Drechsel P, DittrichN, Cauchois A.
Governance and planning, Food production and ecosystem management - Articles
Interest in urban gardening is growing as a means of enhancing social contact and reusing urban spaces. This practice, in fact, has positive effects in social and environmental terms. Because of these effects, urban gardening has spread especially in extensively urbanized and metropolitan areas where land consumption and pollution are...
Italy (Europe)
2020 - Valentina Cattivelli