Food for the Cities: Why Rural Urban Linkages are key to a food secure future

Interview with Bruce Cogill, Programme Leader, Nutrition and Marketing of Diversity, at the 39th Session of the Committee on World Food Security side event, Food for the Cities. Cogill was attending the event as a representative of the UN Standing Committee on Nutrition Security (UNSCN).

Q: What is ‘Food for Cities’?

A: Food for Cities is an initiative of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to focus on the task of supporting food and nutrition security for the world’s cities. The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2012 report published just ahead of this week’s Committee on Food Security (CFS) Meeting states that: “With urbanization continuing in developing countries, future efforts to address poverty and food insecurity will have to focus also on urban areas.” This side event is really asking what is needed to drive rural urban development policies forward, and what support is needed from the CFS.  

Q: You are here representing the UNSCN. Why is focusing on urban as well as rural populations important to achieving the UNSCN goals?

A: The UNSCN issued a statement on urban food security at the World Urban Forum in Naples in early September, that lays out an argument about why it is important to focus on levels of malnutrition and poverty in cities as well as rural areas. Recent high level initiatives (Right to Food - Rio+20, Zero Hunger Challenge - Ban Ki-Moon, the Olympic Challenge - David Cameron, UK Prime Minister and Michel Temer, Vice President of Brazil) have set targets to reduce malnutrition, hunger and stunting.

To achieve these goals, urban populations must be included as this is where the majority of people are living. In 2008 more than half of the world's population was living in cities for the first time in history, a number that is expected to rise to 60% by 2030 and by 2020, it is expected that 85% of the poor in Latin America and about 40-45% of the poor in Africa and Asia will be concentrated in towns and cities*. Yet this is not always at the forefront of many organizations working in food systems, sustainable diets, nutrition or young child feeding.

Q: What are some of the factors that affect nutrition in urban and peri-urban populations?

A: Many of these populations have a high level of poverty and malnutrition, and we are also seeing high levels of stunting.  Poverty and inequity are at the core of the problem but we are also seeing poor information, food choices and a lack of demand for a healthy diet and lifestyle.

The notion of a healthy diet, that is a culturally appropriate, diverse and nutritious diet, is a benchmark which many poor urban and rural consumers have a difficult time achieving. And we see that most graphically in dietary transition, which is the movement towards the consumption of energy dense but nutritionally poor foods, something we are seeing especially in urban areas. This is not just a poor country phenomena - it is happening throughout the world – along with a related rise in non-communicable diseases, such as diabetes, cardio-vascular disease and obesity.

This must catch the attention  of urban planners, public health professionals and policy programmes. I think that rather than transferring the cost of a poor quality diet to the health system, I think urban planners and commercial food systems need to be able to take this up first-hand.

Q: What are the kind of factors that impact on urban diets?

Bioversity International and FAO are looking not just at the food eaten but how it is bought, where it is stored, from whom it is bought, and the kind of quality and diversity that is available. For example, women are often the key decision-makers about diet and food for the family, yet they are often constrained in the choices they can make in terms of time and access to food, food ingredients and fuel.

There are also competing demands around employment, fuel resources and a very high percentage of the meagre weekly budget is allocated to food. This means we need to look at the value chains involved in the food system, shortening those chains by building better links with local producers and enabling people to grow, consume and sell their own food within urban and peri-urban areas.

Q: What kinds of policies are required to build these kinds of rural and urban links? 

A: We are already starting to see a change. Farmers markets are a good example as they are becoming commonplace in many of the world’s cities, including those in developing countries. But there are still constraints around urban planning requirements which in some cases mean meeting health and marketing standards which can be subject to distortion.

Professor Tim Lang and Geof Raynor highlighted this dynamic in a recent essay in the British Medical Journal by coining the term “ecological public health” which complements our own interest in eco-nutrition or environmentally sustainable diets and food systems. 

There is also, as we have heard today, a growing interest in urban populations producing and consuming their own food, as well as selling or bartering that food. Recognizing the importance of peri-urban and urban areas as food producers is a new phenomenon but we need to understand better how to do this safely. For example, there may often be chemical, heavy metal and microbiological contamination in the air, soil, and water which is used in urban agriculture. We need to identify these contaminants in terms of the food systems and mitigate or eliminate those contaminants to support urban agriculture.

Barbara Galassi from UN Habitat, earlier at the side event today, spoke about seeing urban areas as a source rather than an outcome of development for both opportunities and livelihoods. Building market links is an important part of that, especially in developing countries, but we need to ensure those markets are built around health food systems and accessible to all.

The urban poor spend a disproportional amount of their scarce income on food often between 50 and 74%, so their food choices are very important. We need to clearly identify what is culturally acceptable, safe and affordable, what is nutritious and what is environmentally sustainable. We need to promote the importance of a diverse food basket, the nutrition that it contains and get that out there  – this is why initiatives such as Food for the Cities are really important.

_{*UN Habitat}

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Read more

A Global Assessment of the Links between Urbanization, Biodiversity, and Ecosystem Services:

An Action and Policy Document published as part of the Convention of  Biological Diversity.

Food for the Cities discussion list:

This network brings together people committed to work on the issue related to food, agriculture, urbanization and cities on themes such as: right to food, nutrition, emergency operations, production and marketing, natural resources management and land tenure, local governance, and rural-urban linkages, and much more. It contributes to a local food system approach centred on cities.  It is an open platform bringing together people from the national and local governments, municipalities, international organizations, private sector, academics, NGOs and civil society.  To join the network, connect to http://dgroups.org/fao/food-for-cities