Global Forum on Food Security and Nutrition (FSN Forum)

Re: Strengthening urban and peri-urban food systems to achieve food security and nutrition in the context of urbanization and rural transformation

FAO Urban Food Systems PPA BE4

FAO
Italy

Dear all,

Please find the inputs from  the FAO Urban Food Systems PPA BE4 below. Kindly consider that the inputs include the contributions received by the FAO Green Cities and Urban Food Agenda teams.

Best regards,

Cecilia Marocchino, Urban Food Agenda Coordinator, Food Systems and Food Safety Division (ESF), FAO

Contributions to the guiding questions

A. Share your comments on the objectives and proposed content of this report as outlined above. Do you find the proposed scope comprehensive to analyze and discuss the key issues concerning the role of urban and peri-urban food systems in achieving food security and nutrition? Are there any major gaps or omissions?

Your input/comment and views
  • The nature of rural urban linkages is changing. The rural–urban distinction no longer appears to be an adequate axis with which to understand recent evolution of food systems. The relationship between urban and rural areas has changed: the borders between the two are increasingly blurred forming a spatial continuum which links rural hinterland to urban areas. The space in between is dotted with small and medium size cities and rural towns which have a major role in the evolution of food systems. In this context, small and intermediate cities play a crucial role as they could become hubs for essential components of the food systems. The importance of the rural-urban continuum should be therefore at the centre of the report. As a result, It should be highlighted the need for policies that take in consideration rural, peri-urban and urban populations and support their ability to have access to nutritious food and healthy diet while at the same time jointly promoting urban and rural economic, social and environmental sustainability.
  • When mentioning urban and peri-urban food systems, usually we have to consider the movement of people, resources, investment, apart from food, which are also key in urbanization and rural transformation.
  • The rapid increase of urban populations generates special attention to urban areas and their immediate rural territories, as a functional area where most of the actions of the food system occurs, where the majority of food consumers are, and the surrounding rural areas are home to zones of food production and other components of the supply chain (COAG/2020/12). In Latin America, the population residing in urban areas went from representing 29% of the total population, in the mid-20th century, to 81%, currently, the majority in cities with less than 5 million inhabitants (ONU, 2019).
  • The role of local governments in promoting food systems transformation should be highlighted. Many local governments are at the fore front in this agenda, but their role is not sufficiently recognized, and they are not adequately supported with financial and technical capacity particularly in low- and middle-income countries. The New Urban Agenda in 2016 and the Un Food Systems Summit in 2022 have been a turning point in this regard. The Urban Food Systems Coalition has been established (https://ufs-coalition.org).
  • The importance of developing food policy at local level and establish local food governance mechanisms (E.g. Food Policy Council) should be included as an important strategies that many cities are putting in place to operationalize the systemic approach and ensure the engagement of multiple actors. The urban food systems approach which includes urban food systems analysis, the establishment of multi-actor urban food governance mechanisms, the development of holistic food policies, strategies and plans , the integration of food systems in urban planning and the implementation of urban food systems actions according to specific entry points, is at the centre of the FAO Urban Food Agenda approach
  • If the mainstreaming of urban food system into urban planning is mentioned, is it key to insist on the necessary holistic approach to local policy, connecting food to land use, but also local economy (formal and informal), education, health, social relation and equity, etc. This system thinking approach should be mentioned.
  • Urban and peri-urban agriculture, food retail environment (formal and informal), food waste management and circular bioeconomy should be included as possible entry points for initiating the process of developing holistic food systems policies and plans.
  • The gap in terms of multi-level food systems governance should also be included. The linkage between all level of governments should be strengthened to create the enabling environment for cities to properly act and promote sustainable food systems transformation (refers to the Urban Food Systems Coalition)
  • What needs to be highlighted is the relationship between income, diets and food environments across rural-urban continuum: as they move or are born in urban areas, increasing number of people purchase majority of food they consume, especially in medium and big cities. This means that (urban) households are becoming more sensitive to price volatility for food security, since they spend a higher percentage of their household percentage on food than rural households, which has direct impacts on malnutrition and livelihoods. This also means that people purchase more processed foods and consume ‘food away from home’. This also means that the food environments have big role to play, especially the type of food retail outlets present in cities, but also their density by type (e.g. density of fast food outlets vs fresh food outlets in a neighbourhood). Financial and physical access to diverse, safe and fresh food is a key challenge for malnutrition. 
  • It could be interesting to develop to what extent, the “geographical decoupling” contributes to changes in food behaviour and malnutrition. Urban Food systems are key in the sense that they contribute to reconnecting of consumer to producer and changing food consumption behaviour.
  • Urban food diet is an important issue for public health, affecting more countries as the urbanization process intensifies. This area linked urban food system to health has to be developed.
  • The text does not highlight enough the shortcomings of urban agriculture: risk for health (with heavy metals), competition for water resources, use of pesticides in very dense habitat, and animal diseases (difficult to control by authorities);
  • The role of green urban spaces to protect functional ecosystem services should be mentioned, in the context of climate change (higher climate risks for cities concentrating more people) and land use change in urban areas. In this regard, the FAO Green Cities initiative was launched in 2020 to ensure access to a healthy environment from sustainable agri-food systems, increasing availability of green spaces through urban and peri-urban forestry.
  • Avoiding, reducing and recovering food waste is part of food system transformation, also at city level. Food waste recovery can be a track to close the loop of nutrients as cities are a black hole for nutrient coming from rural lands;
  • Some main challenges faced by urban and peri-urban food systems are missing, which are climate change and other shocks and stresses.

B. Share good practices and successful experiences on strengthening urban and peri-urban food systems in the context of urbanization and rural transformation, including in the case of emergencies or conflicts.

Your input
  • Local food systems strategies supported by FAO: the Antananarivo Food Systems Resilience Strategy, The Nairobi Food Strategy endorsed by Nairobi County and integrated in the County Development Plan, Quito Agrifood System Resilience Strategy among many others.
  • Multi-actor food policy Councils or similar mechanisms supported by FAO: the case of Lima, Kisumu, Quito, Nairobi, Bambilor, Kigali.
  • Initiatives taken by cities to develop local food policies and strategies all over the world. References can be identified via MUFPP, ICLEI, C40, CIRAD, Horizon 2020 programme, FAO projects and other UN;
  • The National framework in France, promoting Territorial Food Policies, can be analysed;
  • Worth exploring what has been done by other UN agencies leading response in conflict areas : WFP, UNHCR, IOM (e.g. MITSA project in Senegal and Ivory Coast led by IOM);
  • The Approach used by FAO with partners to support cities and local governments in mainstreaming food systems in local policies, planning and actions (reference to the FAO Urban Food Agenda and FAO Green Cities Initiative).

C. Share recent literature, case studies and data that could help answer the following questions:

1.            What are the main bottlenecks hampering the contribution of urban and peri-urban food systems to food security and nutrition?

Your input

 

2.            How can urban and peri-urban food systems be transformed and made more equitable and accessible both for food system actors and in terms of food security and nutrition outcomes?

Your input
  • Cross-sector collaboration among national, region and local governments with focus on integrated urban planning and multistakeholder mechanisms;
  • FAO through Urban Food Agenda approach supports cities and local governments to integrate food systems into local policies, plans and actions and through 3 pillars: i) conducting urban food systems analysis to create evidence and knowledge; ii) supporting urban food systems policy, planning and governance by facilitating food governance mechanisms and development of strategies, and iii) implementing urban food actions;
  • Mobilising the food production/processing potential of the territory; reorienting food actors of the local value chains (or developing new chains) to better channel the local production to the local market. Of course, food imports are necessary, but the nearly total geographical decoupling we now observe has bad side effects;
  • Adopt a system-thinking approach linking local food policy to health, economy, education in the territory;
  • Develop school canteen supplies with organic and local food, and use this policy to reconnect children to their territory. They'll become ambassador in their family;
  • Facilitate collaboration between local governments to avoid border effects and pay attention to rural-urban linkages;
  • Develop a social security related to (healthy) food: subsidy poor family in food purchasing power for health food (healthy for the planet and the body);
  • Ban food ads. For example, in France, in 2017, food ads budget amounted € 2,4 billion, while the food campaign of the ministry on health amounted €4 million (600 times less);
  • Adopt the territorial perspective, a territory (country level) might have overlapping configurations of food systems;
  • Invest in data to understand context-specific patterns that determine how the FS works from farm to fork and invest in evidence to inform about risks and inefficiencies;
  • Get the relevant actors around a table and define most relevant entry-point and priorities to be addressed under a common vision for the future;
  • Embrace a resilient approach based on the last 10 years evidence related to shocks and stresses;
  • Identify the regulations which might be involved with most relevant behavioral patterns and include multi-sectorial thinking to agree on the necessary changes;
  • Invest in a cost-benefit analyses putting social, environmental and health values in the center of the equation;
  • Invest in education and awareness at all levels to change behavior;
  • Establishing institutional multi-stakeholder mechanisms dedicated to food systems governance: ‘food units’ in local and regional governments, inter-ministerial committees;
  • Generating open data, knowledge and evidence on local level regarding most important food system aspects and entry points under the public domain: food insecurity and malnutrition, food markets and outlets, food infrastructure, food waste, circular economy, food safety, public food procurement;
  • Investing in remunerative agrifood system jobs, and better agri-business;
  • Adopting integrated food systems policies;
  • Improve information and public commitment in the middle stages of food supply chain / logistics, processing, distribution / where value is concentrated, also emissions and inequities.

3.            How can urban food supply chains, formal and informal, local and global, be made more resilient to ensure food security and nutrition within urban settings?

Your input
  • Policy and investments in market and value chain infrastructure (cold chain, storage, processing facilities), in mechanisms for fresh food product differentiation (participatory guarantee systems/certificate mechanisms) and low-cost traceability systems, in peripheral infrastructure (roads, electricity, water, sewage); in local fresh food outlets and domestic horticultural sector (farmers markets and short supply chains), in agrifood system education sector (integrating education nutrition and diets in all the agrifood education sector) and agribusiness enterprise development (especially targeted to youth and women); in innovative, incentivizing policies and capacity building for inclusion of small informal businesses. 
  • Develop storage facilities and transport systems;
  • Develop mechanisms to monitor food markets;
  • Effective food distribution, including expansion of delivery services, establishment of temporary food hubs, direct food distribution to vulnerable populations, and logistical support mainly provided in large cities;
  • Promote short food chains to enable urban citizens to access food products;
  • Providing information to food consumers (where does the food come from, how it has been produced, transformed, by who, what are the induced pollutions and GHG emissions, what is its health score). One of the key levers should be to provide the true cost of food;
  • Develop public food policy that link agriculture-food-health-climate-biodiversity & Inform the consumer & Adopt food trade agreements that avoid to exports externalities in other territories/countries;
  • Develop biocircular economic solutions and adopt agroecological agricultural practices, in particular in diversifying food production (livestock & crops);
  • Identify risks and inefficiencies from key commodities and develop the necessary evidence to unpack bottlenecks. Ref: Develop a food flow mapping assessment, Colombo CRFS;
  • Consider the assessment of the last 10 years of shocks and stresses and how the system has responded effectively or not using existing or developing new capacities (collective initiatives, policies, programmes). Ref: FAO comparative global study on CRFS resilience;
  • Promote the circular development of urban food systems

4.            What changes are needed in urban planning to better support all dimensions of food security – including support for human rights, agency and sustainability? Which are some of the measures that can strengthen the agency of local actors in urban and peri-urban food systems? 

Your input
  • Shared data on land tenure;
  • Training of urban and territorial planners on these issues;
  • Multistakeholder dialogue and collaboration mechanism;
  • Food system assessment tools and the application in the local context;
  • Developing and enforcing appropriate land regulations that protect agriculture lands from urbanization. Making land trade transparent;
  • Developing food distribution systems that consider the ‘food desert’ risks and food security at large;
  • Ban food ads (from cities);
  • Ref: MUFPP 37 recommended actions clustered in 6 categories which can be included in urban masterplans;
  • Ref: MUFPP Monitoring framework as a concrete guide on indicators that help city planners to choose food priorities;

Develop multidisciplinary urban planning teams to develop integrated urban planning, linking urban (or land-use) planning with the economic, social, health and environmental dimensions. Infrastructure should serve social, health and environmental welfare and not the other way round. Integrated technical committees are not enough but consider inviting to thematic planning sessions representatives from the private and civil society sectors;

  • In China, there are government issues policies to protect cultivated land area since 2000, which seek to balance increases in urban construction land with a reduction in rural construction to alleviate the loss of arable land (Deng et al., 2015). These policies have achieved some successful results, where a process of resettlement in some provinces converted over 660 ha of rural housing land into farmland. However, overall, it is projected that these policies do not suffice since the continued urbanization rate in towns and cities that keeps converting arable land for settlement purposes is faster than the rate of offsetting the rural settlement into arable land (Deng et al., 2015).

 

5.            How can national and municipal governments strengthen the potential for low-carbon, inclusive, relatively self-sufficient and resilient cities and towns to drive improved food security and nutrition in the wake of climate change and other crises?

Your input
  • Join FAO Green Cities Initiative (GCI) to get support; The GCI focuses on improving the urban environment, strengthening urban-rural linkages and the resilience of urban systems, services and populations to external shocks. Ensuring access to a healthy environment and healthy diets from sustainable agri-food systems, increasing availability of green spaces through urban and peri-urban forestry, it will also contribute to climate change mitigation and adaptation and sustainable resource management. It provides technical support to cities in different levels:
    • Actions for metropolitan cities to enhance their contribution to sustainable growth and wealth at national level with a focus on innovation and green technologies for agri-food systems and green infrastructure, improved food distribution systems and food environments, and better food and water waste management through improved urban planning and rural urban linkages.
    • Actions for intermediary cities to enhance their role in connecting rural and urban areas to basic facilities and services with a focus on balancing green and healthy environments with productivity, producing local food, connecting producers and local markets, innovative agro-processing food hubs and green jobs, farmers markets and circular economy.
    • Actions for small cities to enhance nutrition, healthier diets and closer interactions to where food is produced with a focus on governance for functional territories, innovation and green technologies for green infrastructures and food systems, improved agro-processing hubs and urban-rural linkages, promoting off-farm job opportunities, reducing food loss and better food and water waste management.
  • Improve short food supply chain;
  • Diversify food supply and access sources;
  • Exchange knowledge and lessons learnt;
  • Joint actions between national and municipal governments;
  • Adopt nature-based solutions and green infrastructures providing the expected services;
  • Adopting exemplary actions such as home-grown school feeding programme (as well as for other public canteens), and supporting the connections between local producers and public purchasers;
  • Invest circular economy solutions, in particular in avoiding-reducing-recovering food waste and organic waste. As cities concentrate food and food consumption, there is an urgent need to close the loop of organic Carbon and nutrients (NPK), getting value from faeces and unavoidable food waste;
  • Cities are powerful driver for food habits and food behaviours. National and local governments can facilitate switch for planetary health diet with less meat and more pulses playing on food ads (to be banned), public canteens (organic, seasonal and local food with vegetarian meals), food environment and distribution (market place accessible to local famers, fresh food retailers in the city);
  • Cities (and national governments) can also promote changes in agricultural practices in their territory, promoting Agroecological practices, encouraging carbon sequestration in agriculture (hedge, soil carbon) and develop local labels for low carbon local food.
  • Local and national governments can incentive local supply chains to better consider (transform and sell locally) the local farm products, however self-sufficient food production shouldn’t be an objective, unless to put food security at risk. The driver is more how to reconnect local agriculture to its territory;
  • Read the IPCC Report Summary for Cities to be aware of what science is forecasting for the next 30 years and act;
  • Engage with international goals and objectives. Choose to collaborate at multiple scale defining roles and responsibilities, define a feasible way to report on results. Invest the most in supporting the weakest. MUFPP, SDGs;
  • Involve multi-sectorial thinking, do not leave all the burden to governments. Partner with the private sector and the civil society;
  • Invest in R&D for locally-adapted and climate shock-resistant seeds

6.            What are the most appropriate policies (and gaps in existing policies) along the rural-urban continuum to address issues of land tenure, urban expansion into farmland and the growing competition for natural resources?

Your input
  • See examples from CRFS policy briefs https://www.fao.org/in-action/food-for-cities-programme/resources/policy-briefs/en/
  • The change is the unprecedented: high rate of the urbanization in Africa and Asia;
  • It is key to strengthen cooperation between local government (and their stakeholders) at territorial level to better anticipate collectively and enhance urban-rural linkages;
  • It is key to link land use regulation to a territorial food protect. In France it is the case: local governments have the possibility to activate these 2 groups of tools: regulation and territorial project, and these policies must be conducted over the long term;
  • It is also key that these policies are cross sectorial linking drinking water provision, economy and trade, agricultural practices, food education, information of the consumers, biodiversity;
  • Land Laws and regulations (land tenure, land-use strategic documents, masterplans schemes, development plans at national and local level);
  • Policies on: water, agriculture and environment, adaptation plans, resilience and contingency plans;
  • Main gaps are observed in the omission of systemic approaches, the inclusion of food systems, considering resilience as an optional approach. Implementation is challenging in many countries due to the complexity of land-ownership patterns;

7.            How can urban and peri-urban food systems ensure that food and nutrition needs of specific groups of people, such as migrants, the internally-displaced, children, adolescent, etc., are met?

Your input
  • These different groups have different needs and need different approaches – for children, it is crucial to work on maternal nutrition in the first 1,000 days of life (between a woman’s pregnancy and child’s second birthday), as it is a brief but critical window of opportunity to shape a child’s development in terms of nutrient provision. Working with local health centers on training of frontline health workers on women’s education around nutrition, investment in distribution of adequate supplements, and social and behavior change communication is a key for preventing life-long impacts of under- and malnutrition in form of stunting, wasting and cognitive impairments. 
  • Offering the possibility of displaced people to farm themselves (per ex near a refugees camp);
  • Implement in-depth assessment and make policies based on the results;
  • Establish multistakeholder platform and dialogue mechanism;
  • Multi-stakeholder governance through participatory dialogues and platforms enables more inclusive approaches to happen;
  • Holistic Stakeholder mapping tools are needed to make sure you don’t leave anybody out;

8.            What are the potential benefits and challenges of territorial markets for strengthening food security and nutrition for urban populations?

Your input

  • Territorial markets are at the heart of local food systems, especially in low-income settings. They are crucial not only for securing access to markets for smallholder farmers, but also for safeguarding food security and nutrition in the territories in question (CFS, 2016; FAO, 2015). Territorial markets also play a critical role in ensuring day-to-day access to fresh and seasonal and traditional food products, such as vegetables, fruits, meat and fish (FAO, 2016; FAO and iNRA, 2016). Majority of population in developing countries purchases fresh food at territorial markets (across all income levels) (Gomez and Ricketts, 2013), and considering this, upgrading these markets (investing in infrastructure, providing access to financial and credit services for smallholders, supporting product differentiation and marketing, improving market management and governance)  to deliver safe, accessible, and diverse food regularly would improve livelihoods and diets for majority of population in developing countries (including both consumers and retailers); Despite their importance, territorial markets are often not available in (national) data collection systems. This is why FAO has developed the initiative on mapping of territorial market, including data collection methodology, indicators, database and lessons learnt from the analysis. You can learn about more about the initiative here: https://www.fao.org/nutrition/markets/territorial-markets-initiative/en/.
  • Location and accessibility;
  • Management and monitoring mechanism;
  • Territorial markets can contribute to informing and raising awareness of food consumers. It is therefore necessary to work with food vendors and develop Participatory Guarantee System facilitating the information of the consumer;
  • Benefits : local consumption by increasing territorial markets reduces food miles and GHGs, shortens supply chains reducing intermediaries and costs, is contributes to local job creation inclusion and job diversification, can benefit from circular approaches, products are fresher and do not need conservation chemicals contributing to healthier food;
  • Challenges: Space availability, needs infrastructure investments, governance and intercommunal coordination, regulations and resources, food safety regulation mechanisms;

9.            In what ways can the incorporation of climate resilient agricultural and circular economy practices in urban and peri-urban agriculture provide climate co-benefits for all and enhance climate resilience?

Your input
  • When waste management is well done, the water drainage channels are less clogged;
  • Agriculture fields can offer space for temporary buffers during flooding events;
  • Urban green space helps reducing the urban heat island effect;
  • High tech UPA practices such as hydroponics or vertical farming can also lead to the more optimal use of scarce resources such as water and soil;
  • Bringing production areas closer to cities can contribute to lowering the pressure on agricultural systems that border natural ecosystems (forest, wetlands, grasslands, etc.), which play a critical role in the conservation of biodiversity, mitigation of climate change and the provision of environmental services on which all types of life depend;
  • You reduce the use of chemical input (whose production emits GHG);
  • Recovering Food Waste avoid methane emissions;
  • FAO UPA sourcebook;
  • UPA combined with UPF can contribute to NBSs to improve urban resilience to increasing natural hazards, providing at the same time food. The increasing biomass in cities can be used to produce compost for urban farmers and energy. Urban biodiversity increases the quality of the urban environment, watersheds are preserved, water resources are preserved.
  • Design and implement models to improve green infrastructure in the urban and periiurban areas, considering solutions based on nature, and multilevel governance;
  • Considering different opportunities of collaborative food transportation as fluvial logistics, urban food hubs, CSA, among others

10.         How can citizens be engaged and empowered to drive inclusive, transparent, participatory processes for urban transformations, ensuring synergies and complementarity with city councils?

Your input
  • Give voice to civil society at municipality level;
  • Climathon a possible method;
  • Using Open street maps communities (Open Green Maps | Open Green Map... )
  • Join multistakeholder mechanism;
  • Participate in a food council;
  • Develop home grown school feeding program together with food education, Then children contribute changing their family;
  • Develop the true cost of food: consumers must be aware about what the eat;
  • FAO CRFS Handbook and online toolkit ;
  • Participation in local food policy councils, food and city labs ;
  • Using technology (apps, e-platforms) that connect and complement existing knowledge in communities, point to gaps, and help in sharing information on local food systems – food waste, CSA, urban/community gardens, land, and which can be used for advocacy on the local level ;
  • Participation through public educational institutions (school meals and garden programs) ;
  • Volunteering in food solidarity channels (e.g.food banks) ;
  • Developing local food initiatives : UPA, CSA, local food markets, food maps, etc.

11.         Which experiences of urban communities to increase access to fresh food and healthy diets can inspire broader public policies?

Your input

 

 
See the attachments: