Habitat III Expert Group Meeting “Integrating Food Security and Nutrition into Urban and Territorial Planning”

Distinguished Delegates,

Ladies and Gentlemen!

 

It is with great pleasure that I welcome you, on behalf of FAO, to this expert meeting, organized by Habitat III Secretariat with the support of my fellow colleagues in FAO Headquarters, and UN sister agencies, including UN-Habitat, IFAD and WFP.

Somewhere around the end of the first decade of the century, there was a turning point whereby city dwellers outnumbered rural populations for the first time in history. Projections say that by 2050, as much as ¾ of the world’s population will be calling cities their “home”.

Nourishing, not just feeding, an increasingly urban world poses important challenges to an already strained food system. Just to mention a few, these challenges include the need for additional production of accessible, nutritious, safe and diverse food for the urban populations. Beyond production “feeding the cities” in a way that benefits domestic producers especially small and family farms requires food-provisioning systems, investments in infrastructure and logistics.

Lifestyles in urban areas are characterised by unhealthy dietary patterns which result in complex web of malnutrition problems ranging all the way from severe undernourishment and undernutrition to an increasing incidence of obesity. Urban areas are characterized by an increased risk of foodborne diseases, often associated with the consumption of street foods that are prepared following unsafe practices.

However, we can see urbanisation as a challenge and opportunity rather than a catastrophe. Cities, as a result of economies of agglomeration, offer opportunities for the provision of essential services (health, water, sanitation, social protection schemes, transport). Such services could be planned and used to tackle issues of food security and nutrition. Key urban issues such as health and nutrition, transportation, infrastructure, housing, water and sanitation, ecosystem resilience, urban-rural linkages, natural resources management and urban planning- have important food-system and rural components. Those are themes on which to base a  much-needed dialogue on what has been done so far and what is still to be done to actively shape and plan “the cities we need” for us and our children. It allows us to put a spotlight on food and nutrition security in cities if we have to solve the challenge of how to feed and nourish adequately people, all of them.

 

Urban and territorial policy tools can contribute to better nourished cities:

Urban planning has a central role to play in promoting urban food security and nutrition. Planning, from neighbourhoods to city, metropolitan, territorial and national levels, is a key tool to operationalize the linkages between SDG2, SDG10 (inequality) and SDG 11. There is a great potential of urban and territorial food system planning as a cross-cutting process. It can address the entire food system in relation to supply, logistics, distribution through wholesale and retail formal and informal traders, public outlets and food waste.

More specifically, integrating food into urban and territorial planning can result in:

i) incorporating mechanisms for making nutritious and fresh food more accessible, mainly to the urban poor, and reducing overall inequalities in access (e.g. zoning promoting healthy food access and restricting unhealthy  food outlets)  

ii) improving the functionality of food markets and distribution through spatial planning of cities and territories

iii) promoting the use of public spaces and services for small food entrepreneurs both formal and informal;

iv) improving the connectivity between urban and rural areas;

v) prioritizing protective mechanisms for the preservation and expansion of urban and peri-urban agricultural land, promoting productive public spaces and improving the use of urban and peri-urban agriculture;

vi) reducing greenhouse gas emissions through more efficient food transport; and

vii) improving urban and territorial ecology through better use and management of land, water and waste.

 

 

The New Urban Agenda, the global commitment on sustainable urban development for the next two decades, clearly recognizes food security and good nutrition as an urban priority. This was a first important policy achievement. As a matter of fact, it is a historic change in urban policy setting at the global level. The New Urban Agenda calls on national governments to take responsibility and action at international, national and local levels to efficiently position food security and nutrition as a priority in the urban context. At the same time the Implementation Plan for the New Urban Agenda draws attention on key issues such as the access to food, strengthening of urban-rural linkages and the food system planning.

We believe prosperous cities and thriving rural areas can drive the change for the sustainable food systems we need for healthy diets. It is important we win our battle against food insecurity and malnutrition in all its forms in the cities if we are to achieve several goals under the SDG agenda.

FAO recognizes the importance of supporting the New Urban Agenda and is committed to engaging in the post-Habitat III process as one of the lead agencies with the mandate to eradicate hunger, food insecurity and all forms of malnutrition.

This expert meeting is a great opportunity: i) to provide recommendations that can help nations to operationalize their commitments made in the New Urban Agenda; and ii) to set a knowledge ground for upscaling good food system practices that can result in cities driving the rural-urban developments we need.

 

 

Distinguished Delegates,

Ladies and Gentlemen!

Thank you for your genorisity to contribute with your expertise to assist countries with enabling an adequate environtment towards sustainable food systems and improved healthy diet in their urban and territorial agenda at national, subnational and local levels.

Have a very productive two-working days in New York