Urban Food Sustainability
Some emerging city farmers in their quest to address problems of urban food supply and low income give homegrown solutions City dwellers need inexpensive and ample supplies of fresh and enriching food. And this need builds up fast as time goes by while arable urban lands ideal for food production undoubtedly shrink. Consequently, the demand for food in not so- distant future becomes more constraining. This imminent problem has created urban food raisers in built-up vicinity. Not only food plants, these new farmers also rear livestock, poultry, and even fish in so compact an area. City residents especially those from the lower brackets feel insecure about their food supply because food is fast becoming a very costly item. In developing countries such as India, Thailand, Bolivia, and Egypt, sources revealed that about 69 to 89% of resident income is spent on food. Some factors trigger the stepping up of urban farming such as reduced household income, inflation, quick-paced urbanization, uneven food distribution, drought, negligent city ordinance, among others. About 200 million of city residents in 1993 grow food, supplying nourishment and income to about 700 million people. In 1980, about 25% of all urban household in the U.S.A. was producing food. Similarly, about 57% household in six Kenyan cities was engaged in food production. Moscow City, on the other hand, had 32.6 to 70% households. Some cities supply their residents by growing their own food. Singapore, Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Karachi deliver about 25 to 85% of their own fruits and vegetables to city population; thus, growers generate income and save cash from the produce. Growers save from 18 to 60% in household food when they grow their own. With shrinking land space in the city, residents grow food plant on land unsuited for building including idle public lands. Some use small inaccessible vacant land, streamsides, flood-prone areas, and even some bodies of water. Some under-used areas useful for farming could be used for growing food plants. In 1980, Metro Manila had about 203 km ² of such land; Bangkok had 338 km²; Karachi had 4,850 hectares; Sao Paolo had 600 km²; and Bombay had 200 km². These areas, though suitable for urban farming, are not accessible to farmers. Zoning laws, on the other hand, may hinder grower who wants to use his own or his neighbor’s land. A study in Kampala, Uganda has identified the four rationales why residents join urban food plant growing. They participate in urban agriculture because they want to produce crop commercially; others said they want to be self-sufficient; some reasoned self-sufficiency. Outside the above-mentioned reasons, the last rationale hinges on the fact that other participants have no other recourse, or simply they raise food plants for survival. Survival urban growers include the low-income earners, some female-headed households, widows, and families deserted by primary wage earners. Food sufficiency was demonstrated in China during the early 1930s. Shanghai City was able to feed its 3 million residents with its own food harvested in the city within a 100-km radius. The food was not costly and just raised at adjacent areas. This kept prices and transit cost very low. In Latin America, Haiti has joined urban gardening. Here, residents of some of the under privileged urban areas use recycled scraps such as tires, baskets, kettles, pails, and other types of containers in growing food plants, which consequently have improved their health, income, and nutritional condition. Improvements came in Haiti because of training sessions conducted by various community-based and non-governmental organizations in establishing gardens in limited spaces. The objective of the training is aimed at reducing their reliance on purchased food, which absorbs almost 50% of household expenses. Haiti’s average annual per capita income is less than CA $ 350. Average residents, for instance, in Port-au-Prince, Haitian capital, eat no more than two home-cooked meals per week. They rely mostly on street food vendors and small eating-places. Besides zoning laws, urban raising of food plants are limited by other factors such as access to land, and access to good water supply. These depend on the desire or idea of city planners. In the absence of irrigating water, growers may resort to using polluted water, which may directly expose both growers and consumers to possible danger. Pollution of the water table, on the other hand, is its indirect effect. To cope up with such limited space, some cities resort to compact agriculture where systems are integrated. In Hong Kong, for instance, poly-aquaculture is integrated with animal husbandry. In Singapore, with its limited area, multi-cropping, hydroponics and the use of early-maturing or short- growing varieties are used to keep up vegetable supply. The use of hydroponics growing promises fresh greens in compact space such as those found in apartments, balcony, and the like. The simplicity of container gardening using recycled scraps, on the other side, must also be harnessed. With the surfacing of new studies on raising foods in urban sites, new systems, techniques, policies, and even new regulations must be brought about. In the very near future, global urbanization seems inevitable as more and more people will reside in the cities, trailing behind the number of population in rural areas. It is time now that planners, researchers, and politicians to talk, listen, and act.
The author is a Freelance Journalist and Plant Pathologist, from the University of the Philippines, who writes about food and agriculture for local and international journals.
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