Gordon Prain

African urban harvest

Cameroon.- The Institutional and Regional Context.- Urban Agriculture in Africa: What Has Been Learned?.- Urban Farming Systems in Yaounde - Building a Mosaic.- Crop-Livestock Integration in the Urban Farming Systems of Yaounde.- Institutional Development of Urban Agriculture - An Ongoing History of Yaounde.- Uganda.- Changing Trends in Urban Agriculture in Kampala.- Can Schools be Agents of Urban Agriculture Extension and Seed Production?.- Identifying Market Opportunities for Urban and Peri-Urban Farmers in Kampala.- Health Impact Assessment of Urban Agriculture in Kampala.- Kenya.- Recycling Nutrients from Organic Wastes in Kenyas Capital City.- Crop-Livestock-Waste Interactions in Nakurus Urban Agriculture.- Benefits and Selected Health Risks of Urban Dairy Production in Nakuru, Kenya.- Urban Agroforestry Products in Kisumu, Kenya: A Rapid Market Assessment.- Urban Agriculture and Institutional Change.- IDRC and Its Partners in Sub-Saharan Africa 2000-2008.- The Contribution of Research-Development Partnerships to Building Urban Agriculture Policy.

An agriculture and health inter-sectorial research process to reduce hazardous pesticide health impacts among smallholder farmers in the Andes.

BackgroundThe use of highly hazardous pesticides by smallholder farmers constitutes a classic trans-sectoral ‘wicked problem’. We share our program of research in potato and vegetable farming communities in the Andean highlands, working with partners from multiple sectors to confront this problem over several projects.MethodsWe engaged in iterative cycles of mixed methods research around particular questions, actions relevant to stakeholders, new proposal formulation and implementation followed by evaluation of impacts. Capacity building occurred among farmers, technical personnel, and students from multiple disciplines. Involvement of research users occurred throughout: women and men farmers, non-governmental development organizations, Ministries of Health and Agriculture, and, in Ecuador, the National Council on Social Participation.ResultsPesticide poisonings were more widespread than existing passive surveillance systems would suggest. More diversified, moderately developed agricultural systems had lower pesticide use and better child nutrition. Greater understanding among women of crop management options and more equal household gender relations were associated with reduced farm pesticide use and household pesticide exposure. Involvement in more organic agriculture was associated with greater household food security and food sovereignty. Markets for safer produce supported efforts by smallholder farmers to reduce hazardous pesticide use.Participatory interventions included: promoting greater access to alternative methods and inputs in a store co-sponsored by the municipality; producing less harmful inputs such as compost by women farmers; strengthening farmer organizations around healthier and more sustainable agriculture; marketing safer produce among social sectors; empowering farmers to act as social monitors; and using social monitoring results to inform decision makers. Uptake by policy makers has included: the Ecuadorian Ministry of Health rolling out pesticide poisoning surveillance modeled on our system; the Ecuadorian Association of Municipalities holding a national virtual forum on healthier agriculture; and the Ecuadorian Ministry of Agriculture promulgating restrictions on highly hazardous pesticides in June 2010.ConclusionWork with multiple actors is needed to shift agriculture towards greater sustainability and human health, particularly for vulnerable smallholders.

Urban Agriculture in Africa: What Has Been Learned?

Though the crisis in world food prices exploded during 2008, the problem of urban food insecurity in Africa has been a fact of life for many low-income urban dwellers for decades, and especially since the period of structural adjustment in the 1980s (Maxwell 1995). It is not that there is no food; it’s that poor urban consumers cannot afford it. This is the stark but simple truth lying behind much of the agriculture that is widespread within and around African cities. What urban households have known and practiced for generations, urban decision-makers have begun to recognize much more recently: urban agriculture is a livelihood strategy.

Determinants of household food access among small farmers in the Andes: Examining the path

OBJECTIVE Household food access remains a concern among primarily agricultural households in lower- and middle-income countries. We examined the associations among domains representing livelihood assets (human capital, social capital, natural capital, physical capital and financial capital) and household food access. DESIGN Cross-sectional survey (two questionnaires) on livelihood assets. SETTING Metropolitan Pillaro, Ecuador; Cochabamba, Bolivia; and Huancayo, Peru. SUBJECTS Households (n = 570) involved in small-scale agricultural production in 2008. RESULTS Food access, defined as the number of months of adequate food provisioning in the previous year, was relatively good; 41 % of the respondents indicated to have had no difficulty in obtaining food for their household in the past year. Using bivariate analysis, key livelihood assets indicators associated with better household food access were identified as: age of household survey respondent (P = 0.05), participation in agricultural associations (P = 0.09), church membership (P = 0.08), area of irrigated land (P = 0.08), housing material (P = 0.06), space within the household residence (P = 0.02) and satisfaction with health status (P = 0.02). In path models both direct and indirect effects were observed, underscoring the complexity of the relationships between livelihood assets and household food access. Paths significantly associated with better household food access included: better housing conditions (P = 0.01), more space within the household residence (P = 0.001) and greater satisfaction with health status (P = 0.001). CONCLUSIONS Multiple factors were associated with household food access in these peri-urban agricultural households. Food security intervention programmes focusing on food access need to deal with both agricultural factors and determinants of health to bolster household food security in challenging lower- and middle-income country contexts.

The Contribution of Research–Development Partnerships to Building Urban Agriculture Policy

This final chapter draws conclusions about the prospects for urban agriculture policy and institutional change based on analysis of the towns and cities examined in this book, each of which casts a different light on a common effort to develop or adapt institutions that will come to terms with the on-the-ground reality of urban agriculture. The research-development partnerships established are examined in a broad conceptual framework and more specifically in relation to the investment in research. A political science perspective examining the power relations between the various actors involved is advocated. Political shifts toward inclusive and democratic governance, including the development of civil society, appear to favor the development of urban agriculture policies and institutions, as does research. The building of research-to-policy platforms may have been key factors influencing such developments in all three capital cities examined.

Gender mainstreaming in organisational culture and agricultural research processes

Despite increased attention to gender issues in the international development arena since the rise of feminism in the 1970s, few agricultural research organisations have integrated gender in their problem diagnosis and technology development. Gender mainstreaming can significantly enhance the impact of research and technology development. Entrenching gender mainstreaming in organisations and their research agendas remains a challenge. To overcome it requires political will, accountability, a change in organisational culture, and technical capacity within an organisation. This article presents an experience of gender-mainstreaming practice in the institutional culture and agricultural research processes by Urban Harvest and the International Potato Centre (CIP).

IDRC and Its Partners in Sub-Saharan Africa 2000–2008

The peer-reviewed studies in this book are part of a larger set of ongoing urban agriculture initiatives in Sub-Saharan Africa. In this chapter we highlight the role played by international collaboration in supporting these, focusing on a group of institutions and how their interactions have evolved over time. Even though these institutions only formalised their programs on urban agriculture over the last decade or so, several were already active in the field earlier. The ideas and concepts associated with urban agriculture have been around for even longer, while the reality of urban agriculture itself dates as far back as humanity’s first urban settlements. For one, the “garden city” concept is rooted in modern urban planning (Smit et al. 1996; Lee-Smith & Cole 2008).

The Institutional and Regional Context

How abundant is Africa’s urban harvest, how much does it help feed and support the 250 million people now living in the continent’s towns and cities? And how could it do this better? These are the questions which this book sets out to answer, and this chapter provides a regional and historical background to the research reported in the book which attempts to answer those questions. Despite the long history of agricultural production in around urban settlements, in Africa as in other parts of the world, this activity has faced technical, institutional and policy constraints, which only recently are beginning to change. The chapter provides an account of the origins of these constraints and why overcoming them can make an important contribution to urban food security and poverty eradication. It locates the present study within a research agenda begun more than 20 years ago which aims to provide evidence of the role of agriculture in the livelihoods of urban and peri-urban households and the changing treatment of this agriculture by city governments.