Transcript Periurban Agriculture

Agricultural Production in
Developing Countries
MSc 551
Seminar Presentation:
Peri-urban Agriculture
Andrew Bradford
Peri-urban Agriculture
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Urbanization
Peri-urban interface
Agriculture
Urban proximity
Food security
Agricultural Efficiency
Sustainability
Risks
Urbanization
• Recent demographic events
• Origins: mercantile colonialism
• Current: Neo-colonialism, New
International Division of Labour
• Push: neglect of rural areas, domination of
cash cropping, civil conflict
• Pull: employment, health, education, family
migration patterns
Urban Issues
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Shelter
Poverty
Pollution
Violence
Solid waste
Unemployment
Air pollution
Food security
Human effluent
Peri-urban Interface
• Defined as the transition zone between rural
and urban areas, i.e. those areas surrounding
cities, which are in most ways integrated
with the city
• High growth rates (70 percent of rural
migrants, in addition to migrants from the
city itself) on often marginalized lands
• The distinction between urban and periurban depends on the density, types, and
patterns of land uses, which also determine
the constraints and opportunities for
agriculture
Urban Agriculture
• Agriculture within cities
• Refers to small plots (e.g. gardens, verges,
rooftops) within a city that are used for
growing crops and raising small livestock or
diary cows for subsistence or sale in local
markets
Peri-urban Agriculture
• Agriculture around cities
• Refers to smallholdings and commercial
farm systems located around cities that are
growing crops (often horticultural crops, i.e.
vegetables and fruit), raising livestock, fish
farming (aquaculture), or producing milk
and eggs for peri-urban and urban markets
Urban Proximity: Opportunities
• Less need for packaging, storage and
transportation
• Potential agricultural jobs and incomes
• Non-market access to food for poor
consumers
• Availability of fresh, perishable food
• Proximity to services, including waste
treatment facilities
• Waste recycling and re-use possibilities
Urban Proximity: Risks
• Environmental & health risks from
inappropriate agricultural and aquacultural
practices
• Increased competition for land, water,
energy and labour
• Reduced environmental capacity for
pollution absorption
Food Security
• Increases quantity of food available
• Enhances food security during times of
crisis and severe scarcity
• Enhances freshness of perishable foods
reaching urban consumers
• Offers employment opportunities (estimated
800 million urban residents currently active)
Agricultural Efficiency
• Cost savings because of proximity to
consumers, less need for extensive &
expensive infrastructure for transportation
and preservation of perishable products
• Concerns arise over competition for
resources (land, water, labour and energy)
• Horticulture: practised by poor & landless,
crop species allows year round production,
employment & income
• Productive use of under-utilized resources,
vacant land, treated wastewater, recycled
waste and unemployed labour
Sustainability
• Basic resources conflict (water & soil)
• Higher risk in urban food production
• Requires land use planning which views
agriculture as an integral component of
urban natural resources system and balances
the competitive and synergistic interactions
among the users of natural resources (water,
land, air, wastes)
Risks
• Inappropriate/excessive use of agricultural
inputs may contaminate drinking water
sources
• Microbial contamination of soil & water,
including pathogens
• Infection from worms, nematodes &
hookworms
• Air pollution (carbon dioxide & methane
from organic matter, ammonia, nitrous
oxide & nitrogen oxide from nitrates)
• Intensive livestock: zoonotic diseases &
veterinary public health issues
Conclusion
• Opportunities exist for increased food
security, employment, increased resource
utilization & environmental enhancement,
• Improvement in quality of life
• Requires integrated management, land use
planning, legislation, monitoring & control
• Should not be developed in competition
with rural agriculture, concentrate on
activities in which it has a comparative
advantage (fresh, perishable foods)
References
Girardet, H. (1999). Schumacher Briefings No. 2: Creating Sustainable Cities. Green Books,
Dartington.
FAO. (2000) Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture.
http://www.fao.org/unfao/bodies/coag/coag15/docs/xoo76e.doc [17 th November 2000].
Satterthwaite, D. (ed). (1999). The Earthscan Reader in Sustainable Cities. Earthscan
Publications Ltd, London.
Photographs taken by A. Bradford in Nepal (1998) and Macedonia (2000).