Urban agriculture as a survival strategy : implications for planning.

Abstract

Urbanisation is one of the most forceful social and economic trends currently affecting large cities in the developing world and is an important component of national economic development processes. This is despite the general decline of formal urban economies in both developed and developing countries. A mirror-image reflection of the urbanisation process is increasing urban poverty, clearly evident in large cities and metropolitan areas in South Africa. The urban poor, local government, and urban planners have responded to urbanisation and poverty in different ways. Informal settlement processes take place and consolidate themselves in a climate of isolation and continuous conflict with the rules of the established formal urban economy, with the informal sector providing a safety net for survival. With the barest minimum of resources people living in informal settlements have provided some sort of shelter for themselves in spite of successive and systematic governmental opposition. They have generated many income earning opportunities in the informal sector; and in some cases they have made and effort to supplement household food supplies through direct production within the city. The practice of urban agriculture is guided by the "logic for survival" and it may be equated to squatter housing and street trading in that they are all examples of innovative responses from the urban poor. In the recent past the general response of local government planning authorities in African cities has been the fomiulation and implementation of urban management programmes linked to poverty alleviation programmes. It is within this context that various government authorities have responded by repressing the survival strategies of the urban poor, · tolerating it if they lacked the capacity to control it, or encouraging it by having had enabling mechanisms in place to support such activities. Generally, government authorities have used all of the above strategies simultaneously due to a relatively greater acceptance or tolerance of some informal activities in comparison to others. The practice of urban agriculture has been repressed in certain countries, while tolerated or promoted in others. For urban planners the connection between food and the land on which it is produced has become increasingly remote and abstract as an issue that directly concerns urban planning and wellfare. Food production and distribution is intricately linked to the global economic trade, and it will be difficult to change the terms of trade in an effort to produce subsistence food supplies. People living in urban areas are reliant on the cash purchase of food which in turn is linked to levels of affordability. However in the face of declining real incomes and reduced purchasing power, and as mentioned above, the poor and destitute have resorted to supplementing their household food supplies through direct production within the city. Food relief programmes are an added expense to government's already overburdened coffers. As such food security is a matter that urban planners and policy makers should consider from now on. Urban agriculture has an important role to play in feeding the ever growing urban popUlation, especially the urban poor. The planning of cities rarely considers the production of urban food supplies since the prevailing attitude is one that consigns food production to the rural areas, with the focus of the city on the pursuit of economic activities. There is an compelling urgency to defeat the ethical, ideological, psychological, attitudinal and practical obstacles to promoting urban agriculture since positive policies in support of urban agriculture are unlikely to emerge from this negative frame of mind.