Abstract
AbstractPoor physical and land use planning underpin the chaotic evolution and expansion in cities and towns in sub-Saharan Africa. This situation amplifies urban vulnerability to climate change. Worse, urban landscapes are rarely considered part of the discourse on urban development in sub-Saharan Africa, let alone in climate change adaptation. Yet, landscapes are known to play crucial roles in social, economic, and cultural resilience in cities and towns. Hence, designing basic forms of appealing and functional urban landscapes that support multiple ecosystem services is essential to the drive towards resilience, which relates to the ability to maintain or improve the supply of life support services and products (such as food and water) in the face of disturbance. In this chapter, the idea of transforming idle urban spaces into multifunctional edible urban landscapes is introduced and explored as instrumental for cost-effective adaptation and resilience to climate change in cities and towns in sub-Saharan Africa. Multifunctional edible urban landscape is defined here as a managed landscape that integrates food production and ornamental design, in harmonious coexistence with other urban structures to promote or provide targeted, multiple services. These services include food security, scenic beauty, green spaces for active living and learning, jobs and livelihoods support, environmental protection, climate adaptation, and overall urban resilience. This approach constitutes a triple-win multifunctional land use system that is beneficial to landowners, city managers, and the general community. This chapter explores the benefits, challenges, and prospects for practically transforming urban idle spaces into multifunctional edible urban landscapes using an example project from Ghana. The chapter shows that multifunctional edible urban landscape transformation for resilience is practically feasible, and sheds light on the possibility of the food production component paying for landscaping and landscape management. It concludes with thoughts on actions required across sectors and multiple scales, including mobilizing stakeholders, laws, policies, and incentives, to actualize multifunctional edible urban landscapes as key transformational components of resilience in sub-Saharan Africa.
Highlights
IntroductionUrbanization has its promise and value in terms of concentrating resources and capital to improve physical development and human well-being; but it has its perils too as it increases the demand for basic necessities of life (such as food, water, shelter, employment, and recreational opportunities) and the complexity of managing the resources and the socioecological processes that underpin ecosystem services and quality of life
The Challenges of Urbanization, Climate Change, and Resilience in AfricaUrbanization has its promise and value in terms of concentrating resources and capital to improve physical development and human well-being; but it has its perils too as it increases the demand for basic necessities of life and the complexity of managing the resources and the socioecological processes that underpin ecosystem services and quality of life
Sub-Saharan Africa will host most of the largest cities that will arise from the projected population growth in Africa, most of them in coastal areas (Di Ruocco et al 2015)
Summary
Urbanization has its promise and value in terms of concentrating resources and capital to improve physical development and human well-being; but it has its perils too as it increases the demand for basic necessities of life (such as food, water, shelter, employment, and recreational opportunities) and the complexity of managing the resources and the socioecological processes that underpin ecosystem services and quality of life. Sub-Saharan Africa will host most of the largest cities that will arise from the projected population growth in Africa, most of them in coastal areas (Di Ruocco et al 2015) These underscore the challenge and importance of sustainably managing the quality and resilience of urban environment and life by maintaining and enhancing the integrity and functionality of the systems that underpin resilience, food systems (Russo et al 2017; Haberman et al 2014). Africa is considered a highly vulnerable continent to the adverse impacts of climate change (IPCC 2007; Chapman et al 2017), and the continent is already experiencing the impacts of climate change, through highly frequent and severe episodes of droughts and floods (African Union 2020; Batchelor and Schnetzer 2018; Van Rooyen et al 2017; Lwasa 2014; Armah et al 2011) This vulnerability stems partly from Africa’s poor physical planning and environmental degradation, and overreliance on agriculture, which is hypersensitive to climate change (IPCC 2007). These challenges raise the imperative for exploring several response options, including the planning, evolution, development, and uses of urban landscapes for reducing vulnerability and enhancing resilience (Russo et al 2017)
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