Urban Food Supply Research Articles

How cities source their food: spatial interactions in West African urban food supply

In West Africa, increasing rural–urban flows of food, driven by growing urban populations, require functional, efficient links between cities and production areas. However, underlying mechanisms of urban food sourcing in West Africa are poorly understood. This study deepens understanding of spatial interactions between cities and production areas by examining the effects of settlement size, geographical distance, and agricultural suitability on food inflows to four West African cities. The analysis was informed by theoretical spatial models and data on food flows, road network, agricultural suitability, and settlements. Results showed that food travelled further from larger supplying settlements, and towards the two larger destination cities. This supports the idea of a hierarchical system, where food provisioning area and upstream supply chain length increase with settlement size. Overall, towns with fewer than 100,000 inhabitants, often representing aggregation centres, were among the major suppliers to the cities. Complementary agricultural suitability between origin and destination shaped food flow direction and length, but poor road access and international borders impeded trade. Spatial models did not fully explain food flows: they were also influenced by historical factors shaping certain settlements’ importance as sources. Study cities were supplied by a diversity of more and less concentrated food sources, representing production sites or aggregating markets, which should theoretically support food supply resilience. Improvements to storage and road infrastructure, and removing trade barriers, could improve food supply to cities, and producer and trader livelihoods. Emerging research on urban food systems governance could support understanding of how best to do this.

The trajectory of urban food supply policy: The Centennial Municipal Market of Campos dos Goytacazes, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

The trajectory of urban food supply policy: The Centennial Municipal Market of Campos dos Goytacazes, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

The Influencing Mechanism of Household Food Purchasing Behavior and Household Reserve Efficiency under Non-Normal Conditions

Family reserves are an important part of national reserves, and how to do a good job in family reserves is a common concern of the government and society. Under the non-normal conditions of major accidents and disasters, wars, plagues, social unrest, etc., urban food supply mainly depends on external supply guarantee, and urban residents’ risk perception is more sensitive. Based on the Theory of Planned Behavior and Norm Activation Model, this study constructs an analytical framework for the risk perception, perceived behavior control, and family reserve efficacy of urban residents under non-normal conditions from the perspectives of rationality and sensibility, self-interest, and altruism. The perceived behavior control of household food reserves in non-normal conditions is affected by risk perception, subjective norms, and personal norms. On this basis, countermeasures and suggestions are put forward: Urban residents should strengthen their sense of risk and responsibility for storing food at home, reserve food appropriately, and develop a good habit of family saving. On the other hand, it is necessary to pay attention to personal norms, reduce the negative impact of subjective norms on residents, and avoid excessive food storage and food waste.

Productivity potential and economic feasibility of small-sized tomato production in plant factories with artificial lighting: A comparative study with high-tech greenhouse production

Productivity potential and economic feasibility of small-sized tomato production in plant factories with artificial lighting: A comparative study with high-tech greenhouse production

Urban farming and food supply: A comparative review of USA and African cities

Urban farming plays a crucial role in addressing food security challenges in both developed and developing regions. This comparative review explores the dynamics of urban farming and its impact on food supply in two diverse contexts: the United States (USA) and African cities. The study investigates the unique challenges and opportunities faced by urban farming initiatives in these regions, considering factors such as infrastructure, socio-economic conditions, and agricultural practices. In the USA, urban farming has gained momentum as a sustainable solution to enhance local food production and reduce the carbon footprint associated with long-distance food transportation. The analysis delves into the policies, technological advancements, and community engagement strategies that have contributed to the success of urban farming in American cities. Additionally, the study examines the integration of rooftop gardens, vertical farming, and community-supported agriculture in the USA's urban landscape. Conversely, African cities grapple with distinct challenges in implementing and sustaining urban farming practices. The review explores the impact of rapid urbanization, limited resources, and diverse climatic conditions on the feasibility of urban agriculture in African contexts. Strategies such as community empowerment, micro-financing, and knowledge sharing are examined to understand their role in overcoming obstacles and fostering resilient urban farming systems. Keywords: Urban Farming, Food Supply, Sustainable Agriculture, USA, African Cities, Urbanization, Community Engagement, Agricultural Practices, Food Security, Comparative Analysis.

Governing the reterritorialization of agricultural activities: An assessment of food planning policies in France

Governing the reterritorialization of agricultural activities: An assessment of food planning policies in France

Rediscovering circularity in productive urban landscapes

Rediscovering circularity in productive urban landscapes

Fresh bell peppers consumed in cities: Unveiling the environmental impact of urban and rural food supply systems

Fresh bell peppers consumed in cities: Unveiling the environmental impact of urban and rural food supply systems

Fostering urban short food supply chains: Evidence from the Netherlands

Short urban agri-food supply chains are an effective way to promote sustainability, viability, local economy and food security. This venture requires collaboration and knowledge from different disciplines, such as agriculture, food processing, logistics, sustainable economy, social innovation, engineering and ICT. However, there are many gaps in this research field, and many grey areas in government policy and regulations. The scope of this research is to explore the concept of short urban agri-food supply chains through case-study analysis and discussion. A case study was conducted based on a Breda (The Netherlands) municipal urban farming development, which included field observation, in-depth interviews with technical and knowledge experts, and detailed examination of present developments in short urban agri-food supply chains. Currently, urban farms operate in rather small scales, partly due to limited resources, sustainability requirements, lack of infrastructure, and deficiencies in regulatory compliance policy, food quality assurance system implementation guidance, local distribution platforms, etc. Moreover, urban farming’s small-scale operation form, combined with seasonal distribution patterns result in very high operational and distribution costs. Supply chain partners need targeted support in order to support and improve urban farming business operations. Emerging local-to- local business models are expected to facilitate contemporary needs and promote sustainability.

Sürdürülebilir Kentlerin Gelişiminde Kentsel Tarım Yaklaşımı: Elazığ Kenti Örneği

Urban areas are generally residential areas that are not considered important in terms of agricultural production. Since agricultural activities are not considered important in urban areas, cities with high population density, especially in metropolitan cities, are deprived of agricultural production areas. When considered from this point of view, cities come to the fore as places where food is consumed, sold and easily available. Although agricultural activities seem to be far from urban areas, the concepts of agriculture and city cannot be considered separately. One of the tools in question for ensuring sustainable urban development is urban agriculture. Urban agriculture is a phenomenon that enables communities in many regions to interact on many issues, beyond being a simple task. Within the scope of this study, the city area of Elazig province was examined from the perspective of urban agriculture. Various suggestions are presented to ensure sustainability in Elazig province, to develop more accurate insights into regional and urban food supply, to increase the importance of urban aesthetics, urban land use, urban environmental management, public health and economic development.

Informal ready-to-eat food vending governance in urban Nigeria: Formal and informal lenses guiding the practice.

Informal ready-to-eat food vending is an important, cheap, convenient, accessible and readily available urban food supply sector that has become an increasingly important part of the diets of people in developing cities in Africa and throughout other contexts in the Global South. Over decades, despite challenges associated with health and hygiene, street foods have been informally accepted as part of the urban food supply system, particularly among the urban poor. Despite the importance of street foods to food security and employment needs in urban Nigeria and elsewhere, very little is known about the governance arrangements (whether formal or informal) revolving around their food provisioning practices. The paper explores governance arrangements that steer and shape food provisioning practices in Ibadan, Nigeria. Taking a social practice approach, the paper analyses the interconnections between governance and ready-to-eat food vending practices. It doing so, it draws on insights generated through a qualitative study incorporating in-depth interviews and participant observation methods to understand different governance arrangements revolving around food vending practices. The findings reveal that formal and informal governance structures are jointly steering and shaping practices of informal ready-to-eat food vending. They furthermore highlight the crucial role informal middlemen fulfill in informal food governance chains. These insights provide new avenues for thinking about food governance of urban food supply systems in terms of co-governance between formal and informal actors. They also provide empirical evidence that can aid policy application and implementation on urban food supply systems going forward. The paper concludes by discussing the potential of a co-governance informal food sector framework that recognizes and encompasses the formal-informal nature of the food sector. Such an approach recognizes and involves informal middlemen in the governance of informal ready-to-eat street food vending embedded in a larger framework of food system governance.

Life cycle assessment of urban food supply: Key findings and recommendations from a French metropolitan area case study

Life cycle assessment of urban food supply: Key findings and recommendations from a French metropolitan area case study

Urban agrobiodiversity, health and city climate adaptation plans.

To identify the scope and nature of agricultural biodiversity actions within the climate adaptation plans of a sample of large world cities. I evaluated data from the 2021 Cities Climate Adaptation Actions database curated by the Carbon Disclosure Project. Cities with a population over 1million and reporting at least one adaptation action were included. I identified actions involving agriculture and biodiversity using a framework consisting of five agrobiodiversity categories: urban and peri-urban land use and water management, and urban food supply chains, food availability and food environments. I also identified reported health co-benefits and health sector involvement. Of 141 cities reviewed, 61 cities reported actions on agricultural biodiversity, mostly supporting land use or water management. Key health outcomes addressed were illnesses linked to air pollution and excessive heat and vector-borne diseases, corresponding with cities' major health concerns. Greenhouse gas mitigation was also addressed by many cities. Fewer cities reported actions in food categories or concern for noncommunicable diseases or poor nutrition. Nearly two thirds of cities (40/61) reported health co-benefits or health-sector involvement for at least one intervention. A higher proportion of the 43 cities in low- and middle-income countries reported agrobiodiversity actions and health co-benefits than the 18 cities in high-income countries. Cities are key partners in achieving sustainable global agriculture that promotes health and supports climate and biodiversity goals. Cities can enhance this role through climate adaptation plans with strong health engagement, a focus on nature-based solutions and greater emphasis on food and nutrition.

How Important are Digital Technologies for Urban Food Security? A Framework for Supply Chain Integration using IoT

How Important are Digital Technologies for Urban Food Security? A Framework for Supply Chain Integration using IoT

The current and potential role of urban metabolism studies to analyze the role of food in urban sustainability

AbstractFood supply chains are essential for urban sustainability. To reflect on the state of knowledge on urban food flows in urban metabolism research, and the actual and potential role of urban metabolism studies to tackle food sustainability in cities, we systematically review scientific research on food from an urban metabolism perspective and apply statistical and thematic analyses. The analysis of 89 studies provides insights as to the relation between food supply and (environmental and social dimensions of) urban sustainability. First, food is an important contributor to urban environmental impacts, if a consumption‐based approach is adopted. Secondly, the social impacts of urban food supply remain scarcely studied in urban metabolism research, but emerging results on public health, malnutrition, and food waste appear promising. In parallel, we find that the findings of the studies fail to engage with debates present in the broader literature, such as that of food justice. Our analysis shows that most studies focus on large cities in high‐income, data‐rich countries. This limits our understanding of global urban food supply. Existing studies use innovative mixed‐methods to produce robust accounts of urban food flows in data‐scarce contexts; expanding these accounts is necessary to get a better understanding of how urban food supply and its diverse impacts in terms of environmental and social sustainability may vary across cities, a necessary step for the urban metabolism literature to contribute to current debates around food sustainability and justice.

Urban food supply: the policy pathway from the perspective of the municipal market in Campos dos Goytacazes (RJ)

This article analyzes urban food supply from the perspective of municipal markets in urban spaces; the locus of the research is the municipal market in Campos dos Goytacazes (RJ), a space with over one hundred years of history that is essential for the population's food supply and also a place of social interaction. The general objective is to understand how the relationship between the local government and the vendors who are licensed to sell at this market is established as a vehicle for food supply. We follow the history of this market from the time when places to buy food first appeared in the city and its inauguration up to its most recent configuration and relationship with the city government, in a longitudinal and theoretical-historical setting. The study is exploratory and descriptive and combines a qualitative approach with some quantitative elements; bibliographic and documentary research, questionnaires, and semi-structured interviews were utilized. The municipal market was seen to play an important role in supplying the city, and also as a bearer of memory and cultural heritage. Many people were seen to circulate within this type of space, which is permeated by interests that add complexity to the relationships established there. The directors of the market are appointed by the municipal government, which consequently influences the operational structure of the market, but informal rules dictate the relationships between public bodies and officially authorized people, affecting their regulatory and supervisory functions with market vendors.

Investment priorities for research and innovation in urban agri-food systems: Toward more resilient cities in the Global South

Urban and peri-urban agriculture (UPA) is widely distributed throughout the Global South. Despite urban population growth and diversifying food habits, UPA delivers an important part of urban food supply, as well as other types of services to cities, such as employment and waste reuse. Nevertheless, the extent and importance of UPA varies between different urban areas, while challenges like limited recognition, land conversion, and water pollution and competition threaten the potential of UPA to contribute to urban resilience. Key investment priorities for research and innovation for overcoming current challenges include incentivized peri-urban zoning, urban allocation of productive lands, and increasing capacities for controlled environment agriculture (CEA). Innovative repositioning of food marketing can help to strengthen supply of healthy food from UPA production, increase decent employment, and turn food markets into nutrition hubs. Priority innovations for contributing to the circular bioeconomy of cities include scaling the safe use of wastewater for irrigation through investments in the adoption of multiple risk-barrier approaches and scaling UPA-based ecosystem services for valorising solid waste and environmental management. Innovations in urban governance are required to support these processes by bringing food systems into urban planning through food mapping and the multisectoral platforms for dialogue and policy formulation across city regions and with vertical levels of government.

Agricultural Location and Crop Choices in China: A Revisitation on Von Thünen Model

Growing populations and rapid urbanization have put tremendous pressure on the food supply. The rural hinterland around cities is an important source of the urban food supply chain. Facing the constraints of China’s land stock, reasonable use of land space and optimization of agricultural crop structure is crucial to meet the food demand. Von Thünen Model, which is fronted by a 19th-century German economist, outlines a rural landscape of commercial farmers growing agricultural products for local markets while proposing basic patterns and principles of land use in agriculture. Using data from China’s OVOP (“One village, One product”), this paper analyzes the agricultural location and crop choices around two levels of cities (provincial capital cities, and county-level cities) by using Thünen’s theory. The results showed that crop density did decrease as the distance to urban increased. Crop rings are present in the vicinity of both metropolitan and county-level cities, distributed according to crop intensity. Evidence from China suggests that agricultural location and crop selection still follow the basic principles of the Thünen model. Planners and policymakers should refocus on the Von Thünen model to utilize land space and optimize agricultural production scientifically and efficiently.

The effect of poorly controlled physical development on urban food production in Ibadan, Nigeria

Urban expansion, mainly occasioned by poorly controlled physical development, continues to pose severe threats to sustainable food production. While studies have concentrated more on food production in the hinterlands of Nigeria, there is a dearth of information on empirical investigations into urban food supply. This study, therefore, examined the effect of poorly controlled physical development on urban food production in Ibadan. An ecological footprint model was used to provide its theoretical anchor, while a longitudinal survey was the research design of choice. Both primary and secondary data were sourced. Geographical and remote sensing methods of analysis were used, with the primary focus being on Ibadan City and the dairy farm that has been converted to non-agricultural uses. This research revealed that Ibadan’s total urban area increased from 70.3584 ha in 1986 to 411.8877 ha in 2019. This expansion was accompanied by the loss of agricultural land, the depletion of water bodies, and agricultural land conversion. Validation of the research findings revealed a relatively high accuracy in terms of the Kappa value of 0.72 and an overall classification accuracy of 79.17% for 1986, of 0.84 and 88.33% for 2000, and of 0.91 and 92.5% for 2019. This studyrecommends that farmers should be trained on soilless farming practices such as aeroponics and hydroponics which both require relatively small portions of land to produce food.

THE ROLE OF RAILWAY TRANSPORT IN THE EVACUATION OF THE POPULATION DURING HOSTILITIES IN UKRAINE

In the extremely difficult time of aggression by the Russian Federation, the first and most important task for Ukraine's railway transport is to provide logistics for the transportation of humanitarian and military aid, as well as internal movement (evacuation) of the population. The state transport is covered by 2-5 times increased van traffic and passenger traffic. In such a situation it is necessary to control the number of passengers at the stations, to provide them with assistance and advice. The volunteer movement is one of the important conditions for the functioning of the state in wartime. Volunteers at the stations ensure the distribution of passenger flows in individual directions and provide advice on the schedule of trains. Humanitarian aid is now arriving in large quantities and needs to be delivered as soon as possible to places where it is most needed, to cities where active hostilities are taking place and to cities where the flow of internally displaced persons is concentrated. The logic of the movement of passengers must be clearly formed, because in a difficult emotional and physical state, people have a hard time understanding the course of action and the requirements for the carriage of passengers. After analyzing the formed passenger flows in the first days of evacuation, the main directions of movement of citizens were determined. The analysis revealed that the number of passengers in evacuation trains heading west to the country could cause overcrowding in the receiving cities and cause a collapse in urban transport, settlements and food supply. These are the main issues facing the government and the logistics system for moving people and goods across the country. The solution to the acute problem was the possibility of simplifying passenger transportation and the organization of international trains with allied countries, where there is the possibility of transportation without changing the rolling stock through different track widths. The development of such routes has made it possible to simplify the logistics of population movement and reduce the burden on the border service of Ukraine. To reduce the crowds after crossing the borders of Ukraine, a schedule of trains from the nearest railway stations of neighboring countries was developed together with the neighboring states, which facilitates the movement of migrants within the routes of passengers. The second problem is the overcrowding of trains and the complexity of their equipment for flights, as well as the establishment of a system to provide them with drinking water on the routes. Due to sufficient technical equipment, coordinated work of railway transport workers, and their high executive discipline, this chain has been successfully implemented.