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RURAL-URBAN LINKAGES
June 9th, 2015

Farming Matters | 31.2 |June 2015 This ‘twin’ issue of Farming Matters and Urban Agriculture Magazine, produced together by ILEIA and the RUAF Foundation, looks at some existing experiences with strengthened rural–urban linkages and what they teach us about improving food systems for both consumers and agroecological farmers. This issue shows how agroecology is a consistent … Read more

Editorial – Building sustainable food systems beyond the rural–urban divide
June 9th, 2015

Rural–urban linkages connect people in cities with people in the countryside on a daily basis. The links are tangible and include markets, migration flows, knowledge exchange, leisure and tourism, ecosystem services, food production and consumption. To support sustainable, fair and resilient food systems, an enabling political and institutional environment is needed. This ‘twin’ issue of … Read more

Opinion: The WTO must allow support to national food systems
June 9th, 2015

Biraj Patnaik argues that the WTO must allow developing countries to address their people’s food security needs. He outlines the fundamental changes needed to reverse this injustice. How much support can developing countries provide to their farmers for domestic food security without being accused of distorting international trade? This question is at the heart of … Read more

Community supported agriculture thriving in China
June 9th, 2015

Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) is one of the best examples of successful, alternative food distribution, providing real income to producers and affordable healthy food for consumers. Food is grown in peri-urban areas and trust between producers and consumers is strengthened. And China has not been left behind, as over 800 CSAs with 100,000 consumers are now … Read more

Egyptian youth challenge the city–country divide
June 9th, 2015

The ancient Egyptian civilisation, founded upon the agriculture and peasantry of the Nile Valley, is famous worldwide. Yet, today peasantry in Egypt often denotes poverty and there is a widening social divide between farmers and urban consumers. But over the past ten years, and particularly since the revolution in 2011, Egyptian youth are leading the … Read more

Opinion: Finding food security in the rural-urban continuum
June 9th, 2015

Pablo Tittonell argues that it is high time we rethought the role of farms that straddle the rural–urban continuum. Peri-urban farming contributes to food security, buffers shocks and maintains agrobiodiversity. Only recently I realised that when I was a child, my grandfather was practicing a form of urban agriculture in our backyard in the outskirts … Read more

Locally rooted: Ideas and initiatives from the field
June 9th, 2015

There are many benefits from strong rural–urban linkages. Amongst others, consumers access healthy, ecologically produced food and build connections with producers, while farmers access fair markets that value their way of life. As seen here, it is for these reasons that both farmers and consumers work together to strengthen the connections between rural and urban. … Read more

Mind! New books on rural–urban linkages
June 9th, 2015

Sustaining Local Food Webs B. Murphey (Ed.), 2014. Practical Action Publishing, Warwickshire, UK, 92pages. This report concludes that “local food webs are a cornerstone for the model of food provision that should be prioritised in order to secure our future food.” The authors’ set out to convince those who influence agricultural, food and nutrition polices … Read more

Participatory certification in Brazil supports local food systems
June 9th, 2015

Participatory guarantee systems support farmers’ access to markets, and provide an alternative to often prohibitively expensive third-party certification. They also bring together networks of farmers and urban citizens who are redefining food production standards from the bottom up. In the past two years, the number of participatory guarantee systems across Brazil has more than doubled, … Read more

Producers and consumers build new food practices
June 9th, 2015

Initiatives based on ‘short chains’ between farmers and consumers are slowly but surely gaining ground in the Netherlands, a country with a strongly industrialised food system. Looking for ecological, healthy, and fresh food, urban consumers are now creating innovative channels that support local and organic food producers. An increasing number of Dutch citizens are worried … Read more