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Dear all, Just a very quick reaction to Johan Kieft and Martin Fowler. - Please do not understand my plea for more attention for urban agriculture and reuse of urban wastes and wastewater as an argument against investment in rural agriculture. To the contrary. - The fact that in some countries the rural poor are far out the major part of the total number of poor in that country, in my view, is not an argument to focus this discussion (nor future policy attention) exclusively to the rural sector. - With the quick growth of the cities, urban poverty grows too and the moment is not too far away that most poor will be concentrated in the cities in various developing countries. - In many cities, a substantial part of the urban poor are involved in urban agriculture in one way or another. Moreover, their activities are also of importance for food security of other (non-farming) poor urban families (easy access, low price, fresh nitritious food). - In most cities a substantial part of products like milk, eggs, vegetables, meat, mushrooms, etcetera is produced within and in the direct environment of the city. As long as cooling and transport systems in most rural areas -and especially the marginal ones- are weak and unreliable and related costs remain high, such (growing) urban demand will be satisfied mainly by urban and peri-urban farmers or by imports. - This is one reason why I am not too sure that investment in improvement of market access in marginal areas will prove to be more efficient than investment in urban agriculture. But I am not an economist, so I leave that discussion to others. - In anyway, rural and urban agriculture to a large extent seem to be complementing each other, rather than competing. Maybe also in this Forum? Regards, Ir Henk de Zeeuw Coordinator Resource centre on Urban Agriculture and Forestry (RUAF) ETC Foundation P.O.Box 64, 3830 AB Leusden, the Netherlands Phone: 0031-33-4326039 Fax: 0031-33-4940791 E-mail: <address removed> Internet: www.ruaf.org and www.etcint.org _____ From: <address removed> [mailto:<address removed> On Behalf Of Johan Kieft Sent: Thursday, May 06, 2004 1:12 PM To: Martin Fowler; <address removed> Subject: RE: Urban agriculture Dear all, This is a good point. Writing form Indonesia, the same is true here, around 8 out of 10 poor live in rural areas. This counts as well for those who are malnourished or suffer otherwise from poverty. The experiences here with the economic crisis has learned that urban poor, when the economy starts growing again do recover quicker although they were initially harder hit. This recovery to a large extent explain the decline in poverty in the country. Instead of focusing on urban agriculture, it might more efficient to improve market access in remote marginal areas and ensure that those people gain access to better basic services including (culturally) appropriate agricultural extension. However lessons learnt from previous experiences have to be taken into account. regards Johan Kieft Program Leader Agriculture CARE Int. Ind. -----Original Message----- From: <address removed> [mailto:<address removed> Behalf Of Martin Fowler Sent: Thursday, May 06, 2004 5:54 PM To: <address removed> Subject: Urban agriculture Dear All, Have we got the balance right? We seem to be focussing our discussion so much on urban agriculture/the use of urban waste water for irrigation, etc (although far be it for me to underestimate its importance....to the livelihoods of urban dwellers; and I am enjoying reading the urban agriculture contributions). A few figures from Uganda to support my position: 87 per cent of the population is rural. 96 per cent of the country's poor live in the countryside (an increase from the 1992 figure of 93 per cent) and 42% of the rural population lives under the absolute poverty line, compared with 12 per cent of urban dwellers. The heads of 81 per cent of those households classified as poor are employed in the agricultural sector. By mid-2000 poverty had decreased to 59 per cent of its 1997 level in the urban areas, but to only 80 per cent of this level in the rural areas. I don't believe Uganda is the only country in which a similar situation exists. Given the poverty-reduction focus of DFID (and all participants in this e-forum, I hope/assume) should we not, in the short time that remains to us, try to focus our thoughts, etc., on aspects of agriculture/development in the rural areas? Yours, Martin Fowler (....an urban-based agricultural economist) Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries, Entebbe Uganda
Please visit dfid-agriculture-consultation.nri.org.