Risk and Vulnerability Mailing List Archive

["Lee-Smith, Diana (CIP-NAIROBI)" <<address removed>>]

One of the reasons people (farmers) migrate to urban areas is to minimize
risk and maximize a diverse range of livelihood opportunities, as I pointed
out in my contribution to the poverty debate. 

Farmers located in or near urban areas have a ready market, but they are
subject to other types of risk. In Kampala, Uganda, we are developing an
approach to health risk analysis of Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture (UPA).


On the health benefits side are various aspects, but mainly improved
nutrition. Data so far confirm children in low-income urban farming
households are better nourished than in equivalent non-farming households,
but this may only apply where women/mothers are the farmers and/or where the
farming system is combined subsistence/commercial. These data are important
for policy makers when looking at reducing hunger and poverty, as most
currently have restrictive (or no) policies on urban agriculture, plus
unsupportive legislation and little (or no) urban extension. 

On the health risks side, we are researching pathogenic and toxic risks from
use of urban waste water for irrigation, risks from air pollution and
contaminated soils, and zoonotic disease transmission. We do not have the
results yet, and this work needs to be further funded and linked to policy
choices for urban authorities. 

CIP, the parent organization of Urban Harvest, has also developed a risk
analysis model, involving trade-offs made by (rural) potato farmers in
Ecuador using high levels of toxic pesticides. Both farmers and
policy-makers need to trade off increased yields with increased human health
risks. High levels of pesticide use by peri-urban farmers also constitute
significant health risk that needs to be evaluated. 


Diana Lee-Smith
Sub-Saharan Africa Coordinator
Urban Harvest (formerly SIUPA)
International Potato Centre (CIP)
P O Box 25171 Nairobi 00603
Kenya
CIP is a Future Harvest Centre supported by the CGIAR
Tel: 254 20 630743 ext. 4942
Fax 254 20 631499
Mob: 254 722 677 526
E-mail <address removed>
www.cipotato.org/urbanharvest

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