Jun 24, 2022
Credit: Joshua Resnick/AdobeStock
Editor’s Note: With 60% of the world’s population set to be dwelling in cities within the next decade, it is time to ask ourselves how we can rethink our food systems on a structural level to best serve these urban communities. Meiny Prins of Priva shares her expert opinion on why we need to localize, and specifically urbanize, our food systems in order to adapt to the changing needs of our communities and of our planet.
Written By Meiny Prins
Credit: meed.com
Many of the compelling challenges we face in the world today, including climate change, obesity and a lack of biodiversity, are interconnected and relate to the way we produce and transport our food. Solving these issues starts by bringing sustainable food production back to the city.
The world is urbanizing at a rapid pace. By 2030, 60 per cent of the world population will live in urban regions. Because of this, megacities around the globe continue to expand, causing the green areas around cities – better known as green belts – to disappear. And with them the farmers who used to feed the urban dwellers.
The result? A world where cities heavily rely on a system in which food is produced on an increasingly industrial scale in a few centralised locations.
This type of food production has many negative consequences, both socially and ecologically. Subsidies on fossil fuels have made it economically viable to ship food halfway across the world. This creates an enormous amount of CO2 that is destroying our climate.
In addition, large-scale monocultures that diminish biodiversity, cause deforestation and deplete soil health have become the norm. At the same time, millions of people suffer from lifestyle diseases because they live in food deserts, cities where it is almost impossible to find fresh produce.
It is time for a reset.
We need to inspire city governments, urban planners, developers and architects to rethink the way cities are designed. We need to bring green belts closer to the cities and develop the ‘brown fields’ in urban areas to create more space for food production.
I see cities of the future as food-producing cities that produce much of their own food and are the source of a sustainable future. Imagine the food potential; London, with 2,700 hectares of undeveloped land, could be self-sufficient for more than 60 per cent of its population, according to data from the Sustainable Urban Delta foundation.
What is critical to success is the establishment of long-term, strategic collaborations between all stakeholders in the horticulture ecosystem and developing knowledge partnerships with universities and research institutes to drive innovation in and around the region’s major urban areas and co-create sustainable business models.
As governments worldwide, including in the Middle East, have embraced the idea that a significant part of their food can be produced locally and sustainably, these knowledge partnerships have started to take shape.
In fact, the region has made incredible strides in food security strategy development and the implementation of sustainable growing solutions in collaboration with the private sector.
Over the past two years, the global pandemic has further accelerated the global quest for local food production, with cities and countries around the world having faced logistical challenges in food production and trade, making this an opportune time to further intensify this focus.
