Understanding urban food provisioning in West Africa and its effects on urban food system sustainability

了解西非的城市粮食供应及其对城市粮食系统可持续性的影响

• 批准号: 432730568
• 负责人: Dr. Hanna Karg
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Research Fellowships
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2019-12-31 至 2021-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/432730568?language=en
• 关键词: Understanding; urban; food; provisioning; West

West Africa’s rapid urban growth is fundamentally changing food systems, resulting in a growing urban demand for food, a stronger reliance on marketed food, and changing diets. These changes widen the spatial gap between food consumption and production and influence the ways in which food reaches cities. However, very little is known about where cities in West Africa get their food from and which factors govern food supply and distribution patterns. Previous research under the UrbanFoodPlus project has allowed the collection of empirical data from 2013 to 2017 on urban food flows in four West African cities for different seasons but does not provide information on the causes for and effects of these flows on food systems. By moving beyond descriptive case studies, this project aims at assessing the underlying mechanisms for current food supply and distribution patterns and their effects on urban food system sustainability. The proposed research has three key objectives: First, it aims at identifying factors explaining food supply patterns and at up-scaling general patterns to other urban centres in the sub-region. Second, it will assess the impact of the current food supply regime on urban food system sustainability and resilience. Third, the study will assess existing policies on West African food systems and contribute to the formulation of policy recommendations taking into consideration future scenarios. The Institute for Resources, Environment, and Sustainability at the University of British Columbia (Vancouver, Canada) will support the implementation of objectives 1 and 2, while objective 3 will be handled at the SWAC (The Sahel and West Africa Club) (Paris, France). The proposed project will employ statistical and spatial analysis methods and take a system perspective. It will consider urban food systems and their activities from production to consumption, as well as their (telecoupled) interactions with other systems. It will bridge different spatial scales, and link science with policy. As such, it will contribute to enhancing our understanding of urban food systems in West Africa, a region, where data scarcity is a major problem.

西非城市的快速发展正在从根本上改变食品体系，导致城市对食品的需求不断增长，对市场食品的依赖越来越强，饮食结构也发生了变化。这些变化扩大了食品消费和生产之间的空间差距，并影响了食品到达城市的方式。然而，人们对西非城市从哪里获得食物以及哪些因素支配着食物的供应和分配模式知之甚少。此前在UrbanFoodPlus项目下进行的研究收集了2013年至2017年西非四个城市不同季节的城市食物流动的经验数据，但没有提供关于这些流动的原因和对食物系统的影响的信息。通过超越描述性案例研究，该项目旨在评估当前粮食供应和分配模式的基本机制及其对城市粮食系统可持续性的影响。拟议的研究有三个关键目标：第一，它旨在确定解释粮食供应模式的因素，并将一般模式推广到次区域的其他城市中心。其次，它将评估当前粮食供应制度对城市粮食系统可持续性和复原力的影响。第三，该研究将评估关于西非粮食系统的现有政策，并帮助制定考虑到未来情况的政策建议。不列颠哥伦比亚大学(加拿大温哥华)资源、环境和可持续发展研究所将支持目标1和目标2的实施，而目标3将由萨赫勒和西非俱乐部(法国巴黎)负责。拟议的项目将采用统计和空间分析方法，并从系统的角度出发。它将考虑城市食品系统及其从生产到消费的活动，以及它们与其他系统的(远程耦合)互动。它将架起不同空间尺度的桥梁，并将科学与政策联系起来。因此，它将有助于加强我们对西非城市食品系统的了解，因为在西非，数据稀缺是一个主要问题。