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An FAO report on urban and peri-urban in the region GROWING GREENER IN AND THE CARIBBEAN

Foreword iii Overview 1 Ten profiles 10 City 20 30 36 44 50 58 El Alto 66 72 Rosario 80 Sources 90

FOOD AND AGRICULTURE ORGANIZATION OF THE Rome, 2014 On a visit to Tegucigalpa, I went to one of the city’s poorest informal settlements to see an Fao project that was training women to grow crops in their backyards. As we climbed slopes lush with cassava, maize and cabbages, they told FAO’s Director-General visits a family in Tegucigalpa in July 2012 me how the had changed their – by providing their families with fresh, nutritious food and helping them to earn extra income selling surpluses. I met urban farmers like them on the outskirts of , where Fao has helped the Government set up a centre to teach women ecological farming techniques adapted to small spaces. In Managua, I saw prolific gardens of tomatoes, sweet peppers and spinach irrigated by an ingenious system of recycled bottles. In Havana, I visited a farm just outside the city that produces 300 tonnes of vegetables a year, with no chemical inputs. In all of those cities, common people are leading a quiet revolution known as “urban and peri-urban agriculture”, or Upa. In recent years, Fao has strongly supported the development of Upa in Latin America and the Caribbean, in cities from -au-Prince to El Alto on the Bolivian altiplano, through initiatives that involved national governments, city administrations, civil society and non-governmental organizations. That groundwork has been rewarded with widespread recognition – highlighted in this report – of the important role of urban and peri- urban agriculture in sustainable urban development. The report presents urban and peri-urban agriculture in 23 and 10 cities. It shows that Upa is crucial to the food and nutrition security of poor in many cities of the region, supplies urban dwellers with fresh, high-value “local food”, generates employment, The designations employed and the presentation of material in this information product do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the creates greenbelts that improve the quality of urban , and stimulates local economic United Nations (FAO) concerning the legal or development status of any , territory, city or area development. or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries. The mention of specific companies or products of manufacturers, whether or not these have been patented, does not imply that What’s more, when facilitated by government, integrated into city and regional , these have been endorsed or recommended by FAO in preference to others of a similar that are and supported by action to promote sustainable production, improve food delivery, and ensure not mentioned. food quality and safety, Upa is a key component of robust and resilient urban food systems. For The designations employed and the presentation of material in the map(s) do not imply the expression of example, a growing number of cities in the region are linking family farmers in peri-urban and any opinion whatsoever on the part of FAO concerning the legal or constitutional status of any country, territory or sea area, or concerning the delimitation of frontiers. adjoining rural areas to their food banks, school meals and other food and nutrition security The views expressed in this information product are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect programmes, contributing to the livelihoods and -being of both the rural and urban poor. the views or of FAO. The food producers of Tegucigalpa, San Salvador, Managua and Havana, and other common ISBN 978-92-5-108250-8 (print) citizens of Latin America and the Caribbean, are helping to build the greener, more resilient E-ISBN 978-92-5-108251-5 (PDF) and sustainable cities of the future. © FAO, 2014 FAO encourages the use, reproduction and dissemination of material in this information product. Except where otherwise indicated, material may be copied, downloaded and printed for private study, research and teaching purposes, or for use in non-commercial products or services, provided that José Graziano da Silva appropriate acknowledgement of FAO as the source and copyright holder is given and that FAO’s endorsement of users’ views, products or services is not implied in any way. Director-General Food and Agriculture Organization All requests for translation and adaptation rights, and for resale and other commercial use rights should be made via www.fao.org/contact-us/licence-request or addressed to [email protected]. of the United Nations FAO information products are available on the FAO website (www.fao.org/publications) and can be purchased through [email protected]. Growing Greener Cities Case studies in Latin America Juan Martin Mejía Iglesias, Chief, Ermin and the Caribbean Alexander Morataya, Extensionist, José Antigua and Barbuda Ricardo Aparicio, Technical supervisor, Owolabi Elabanjo, Extension Officer, Ministry of Agriculture, , Editor Graeme Thomas Romeo Alfonso Orellana, Extensionist, National Centre for Agricultural and and the Environment; Julius Ross, Technical Consultant, Government of Overview Technical coordinator Makiko Taguchi Technology Antigua and Barbuda Layout/maps Giulio Sansonetti Edgar Arnoldo Medrano, , Belo Horizonte () Peer review FAO: Vyjayanthi Lopez, Chinautla ; Edgar Arnoldo Zoraya B. Souza, Economist, and Caio Alberto Pantoja, Makiko Taguchi; Medrano Menéndez, President, V. Vasconcelos, Agronomist Engineer, RUAF: Marielle Dubbeling In October 2009, representatives of food producers. Savings made on food purchases, Mancomunidad Metropolitan Board of Secretariat for Nutrition and Food go Editorial team Diana Gutiérrez, Paula Directors; Ramiro Perez, Mayor, Palencia Security, Belo Horizonte; Lorena Fischer, governments, research institutes, N s and along with sales of produce, accounted for more Fernández-Wulff, Zoraida de Torres Municipality Officer, World Future Council international organizations from 12 countries than one-fifth of their income. Burgos, Rosamaría Nuñez, Fynvola Le in Latin America and the Caribbean met in Five years later, this report looks at progress Hunte Ward, Katja Majcen Oudho Homenauth, Chief Executive César H. Marulanda Tabares, Data analysis Yota Nicolarea, George Officer, National Agricultural Research Agronomist, Universidad del Tolima, Medellín, Colombia, to develop strategies toward realizing Medellín’s vision of “greener Rapsomanikis, Federica Alfani, and Extension Institute; George Jervis, Bogotá to end high rates of urban and food cities” in Latin America and the Caribbean – Giulia Ponzini Permanent Secretary, Ministry of El Alto (Bolivia) insecurity across the region. ones in which Upa is recognized by , Agriculture Juan José Estrada Paredes, Specialist Maps data © OpenStreetMap Consultant, FAO Office in Bolivia included in urban development strategies and This report is based on the results of an Ricardo St. Aime, National consultant, Havana They met as many countries were emerging -use planning, supported by agricultural FAO survey of urban and peri‑urban FAO Office in Haiti; Joseph Fresnel Mario González Novo, Secretary of slowly from the effects of global fuel and food research and extension, and linked to sources of agriculture in Latin America and Sterlin, Local Agricultural Office Director, , Cuban Association the Caribbean, conducted in 2013, on Ministry of Agriculture, Natural of Agricultural and Forestry Technicians; price inflation, which had pushed the cost of technological innovation, investment and credit, city case studies prepared by national and Aurelia Castellanos Quintero, President, experts in 13 countries of the region, living beyond the resources of many of the and to urban markets and consumers. Cuban Production Association and on a review of recent literature. Karla Andino López, Consultant, School region’s 160 million urban poor. The hardest hit The contributions of the following are GROWING Feeding and Urban Agriculture, FAO were urban families in Caribbean countries with Since 2009, the urban of Latin GREENER gratefully acknowledged. Roslyn Jackson, Technical Services Office in Honduras Coordinator, Rural Agricultural a high dependency on food imports, and those America and the Caribbean has increased by CITIES IN LATIN National surveys Development Authority AMERICA Jamaica in countries with high levels of extreme urban some 50 million, to almost half a billion. The AND THE Roslyn Jackson, Technical Services Lima CARIBBEAN Antigua and Barbuda Coordinator, Rural Agricultural Dennis Escudero, Project Coordinator, poverty, where food purchases account for most of region is now the most urbanized in the world, Owolabi Elabanjo, Extension Officer, Development Authority with Jennifer Zarzar, Alberto Garcia, Ministry of Agriculture, Lands, Housing low-income households’ spending. with 80 percent of its people living in and Jazmine Casafranca, Jorge Elgegren, 1 and the Environment The Medellín meeting proposed an urban cities. Almost 70 million are concentrated in four Henry González, Liaison Officer, FAO John Preissing, FAO Office in Peru OVERVIEW Office in Nicaragua Managua transition toward social inclusion, equity : , , and Rio Flint Wagner, Agricultural Officer, Henry González, Liaison Officer, FAO Ministry of Natural Resources and and . Its Medellín Declaration de Janeiro and in Brazil. Office in Nicaragua Agriculture Julio Alberto Lara Martez, Manager, urged national, and local governments to While the proportion of dwellers in Research, Innovation and Dissemination of Mexico City Bolivia (Plurinational State of ) Urban Agriculture, Agricultural Research Pablo Torres Lima and Luis Manuel incorporate urban and peri-urban agriculture, the urban population has fallen, their total Crispim Moreira, FAO Representative, Institute of Panama Rodríguez-Sánchez, with Mariano Bolivia or Upa, into their programmes for eradicating number grew to more than 110 million in 2010. Salazar Molina, Fernando Rodríguez Paraguay hunger and poverty, ensuring food and nutrition Urban poverty rates remain unacceptably high Chile Carolina Mallada Martinez, Director, Rodríguez, Cristian Alejandro Reyna Julia María Franco, Coordinator, Agricultural Policy Unit, Ministry of Ramírez, Moises Pérez Hernández security, promoting local development and – 30 percent of urban residents in Colombia, Municipal Urban Programme, Agriculture and Livestock; Jorge Gattini, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana improving the urban environment. 35 percent in Guatemala and 24 percent in La Reina Municipality, Consultant, FAO (Xochimilco), Mexico City At the time, Upa was providing a safety net for Paraguay were living below the national poverty Colombia Peru Quito Hernando Arenas Salazar, Coordinator, FAO Office in Peru Alexandra Rodríguez Dueñas, Manager, many low-income families. A recent Fao analysis line in 2011. Urban Vegetables Programme, José Participatory Urban Agriculture Project, Celestino Mutis Botanical Garden, Bogotá Saint Kitts-Nevis Quito of national household surveys collected between And the spectre of urban hunger has not been Gene Knight, Senior Project Officer, 2003 and 2008 shows that 1.4 million urban beaten. A recent study found that Ministry of Agriculture, Marine Resources Rosario (Argentina) Adolfo Rodríguez Nodals, Director and Cooperatives Antonio Lattuca, Coordinator, Municipal dwellers in Nicaragua and Guatemala were also higher food prices are “here to stay” in Latin General, Institute for Fundamental Urban Agriculture Programme, Rosario Research in Tropical Agriculture Vernet A.A. James, Youth Officer and Santiago Backyard Garden Programme Coordinator, Julia María Franco, Coordinator, Winston Magloire, Technical Officer, Ministry of Agriculture, Food Production, Municipal Urban Organic Gardening Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and Rural Development Programme, Santiago Suriname Tegucigalpa Francisco Martinez Pujols, Director, Soenita Parbhoe-Rosan, Economist, Cristina Rentería Garita, Junior Agricultural Extension and Training Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Professional Officer, and Alberto Pantoja, Division, Ministry of Agriculture Husbandry and Fisheries Production and Protection Officer, Ecuador FAO Regional Office for Latin America and the Caribbean; Karla Andino López, Alexandra Rodríguez Dueñas, Manager, Deokee Bholasingh-Hay, Director, Participatory Urban Agriculture Project, Consultant, School Feeding and Urban Extension Training and Information Agriculture, FAO Office in Honduras Quito Services Division, Ministry of Food Production America and the Caribbean. The negative impacts To assess the state of urban and peri-urban for eggs and meat. School gardens and surpluses for sale, the main constraints were the of future price increases, the Bank says, are likely agriculture in Latin America and the Caribbean, backyard family horticulture are the dominant high cost of inputs, the lack of quality seed, and to be felt mainly by the urban poor. Fao conducted a survey in 2013 in 27 countries; forms of urban food production. the unavailability of credit needed for buying tools The United Nations Settlements completed surveys were received from 23 of them Family gardens are common in urban areas of and processing equipment. But higher yields were Programme (Un-) believes that Latin (listed on page iv). Fao also commissioned case Cuba, Colombia, Nicaragua, Ecuador and Peru, no guarantee of higher earnings – most producers American and Caribbean cities have the chance studies on agriculture in and around 13 of the and in most Caribbean countries. They produce had very limited access to markets. to escape from underdevelopment, inequality region’s major cities*. eggplant and okra in Antigua and Barbuda, and unsustainability. Following 50 years of rapid Data was provided on agriculture in 110 cities, carrots and coriander in Tegucigalpa, broccoli and In food systems, agriculture in growth, the process of is “virtually and towns, ranging from major quinoa in Quito, and spinach and strawberries on peri-urban areas and rural areas is critical to the completed” in all countries. urban agglomerations, such as Mexico City, to Bolivia’s altiplano. supply of food to urban centres, and contributes Now, says Un-Habitat, the region needs to the community of San José del Golfo (population: In Bolivian cities, families also raise to employment, livelihoods, nutrition and create urban centres that are environmentally 5 889) in Guatemala; from the prosperous pigs, which fit easily into small spaces and are a environmental resilience. The city region scale is sustainable, promote social inclusion, favour local regional capital of Belo Horizonte, in Brazil, to good source of . In Mexico City , seen as a sustainable, manageable spatial unit for employment, and reaffirm the primacy of public overcrowded camps of displaced people on the residents keep rabbits, birds and sheep. In integrating food production with other spaces. A starting point for that transformation is outskirts of Port-au-Prince. Kingston’s , youths breed tropical fish for services and providing social protection for the urban and peri-urban agriculture. Fao’s inquiry has confirmed that Upa is export to . rural and urban poor. The Food and Agriculture Organization widespread in the region. It is practised, for Urban farmers come from all age groups and In Latin America and the Caribbean, peri- has actively promoted Upa since 1999, when example, by 40 percent of households in Cuba, walks of life. But most are from low-income urban agriculture includes large farming areas it reported that 800 million people worldwide and 20 percent in Guatemala and Saint Lucia. households, and they take up farming as a means that produce cereals, vegetables and root crops, were engaged in crop, livestock, fisheries and In the main cities and municipalities of the of reducing their spending on food and making grazing land for goats and sheep, dairy farms, GROWING GROWING GREENER forestry production within and surrounding urban Plurinational State of Bolivia, 50 000 families are extra income from sales. In 16 of the 23 countries and intensive livestock production units. Some GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA boundaries. Since then, the urban population in also food producers. In Bogotá, 8 500 households surveyed, people practising Upa earned some 22 800 ha of farmland within the bounds AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN the world’s less developed regions has grown from produce food for consumption. In Haiti, income from the activity. of Mexico City produce annually around CARIBBEAN 2 billion to more than 2.7 billion. 260 ha of land in and around Port-au-Prince and The main benefit, however, was improved 15 000 tonnes of vegetables. On the outskirts 2 Along with , and the rising other towns are cultivated by 25 500 families. access to food. Urban food producers and their of Lima, short-cycle vegetables are grown on 3 OVERVIEW challenges of and the depletion of Among capital cities, the “greenest” is Havana, families enjoyed a more diverse diet than other some 5 000 ha of irrigated land for sale in the OVERVIEW natural resources, concepts of Upa have evolved. where 90 000 residents are engaged in some form urban dwellers, and were more likely to consume city’s markets. Small-scale farming is a source of Food production in urban and peri-urban areas is of agriculture, whether backyard gardening or fruit and vegetables regularly. income for settlers from rural areas and many of now seen as integral to resilient and sustainable working in the city’s commercial gardens and Women are the driving force behind urban Lima’s urban poor. “city region food systems” that are incorporated on livestock farms. Quito also stood out: at last agriculture in many countries, and particularly Despite its role in creating employment and fully into development planning. count, the city had 140 community gardens, 800 in the Caribbean, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, feeding cities, peri-urban agriculture is under As well as providing the urban poor with family gardens and 128 school gardens. Honduras and Nicaragua. A high proportion increasing pressure from urbanization itself. In nutritious food and extra income, Upa has Urban agriculture in the region encompasses of urban farming families are female-headed: Argentina, the production of soybean for export become a key part of strategies for reducing cities’ a wide range of activities suited to small spaces, 90 percent in Managua, 86 percent in Haiti, has displaced peri-urban production of milk, fruit , urban wastes, from backyard vegetable gardening to intensive 70 percent in Belize City and 25 percent in Quito. and vegetables. containing , protecting , production of flowers and the raising of small The main challenge facing farmers in the cities In Mexico City, informal settlements are resilience to climate change, stimulating surveyed was lack of space, followed by the poor spreading on land reserved for agriculture, and regional , and reducing dependency on * FAO will publish a detailed analysis of the survey data quality of and the unreliability of the of by domestic and the global food market. and a compendium of the case studies in 2014. supplies. For those interested in producing bigger industrial users has caused a serious decline in the supply and quality of water. Small farmers and reduced taxes on land used for the purpose. But the real test of political and institutional municipal government has adopted as a public have limited access to the city’s markets; they Then there are countries with no policy on Upa, commitment must be at the city level. In policy the promotion of agricultural and livestock lack processing technologies needed to add value including some – Colombia, Ecuador and Peru Caribbean countries, it is national government production in its urban and peri-urban areas. to their produce, and are exposed to – which have large urban and active institutions that regulate and support agriculture Provincial and governments have from the overuse of agrochemicals. urban agriculture programmes in their capitals, in urban areas, which is to be expected, given the responsibility for Upa in Peru. The Metropolitan In Lima, intense competition for water forces Bogotá, Quito and Lima. small size of most Caribbean island states. Lima Municipal Council adopted in September most farmers to irrigate with highly polluted Even in the absence of a national policy, In Cuba, Guatemala and Nicaragua, the 2012 an ordinance which establishes an urban wastewater. Urban sprawl has taken out of however, Upa has been mainstreamed at a fairly task is shared between national, provincial and agriculture programme. However, many local production some of the Province of Lima’s best high level within national institutions. While local authorities. In Rosario, Argentina, the administrations have no policy or programmes for farmland, and is pushing agriculture into more Bolivia has yet to adopt its draft National Food city government allocates 25 agronomists and agriculture. distant and less fertile areas, which will lead to and Nutrition Policy – which is expected to Us$380 000 a year to its agriculture programme, Why do some cities embrace Upa and some longer distribution channels, higher food prices endorse urban and peri-urban agriculture – the while Pro-Huerta provides training, seeds and not? Among factors favouring Upa development and shortages of some produce. country’s Ministry of Productive Development tools and Santa Fe Province funds the installation is the involvement of international organizations, and Plural will launch, with Fao’s of . such as Fao and Un-Habitat, and international Growing greener cities with agriculture needs assistance, a national Upa programme in 2014. Belo Horizonte’s Urban Agriculture Support Ngos, such as the Centres on the support of government, from national to Out of 26 countries for which information Policy recognizes Upa as contributing to “the Urban Agriculture and (Ruaf local levels. Governments set urban development is available, 17 have at least one government full development of the social functions of the ) and the Institute for the Promotion policies and priorities. As major landowners and ministry charged with regulating, facilitating city”. The invests $240 000 a of (Ipes). managers of solid wastes and water supplies, they and supporting Upa. In the Caribbean, a year to promote food production, with support Between 2004 and 2011, a multidisciplinary can provide – or deny – the resources needed for national ministry, usually the Ministry of from the state agricultural extension . Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture Group, based GROWING GROWING GREENER Upa. We examine here the extent of political and Agriculture, is responsible for the sector in Upa development is guided by a Council for in Fao’s Regional Office for Latin America and GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA institutional commitment in the region, and what 11 of the 12 countries surveyed. In Antigua Food Security, which includes representatives of the Caribbean, promoted Upa development across AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN that support means for urban and peri-urban and Barbuda, support to backyard gardening municipal, state and federal governments. the region. It organized high-level meetings CARIBBEAN agriculture “on the ground”. includes the services of eight extensionists and Local government, at different territorial of policymakers and launched projects in 4 Twelve of the 23 countries surveyed have six community facilitators, and the supply of and administrative scales – from parish and Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, 5 OVERVIEW national policies that explicitly promote Upa. seeds, seedlings, fruit trees and inputs, free of municipality to district and province – is Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Uruguay OVERVIEW Eight of them are in the Caribbean. Cuba’s charge or at minimal cost. In Guatemala, the responsible for Upa in Bolivia, Colombia, and Venezuela which generated knowledge and policy dates back to 1997, when the government Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Ecuador, El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, Paraguay tools that are used today in the of Upa decided to promote urban agriculture nationwide. has created a Department of Urban Agriculture, and Peru. Many cities have mandated specialized strategies and programmes, and in training and Its Upa programme has established in Havana a which provides producers with training, tools agencies to manage and support Upa activities in technology transfer. The regional Upa initiative network of agricultural supply stores, municipal and inputs. their . In Quito, it is the municipal also produced a series of radio programmes and seed farms, composting units and veterinary In some countries, Upa is promoted by national agency for , which provides educational videos, an on-line capacity-building clinics. Urban farmers are entitled to agricultural research institutions. Argentina’s Pro-Huerta subsidized inputs and helps to develop urban course, and practical manuals on subjects insurance and production loans. gardening programme has been operational for gardeners’ skills. including gardening, simplified hydroponics, seed In Brazil, support to Upa is part of the national more than 20 years under the National Institute Several municipalities on the outskirts of production and biological pest control. Zero Hunger policy. Implemented with local of Agriculture and Livestock Technology, and has have their own home gardening Local Ngos can stimulate local Upa. Rosario’s authorities, it includes the building of farmers’ helped to establish 8 000 community gardens and programmes. Municipalities, often working programme grew out of an Ngo initiative that markets, training for school gardeners, the half a million family gardens. with Ngos, are also the main promoters of introduced gardening in . The political will allocation of vacant urban spaces for agriculture, Upa in El Salvador and Honduras. El Alto’s of individuals can also be decisive: programmes for urban agriculture in Belo Horizonte and , which allows agriculture in areas where and pesticide is prohibited by . To keep put to good use in its peri-urban farming areas. Bogotá were initiated by elected on is not foreseen. The city’s Urban healthy, the Upa programme provides green Thanks to two new treatment , platforms of food security and inclusive socio- Planning Office conducts an impact evaluation of manure and vermicompost, and links gardeners to 100 percent of the Lima’s effluent will be treated economic development. all proposals for Upa-related activities, requiring, sources of manure, household wastes and agro- by the end of 2014. That opens the way for the Sometimes, the positive results of city for example, that large vegetable gardens industrial residues for making compost. Havana’s re-use of the city’s liquid and solid wastes on some initiatives can influence national policy. The harmonize with their locations. gardens are so productive and cost-efficient that 10 800 ha of farmland, which would increase success of Fao-supported backyard gardening In Argentina, Rosario’s plan makes the national Ministry of Agriculture promotes production and create jobs. projects in Managua and Tegucigalpa helped specific provision for the agricultural use of public agro-ecological production in rural areas as well. Animal production can also be made safer persuade the Governments of Nicaragua and land, and the municipality is building a “green Vegetables are 100 percent organic in Rosario, and more productive. A district office for urban Honduras to “up-scale” urban agriculture to circuit” of farmland passing through and around where gardeners cultivate high-yielding beds agriculture in Lima trained pig farmers in good national level. the city. Food production is also recognized of compost substrate. In Managua, they enrich production practices, such as vaccinating their as a legitimate non-residential land use, on a the soil with made by anaerobically animals, improving their diet, safely disposing of Following the 2007–2008 food crisis, a United par with commerce, services and industry, in fermenting household wastes, and combat wastes and building sties. The farmers Nations high-level task force called for a paradigm Belo Horizonte. whiteflies with sticky traps. have recently begun converting pig manure into shift in , to one that encourages But urban planners are far still behind Upa in In Tegucigalpa, the Fao-supported project biogas and selling it to urban residents. urban and peri-urban food production. many cities, even some with long-standing Upa promoted low-cost gardening technologies Although Mexico City prohibits the use land for agriculture is one recommended measure programmes. While Quito’s new development that were easy to implement using local inputs. of agrochemicals on its peri-urban farmland, – it protects land from competing uses, and can plan envisages an equitable, sustainable and Because is more easily enhanced in enforcement is weak because responsibility for help establish urban farming as an economic participatory city with full employment and a small spaces, various containers were tested to compliance is placed on the farmers, not the activity and urban farmers as a professional diversified economy, it makes no mention of optimize production. The preferred containers suppliers. A transition to GROWING GROWING GREENER category. urban agriculture. were old tyres, which gardeners found higher also requires more efficient management of urban GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA Fao’s survey found that Upa is often excluded Peri-urban agriculture also needs protection yielding and easier to irrigate. In El Alto, organic wastes for composting, and increased AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN from – or not explicitly included in – city land use from unplanned urban growth. To safeguard its a project installed, in small, locally made capacity for the treatment of wastewater for CARIBBEAN planning and management in Latin America and supply of – and oxygen – Mexico greenhouses, hydroponic gardens that produce . 6 the Caribbean. That was the case in Antigua and City has classified more than half of its total land 40 kg of tomatoes per square metre a year. 7 OVERVIEW Barbuda, Chile, Colombia, Dominica, Ecuador, area as a protected suelo de conservación, which Fao has promoted various technologies that To realize Upa’s full potential for generating OVERVIEW Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guyana, includes 300 sq km of farmland. However, efforts conserve water. In Managua, the answer to dry income, stimulating economic development and Honduras, Jamaica, Panama and Paraguay. In to promote sustainable agriculture in suburban season water shortages was a rooftop rainwater delivering food that is safe and of good quality, another five, no information was available. and peri-urban areas are stymied, not only by harvesting system, which channels run-off during producers need access to markets and technologies Only Cuba, Guatemala and Peru confirmed illegal settlements, but also by small-scale farmers’ the wet season to a 5 000 litre storage tank. that add value to their produce. that Upa is included in the land use of at lack of secure . In El Alto, the use of surface mulch and drip Fao’s survey and city case studies indicate least some cities or municipalities. In Guatemala, irrigation reduced water needs by 80 percent. In that many people practising Upa for home the municipality of Palencia has recognized A strong trend in many Upa programmes in Tegucigalpa, many women use old tyres filled consumption also sell surpluses. The proportion of backyard gardening in its development plan. Latin America and the Caribbean is toward with to purify kitchen greywater, and re- “commercial producers” was 26 percent in Antigua In Peru, local governments in three of Lima’s agricultural technologies and practices that use it on their gardens. and Barbuda, 40 percent in Cuba, 54 percent in have incorporated agriculture in their produce more, and better quality, food while When appropriately treated, wastewater from Bolivia and 68 percent in Dominican Republic. planning, sometimes for civic beautification. optimizing the use of natural resources and domestic sources is safe to use on crops and Cities with successful Upa programmes usually Crop and animal production is recognized reducing reliance on agrochemicals. contains that increase yields. Lima’s have well-organized marketing systems. Havana as a legitimate land use in Havana’s strategic In Havana, the use of synthetic fertilizer abundant supply of wastewater could soon be has fruit and vegetables sales points located within 5 km of production units and throughout prepare vegetable trays and baskets, and make Havana the city’s urban , where producers pie fillings, soups, jams and sweets. In El Alto, sell directly to consumers. In 2013, sales amounted 70 families, trained in post-harvest handling and Mexico City to 26 500 tonnes. packaging, now sell their vegetables under the Antigua Another trend in Latin American cities is the brand name, “Verdurita”, in the capital, . and Barbuda spread of farmers’ markets that sell locally-grown Many urban and peri-urban farmers have Tegucigalpa organic food. Quito has 14 one-day bioferias, been tapped as suppliers of institutional feeding Managua open weekly and located in low-income areas as programmes. In Havana, Upa provided in 2013 well as in better-off neighbourhoods. In 2012, some 6 700 tonnes of food to almost 300 000 they sold more than 100 tonnes of produce worth people in schools, centres, Us$176 000. and other institutions in the city. Urban, In Rosario, too, vegetables are sold at peri‑urban and rural agriculture contribute to “agrochemical-free vegetable fairs” in all six Belo Horizonte’s multiple programmes for food Quito of the city’s districts. Rosario’s vegetables and nutrition security. A third of the food in the are certified as organic by a system of “social 46 million meals prepared annually for its school certification”, guaranteed by the municipality, feeding programme is procured from family the city gardeners’ association, Pro-Huerta and farmers in the metropolitan region’s rural areas. a local Ngo that promotes fair trade. The Upa programme in Quito is registered as a producer The international community is developing a GROWING and marketer of organic produce at national level. global development agenda beyond 2015, with Lima GROWING GREENER Belo Horizonte municipality plans to open sustainable development at its core. As part of CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA in the a weekly “urban agriculture that process, all stakeholders have been invited to GREENER El Alto AND THE CARIBBEAN fair” for direct marketing by farmers who have participate in setting Sustainable Development converted to organic production. The municipal Goals (Sdgs), to be agreed by the United Nations Belo 8 government also provides 30 sales points where General Assembly. CITIES Horizonte OVERVIEW rural farmers sell each year some 700 tonnes of There is a general consensus that the Sdgs leafy vegetables, fruit and root crops. should include: eradicating hunger and poverty, Profiles of agriculture Post-harvest processing adds value. In Antigua increasing agricultural production sustainably and as it is practised in and around and Barbuda, some backyard gardeners sell fruit improving food systems, and building sustainable drinks and sun-dried hot peppers. As urban cities that provide food security, economic 10 cities of the region food producers achieve household food security opportunity and a healthy environment, and in Quito, the city’s agriculture programme have strong links to peri-urban and rural areas. Rosario encourages them to form microenterprises, and The city region food system offers a point of trains them in business planning, marketing and convergence for achieving all of those goals. accounting. Urban farmers there have entered the value chain as intermediate or final processors of meat, canned goods, dairy and snacks. The urban agriculture programme in Rosario has created three “social agro-industries” that Intensive vegetable production in Havana furrows in the soil, then lining the rows with began in the 1800s, when Chinese immigrants protective barriers of , stone, bricks or started market gardens on the city’s outskirts. concrete. The soil quality is gradually improved But the foundation of today’s flourishing urban through the incorporation of organic matter; as and peri-urban agriculture movement can be organic content increases, so do the levels of soil traced to a precise date: 27 December 1987, when nutrients and moisture (and the height of the the Central Committee of Cuba’s Communist bed). Following the 1959 revolution, Cuba crisis which led to food rationing and rising Party called for action nationwide to promote Organopónicos – the term applies to both the launched agricultural development rates of malnutrition. With agriculture intensive horticulture, using a technology known technology and the garden – can be applied on as “organoponics”. building sites, vacant lots and roadsides, and programmes that made intensive use affected by shortages of fuel and of two key Organopónicos is a Cuban invention. The arranged in terraces on sloping land. Soil can of agrochemicals and farm machinery. petroleum derivatives, fertilizer term was coined to distinguish it from other be tailored, using specific mixtures, to specific By 1980, when its population reached and pesticide, Havana residents began intensive, high-yielding horticulture production crops. If the soil is affected by nematodes or 10 million, the country planting food crops wherever space was systems, such as hydroponics, which grows plants fungi, the entire substrate can be replaced. If was able to produce food available. At first, yields were low, owing on water and inert substrates that have been necessary, the gardens can be disassembled and for 40 million people. to lack of farming experience and inputs. enriched with mineral nutrients. relocated. Cuba was also one of the But with strong government support, urban While Havana’s urban farmers have With drip irrigation, regular addition of experimented with hydroponics, that technology compost and good horticultural practices – such world’s major producers agriculture was rapidly transformed from a depends on a reliable supply of chemical inputs. as the use of well-adapted varieties, mixed of , with annual spontaneous response to food insecurity to a The Cubans called their solution organoponics cropping, crop rotation and integrated pest GROWING GROWING GREENER exports of more than 550 000 tonnes. The national priority. In the process, Havana has because it uses an organic substrate, obtained management – the raised beds can produce GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 deprived added a new word – organoponics – to from crop residues, household wastes and animal vegetables all year round, and achieve yields of up AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN Cuba of its main trading partner and source the urban agriculture vocabulary, and manure. to 20 kg per sq m. CARIBBEAN of . That, and the ’ has also become a pioneer in a worldwide With the onset of the período especial, In 2013, Havana counted 97 high-yielding 10 trade embargo, ushered in what Cubans call transition to sustainable agriculture that organoponic gardens proved ideal for growing organoponics, which produce vegetables such as 11 crops on poor soils in small urban spaces. A lettuce, chard, radish, beets, beans, cucumber, HAVANA the período especial, an extended economic produces “more with less”. HAVANA typical organoponic garden is started by making tomatoes, spinach and peppers. Among the best NEILJS in brief: HAvana Havana is synonymous with urban agriculture. Supported by a network of seed farms, 1 composting units and veterinary clinics, its farmers produce more than 60 000 tonnes of vegetables and 1 700 tonnes of meat a year. 3 8 2 5

6 4 6 A stall sells fresh, locally grown fruit and vegetables near Havana’s Ciudad Libertad airport, in the municipality of Playa.

1 The gardens of Vivero Alamar, which was created on abandoned GROWING GROWING GREENER waste land 8 km east of the city GREENER CITIES IN LATIN centre in 1997. CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN 7 CARIBBEAN 12 13 HAVANA HAVANA

km 10

7 This garden in Reparto Porvenir, in the municipality of Boyeros, produces vegetable seedlings in root balls, ready for transplanting. 2 Concrete barriers line an organoponic garden on 5th , in the municipality of Playa, western Havana.

3 An organoponic garden near Havana’s most famous landmark, Plaza de la 4 On the corner of 23rd Avenue 5 Vegetables and herbs growing on a “green rooftop” in 8 Inside a in the municipality of Guanabacoa, Revolución, produces lettuce, chard, radish, beets, beans, cucumber, tomatoes, and 222nd , in the municipality Cerro, one of the city’s oldest municipalities. urban farmers raise goats. spinach and peppers. of La Lisa, urban gardeners buy seed at one of Havana’s 52 agricultural stores.

Photographs: Mario González Novo (1-7), Aurelia Castellanos Quintero (8) known is Vivero Alamar, which was created on Not only Havana, INIFAT abandoned wasteland 8 km east of the city centre but nationwide in 1997. Run by a cooperative with 180 members, Alamar’s gardens produce some 300 tonnes of Urban and peri-urban agriculture in Havana has evolved along with Cuba’s national programme for food organic vegetables a year. production in urban areas. During the economic crisis of the 1990s, the focus was on developing organoponic and Agricultural production in Havana is intensive gardens in empty or underutilized city spaces. implemented under two national programmes, in 1997, what had been until then a popular participatory activity was institutionalized, with one for urban and one for peri-urban areas appropriate legislation, to become the Movimiento de (see page 15). It is strongly encouraged by the agricultura urbana. In 2009, the government created a Cuban Government, which created the Havana complementary programme for agricultura suburbana, Provincial Office of Agriculture, seven provincial which seeks to transfer the “extremely positive experiences” of urban agriculture to the peripheries of technical departments and 15 municipal offices Cuba’s towns and cities. to assist the sector. The government has also both programmes aim at achieving local food self- introduced measures to grant vacant land free sufficiency through “food production in the , by the barrio and for the barrio”. Their basic principles are of charge for agriculture and to encourage the agro-ecological production, local-level sustainability, participation of women and youth. continuous technological innovation, and producers’ Crop and animal production is recognized ownership of what they produce. They are expected to as a legitimate land use in the city’s strategic use simple technologies and minimal resources in order to increase food production and reduce dependence on plan, which allows agriculture in areas where food imports. GROWING GROWING GREENER construction is not foreseen, while its Land With drip irrigation, compost and good horticultural practices, in Cuba as a whole, agriculture is now practised by GREENER CITIES IN LATIN some 40 000 urban workers on an area estimated at CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA and Urban Management Scheme of 2013 sees Havana’s gardens can produce 20 kg of vegetables per sq m of fruit, 10 000 tonnes of roots and tubers, AMERICA AND THE peripheral areas as highly suitable for agriculture. in one year 10.5 million litres of cow, buffalo and goat milk 33 500 ha. It includes 145 000 small farm plots, 385 000 AND THE CARIBBEAN backyard gardens, 6 400 intensive gardens and 4 000 CARIBBEAN Upa is supported by a Technical Advisory and 1 700 tonnes of meat. high-yielding organopónicos. Board, representing 11 agricultural research gardens under awnings in soil enriched with In addition, 89 000 backyards and 5 100 plots A feature of UPA in Cuba is the high degree of local 14 autonomy, which is seen as a key to ensuring food 15 HAVANA institutes, by a network of agricultural supply vermicompost. of less than 800 sq m are used by families in the HAVANA security. Cuba’s strategy is to promote agriculture in stores, municipal seed farms, composting units, The city’s urban and peri-urban agriculture city to grow fruit, vegetables and condiments small, local areas with a large number of producers who veterinary clinics and centres for the reproduction sector includes five agricultural enterprises, and to raise small animals, such as and grow food for their own consumption and to meet the of biological pest control agents, and by the city’s which manage some 700 crop farms, 170 guinea pigs, for household consumption. In food needs of their . Each territory acts College of Urban and Suburban Agriculture, farms and 27 tree production units, two densely populated areas, food is produced in autonomously in producing inputs such as seed, animal feed, organic and biological agents for pest which coordinates the training of producers provincial companies specializing in pig and containers on rooftops and balconies. In all, some control. and technicians, and helps to introduce new livestock production, 29 agricultural cooperatives, 90 000 Havana residents are engaged in some Overall coordination of UPA is carried out by the technologies, crop varieties and animal breeds. and 91 credit and service cooperatives that grow form of agriculture. National Urban and Suburban Agriculture Group, organopónicos have become under the direction of the Institute of Fundamental Although flowers and vegetables and raise small animals. Product marketing is based on direct exchange Research in Tropical Agriculture. The group brings emblematic of agriculture in Havana, the city The total area under agriculture in Havana is between the producer and the consumer. Fresh together representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture has developed other high-yielding production estimated at some 35 900 ha, or half the area of produce is marketed through a wide range of and six other ministries, as well as those of 16 scientific systems. It has 318 intensive gardens planted Havana Province. Production in 2012 included outlets, including sales points located within institutions and 53 urban and suburban agriculture subprogrammes. directly in the soil, and 38 ha of semi-protected 63 000 tonnes of vegetables, 20 000 tonnes 5 km of production units and throughout

Crop and animal production is recognized as a legitimate land use in the city’s strategic plan Havana’s urban neighbourhoods. In 2013, sales of vegetables under conventional agriculture INIFAT amounted to 58 000 tonnes. Almost half of that requires around Us$40 million worth of mineral – 26 500 tonnes – was sold to the public through fertilizer and Us$2.8 million worth of pesticide. local sales points, while state markets and fairs The amount of organic fertilizer required handled 21 000 tonnes. for the same level of production is around A further 6 770 tonnes were supplied through 1 million cubic m, and the main cost is the diesel daily deliveries to almost 300 000 people in fuel needed to it an average distance of “priority destinations”, such as schools, maternity 10 km to the farmer’s field. , public health centres, hospitals and other The fuel cost per tonne of organic vegetables institutions in the city. Many farmers, especially is Us$0.55, compared to a fertilizer cost of in the cooperative sector, market processed Us$40 per tonne under conventional agriculture, products, such as spices, and processed meats, representing a total saving of Us$39.5 million. fruit and vegetables, and have supply contracts The cost of pest control is also reduced – from with the tourist industry, which accounted for Us$2.8 million to Us$300 000 – by using 3 500 tonnes of sales made in 2013. biological control agents and biopesticides. Other savings can be achieved through local The holistic approach to agriculture in Havana, production of good quality seed which, under and in Cuba generally, has been shaped by the intensive production, can improve yields by need to produce high yields with minimal use of 30 percent. Given the high cost of imported seed, external inputs, especially agrochemicals derived the Upa programme has established 10 local GROWING GROWING GREENER from fossil fuel. It has been said that Cuba was vegetable seed farms, which supply 40 percent GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA the first country to experience a “” crisis, Tomorrow’s urban farmers? Schoolchildren visit an organoponic of the lettuce seed and 20 percent of the AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN one that will eventually affect food production garden in Havana such as livestock production units, and identifies Chinese chard sown in Havana’s urban gardens. CARIBBEAN worldwide. other local sources of organic matter, including (Nationwide, municipal seed farms produce 16 Concern over rising fuel and fertilizer prices, initiative aimed at fostering a global transition to crop and household wastes and agro-industrial annually 17.6 tonnes of seed of 22 species and 40 17 HAVANA growing competition for land and water, and sustainable crop, livestock, forestry and fisheries residues, such as coffee husks and sawdust. varieties). Havana also has 28 units that supply HAVANA the environmental impact of agrochemicals production. In order to control insect pests and diseases, high-quality plant seedlings – mainly of tomato, led Fao to propose in 2011 a new paradigm of Havana could serve as a good example for producers are trained to analyse phytosanitary cabbage, lettuce, cucumber, peppers and onions – intensive crop production, one that is both highly countries making the transition. Most of the problems and to respond not by attacking the in root balls, ready for transplanting in the field. productive and sustainable. Fao’s “Save and agriculture in the city is fully organic – the use symptoms but by removing the cause – for Seed, soil improvers, vermicompost and Grow” model of agriculture uses an “ecosystem of agrochemicals in urban gardens is prohibited example, improving to treat mould. biological pest control agents, along with tools approach” that draws on nature’s contributions to by law and is also impractical, given the limited They use biopesticides and biological control and veterinary supplies, are sold through 52 crop productivity. quantities available. Because a reliable supply agents supplied by the city’s six centres for the agricultural stores, which are located in all 15 That means, for example, using natural sources of soil nutrients is essential for improving production of natural pathogens, predators and municipalities. The stores also provide technical of plant nutrition, and controlling insect pests by garden substrate and maintaining high yields, parasites of insect pests. services, advice and training to the city’s farmers. protecting their natural enemies, rather than by the Upa programme produces compost, green The agro-ecological approach offers All urban farmers have access to agricultural spraying crops indiscriminately with pesticide. manure, vermicompost, bio-fertilizer and liquid considerable cost benefits. The Upa programme insurance, and to production loans from Havana’s “Save and Grow” is the basis of a new Fao fertilizers, links gardeners to sources of manure, has calculated that producing 1 million tonnes Banco Metropolitano.

The agroecological approach has considerable cost benefits Havana has set guidelines for agricultural peri-urban areas, it designates free spaces in

development in the rest of Cuba, and not only z Novo the intermediate zone for industrial and service le

in towns and cities. Its approach has been zá investments, and those in central areas for high- n adopted as a management model by the national technology enterprises and major hotels. o Go i

Ministry of Agriculture, which promotes a mix r Many of the city’s present farming areas will a

of “technical-industrial” and agro-ecological M be affected by an urban reorganization plan, production in rural areas. which calls for the removal of temporary plots in Innovations such as organoponics, along with central Havana, a reduction in intensive livestock technologies for the production of bio-fertilizers production in areas above the city’s , and and the processing and conservation of seed, the removal of pig farms from urban areas. have been transferred abroad through technical However, agriculture has left an indelible assistance to urban agriculture programmes mark on Havana’s and its proven in more than 10 Latin American countries, benefits – food security, improved child nutrition, including Colombia, Mexico and Venezuela employment and the revival of social values and other countries of the Caribbean. The and solidarity – are recognized by both the Ministry of Agriculture’s national Institute of government and society at large. Among the Fundamental Research in Tropical Agriculture Havana Upa programme’s strategic priorities are (Inifat) has developed a three-year master’s to realize the full productive potential of urban degree course in urban and peri-urban agriculture and to accelerate the organization of agriculture that has attracted students from urban food producers. GROWING GROWING GREENER and . To achieve that, the programme plans to GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA increase the output of biofertilizer and seed, AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN One key lesson from the past 20 years of strengthen support services, and build the CARIBBEAN experience in Havana is that, to be productive capacities of producers in the management 18 and sustainable, urban agriculture must adapt to of infrastructure, the use of water-saving 19 HAVANA physical urban conditions and to local potentials technologies and , and HAVANA and resources. Adaptability will be required integrated pest management. again as Cuba’s economy improves and new Meanwhile, Cuba is preparing the next priorities emerge in its city planning. generation of urban and peri-urban farmers. Since the dark days of the período especial, The country has some 3 000 study circles, where per capita Gdp in Cuba has grown by almost agricultural technicians and producers encourage 80 percent – one of the strongest performances children and youth to take up agriculture and in Latin America – thanks to economic reforms, learn more about agro-ecological production growth in revenue from tourism and exports, practices. In Havana, students are invited to take and, most recently, a boom in the construction part in local agricultural activities, and schools sector. Production of earthworms for use in making vermicompost, use Upa as a practical example when teaching While Havana’s new Land and Urban at a site near the Institute of Fundamental Research simple arithmetic, participatory production and Management Scheme favours agriculture in in Tropical Agriculture social relations.

Agriculture has left an indelible mark on Havana’s landscape Mexico City lies at 2 2 4 0 m above sea level in The 2012 harvest was valued at more than the southern part of the Valley of Mexico, and US$100 million and included 336 000 tonnes was built on a system of lakes that once covered of nopal, 147 000 tonnes of forage oats, 1 500 sq km. There, pre-Hispanic civilizations 12 500 tonnes of potatoes and 15 000 tonnes developed specialized food production systems, of broccoli, carrots, lettuce and a local herb, including floatingchinampa gardens for romerito. Although the is horticulture and the milpa system of mixed Mexico’s leading producer of nopal and romerito, Home to more than 21 million people, the includes , , and maize, bean and squash cultivation on rainfed it is estimated that 80 percent of the food Mexico City sprawls 300 sq km of farmland. But residential land mountain terraces. consumed in the city is supplied by other states The exponential growth of the city – which of the country or imported. across some 7 850 sq km, forming one of the is increasingly scarce in the urban zone, and reached the rate of 25 sq km a year between Almost 90 percent of crop production is world’s largest urban agglomerations. At almost 30 percent of the Federal District’s 1970 and 2000 – and of rural towns in the rainfed, and 80 percent of is under its heart is the Federal District – Mexico population live in poverty owing mainly to suelo de conservación has meant that, today, annual crops, mainly forages and grain maize. – with an the lack of health services and basic housing. most agriculture in the Federal District can be Production of flowers, indigenous poinsettias area of 1 480 sq km and a As a result, the suelo de conservación is regarded as peri-urban and even suburban. and fodder oats generates more than half the population of 9.4 million. under constant pressure: at last count, more The population of Mexico City economically total value of annual crops. Nopal is grown The Federal District than 850 informal settlements had been active in agriculture is estimated at about 16 000, over 4 300 ha, or more than 90 percent of the working on 11 500 family farms. Some 22 800 ha perennial cropland, mainly in Milpa Alta. The covers just 0.1 percent built there and, by one estimate, its natural of land is dedicated to crop production, mainly animal population of the Federal District is of the national territory, habitat is being lost at the rate of 600 ha a in the southwestern of Tlalpan, Milpa estimated at some 6 650 head of cattle, 30 000 GROWING GROWING GREENER and more than half of it is, at least on paper, year. To prevent further degradation of the Alta, Tláhuac and Xochimilco. Farming in pigs, 10 000 sheep and 220 000 chickens. GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA protected from urbanization. Known as conservation zone, the Federal District’s those areas produces maize, fruit, vegetables and Despite the constant pressure of urbanization, AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN the suelo de conservación, the protected government is promoting sustainable, animals for family consumption and local sale, agriculture has survived in Mexico City thanks CARIBBEAN area was created in 1992 to safeguard its ecosystem-based agriculture in rural areas but includes large-scale production of nopal, to farmer innovation and adaptation. For 20 vital ecosystem services, such as the city’s and food production in the city itself. amaranth, vegetables, herbs and ornamental example, nopal has replaced maize as the main 21 plants destined for city and regional markets. crop on the slopes of Milpa Alta, and flowers MEXICO CITY supply of drinking water and oxygen, and MEXICO CITY ehm B e Uw in brief: MEXICO CITY Most agriculture in the Federal District of Mexico can be regarded as peri-urban and even suburban, and it survives thanks to farmer innovation and adaptation. While still at an infant stage, urban food production is increasing.

1 A greenhouse in Mexico City’s southern of Xochimilco, 5 which is famous for its flower production. In 2012, growers here shipped 2.1 million tonnes of potted poinsettias alone.

GROWING GROWING GREENER 4 GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN CARIBBEAN 22 23 MEXICO CITY MEXICO CITY

2

2 At left, farmers in Tláhuac borough harvest romerito, a local herb grown on the sites of ancient floating gardens, or 1 chinampas. At right, a view from the city suburbs of Lake Chalco and Tláhuac farmland, which also produces alfalfa, beans and oats, and apples and pears.

3

Forest

Suburban agriculture 3 A farmer weeds his maize field in 4 Residents of the Emiliano Zapata 5 Vegetables grow in containers Tlalpan borough, deep in the suelo de , in Álvaro Obregón, at on the roof of the Federal District’s Peri-urban agriculture conservación. a workshop on greenhouse gardening. Youth Institute, in Miguel Hidalgo. Map data: Cristian Reyna Ramírez 10 km

Photographs: SAGARPA (1), Luis Manuel Rodríguez Sánchez (2), SEDEREC (3,4), Fernando Rodríguez Rodríguez (5) EC are now grown in greenhouses built on old supported by a variety of legal instruments. R production, US$37 million in the conservation

chinampas. The Federal District’s General Programme of SEDE and sustainable use of natural resources in Peri-urban agriculture is practised in boroughs Ecological Management delimits the area of the , and Us$1.8 million in at middle and higher elevations of Xochimilco, suelo de conservación, and its emergency assistance to farmers affected by Tlalpan, Milpa Alta, Magdalena Contreras, promotes systems and prohibits extreme weather events, such as drought and Alvaro Obregon and Cuajimalpa de Morelos, the use of agrochemicals and synthetic fertilizers flooding. which have the lowest population densities. Plots in the conservation zone. To guide its policies Another SEDEREC programme, for the range in size from 1 to 3 ha and are used for the and programmes for sustainable agriculture, the promotion of traditional food culture, helps production of maize, amaranth, nopal, oats, Federal District is establishing a Rural Council, rural farmers to enter local, national and legumes, fruit and vegetables. Farms there also representing producer organizations, traders and international markets, and organizes trade raise livestock such as sheep, calves, rabbits, pigs, service providers. fairs and exhibitions in the Federal District. horses and poultry. SEDEREC’s programme for agriculture and Meanwhile, the city’s Secretariat for the Closer to the city centre, in Xochimilco and rural development aims at improving production Environment has instituted Mexico’s first system Tláhuac, agriculture continues in lowland areas planning, training, technology development, of organic certification of produce, known as the that were, until recently, peri-urban but are agroprocessing and marketing. Through that, Green Seal, and has set standards for organic now “locked” into medium density suburbs. and other, programmes for rural areas, the city Each year, Mexico City farmers harvest more than agriculture in the conservation zone. 300 000 tonnes of nopal (below). Improved technologies for Holdings are usually of 1 ha or less on chinampas and Mexico’s Federal Government invested making products such as jam – on sale, above, at a city fair – All seven of the city’s boroughs with rural and filled-in . The dominant production between 2007 and 2012 some US$24.6 million in would help boost small farmer incomes areas promote the local production of maize, system is horticulture and floriculture, with some horticulture, floriculture and crop and livestock vegetables, fruit, nopal, fodder, medicinal and

maize, using treated water for irrigation. In most EC ornamental plants, as well as small-scale farming. GROWING R GROWING GREENER suburban villages, sheep, rabbits, birds and horses For example, the Programme for Sustainable GREENER CITIES IN LATIN SEDE CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA are still raised in backyards, and some small Rural Development in Milpa Alta provides AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN dairy farms and indoor pig production units are subsidies to farmers who preserve local maize CARIBBEAN still found. varieties under traditional production systems 24 with low environmental impact. 25 MEXICO CITY Since 2000, Mexico City’s government has MEXICO CITY increased its support to agriculture in the Achieving sustainable agriculture in Mexico Federal District, with the main objective of City’s peri-urban and suburban areas will require protecting the ecosystem services that suburban action on several fronts. In the boroughs of and peri-urban areas provide to the city, and Tláhuac and Xochimilco, the only suburban to a lesser extent, to ensure a local food supply. agricultural areas with permanent water for An important step forward was the creation in irrigation, the overexploitation of aquifers by 2007 of the Secretariat for Rural Development domestic and industrial users has led to a serious and Equity for Communities (SEDEREC), which decline in and quality, and to spearheads the city’s efforts to promote food ground subsidence. production that is free of agrochemicals and, in The challenge over the coming decade will be some cases, completely organic. to increase the capacity for rainwater harvesting Peri-urban and suburban agriculture is and for storage and treatment of wastewater for EC use in irrigation, and to rehabilitate canals and R Improving small farmers’ incomes requires

chinampas in the remaining lake area. That will SEDE the introduction of improved technologies for require a new vision among government agencies processing, particularly of nopal and maize. responsible for the city’s water management. At Although processed nopal and nopal-based present, there is little coordination among the cosmetics have considerable potential, the volume agencies, which cannot, therefore, respond in an of production is still low. In the case of maize, integrated way to the growing demands on the the main challenge is adding value to surplus Federal District’s . grain maize, which is traditionally sold cheaply New approaches are also needed in technical in local and regional markets. Transforming assistance to farmers. Currently, government maize farmers from producers of raw materials support is delivered through projects using into producers of processed foods calls for very professional service providers. A more effective specific technological innovations – such as strategy would be to involve the government, toasters, mills and tortilla makers – that are research institutions and experienced farmers affordable and adapted to the characteristics of in developing applied research that reflects the maize landraces, as well as better marketing real needs of farmers; deliver advisory services opportunities. through programmes rather than individual Small farmers have only limited access to projects; and promote farmer-to-farmer Mexico City’s huge wholesale market, the extension. Central de Abasto, and marketing alternatives Reducing the environmental impact of need to be developed. For small-scale farmers GROWING GROWING GREENER agriculture in the suelo de conservación also In Tláhuac, farm workers harvest verdolaga, a succulent that is with diversified production, they include direct GREENER CITIES IN LATIN eaten as a cooked vegetable or in salads CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA requires changes in current regulations. The cooperatives and microenterprises of biological producer-to-consumer trading at weekend AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN law prohibiting the use of agrochemicals agents for the control of pests and diseases. markets. Consumer organizations that are CARIBBEAN lacks mechanisms for enforcement – for the production of nopal, which has been linked The supply of seed for horticulture and motivated by economic solidarity can also help 26 example, instead of banning or strictly to emissions and the of floriculture is a thorny issue. State seed develop outlets for organic produce, which is 27 MEXICO CITY regulating the marketing of mineral fertilizer nitrates into . production was abandoned in the 1980s, and usually sold in middle and upper class areas at MEXICO CITY and synthetic pesticide, and promoting eco- seed supply is now dominated by large foreign higher prices than those found in supply centres friendly alternatives, it places responsibility for A successful transition to sustainable agriculture corporations and a few Mexican companies. and low-income areas. The city government compliance on farmers, not on the companies will also depend on the efficient management of The cost of certified seed, especially of some should strengthen a SEDEREC initiative that that manufacture and supply the inputs. urban organic wastes to produce high volumes vegetables such as broccoli, is very high and purchases food for distribution to soup kitchens, Tougher measures are needed, especially, in of compost for use in suburban and peri-urban producers are increasingly dependent on a prisons and hospitals. the production of ornamental plants, where the areas. Some of Mexico City’s boroughs have limited range of commercial varieties. Action Finally, younger farmers need secure access to intensive use of agrochemicals is widespread programmes for composting garden wastes, and to encourage the local production of seed arable land in suburban and peri-urban areas. As and farmers are exposed to a high of a composting plant has opened in the Eastern – involving government, research institutions the value of land is determined by its suitability pesticide poisoning. Assessments should also be metropolitan area. However, much work is and farmers’ cooperatives – would not only for urbanization, rather than for agriculture, carried out to measure the real environmental needed to improve the quality of the compost help reduce production costs. It would also help land prices have soared. Efforts to promote impact of recommended practices, such as the and its distribution to farmers. Measures are also protect Mexico’s agrobiodiversity and ensure organic production will have little success if application of high volumes of fresh manure in needed to encourage the production by farmers’ national food security. prospective farmers lack secure title to land and,

The law prohibiting the use of agrochemicals lacks mechanisms for enforcement A space for organic vegetables in the city centre gardens as a source of food for low-income Green roofs on schools, Huerto Romita is a 56 sq m gardening centre, located households as well as cash from the sale of museums and corporate in the heart of Mexico City, which provides an area mita surpluses through local markets. Between o for community vegetable production and teaches R o o 2007 and 2012, the Secretariat invested some t

techniques. It also helps in starting up r Government and private initiatives are “greening”

school gardens, and installs home and community ue US$6 million in 2 800 urban agriculture projects rooftops across Mexico City’s . The Federal H gardens for city residents. – including gardens in homes, housing units and District’s Secretariat for Urban Development and social rehabilitation centres – directly benefiting Housing has promoted rooftop hydroponic gardens, while the Secretariat for the Environment has a mita 15 700 city residents. o

R programme for greening roofs with succulent plants

o o In 2013, SEDEREC signed an agreement with

t to help reduce the impact of air pollutants. So far, the r Havana’s Institute of Fundamental Research programme has installed beds of succulents on more ue H in Tropical Agriculture to help develop urban than 12 300 sq m of rooftops over schools, hospitals, the city’s Natural Museum, and other civic agriculture in the Federal District, and launched buildings. Some of Mexico City’s largest corporate a programme with the boroughs of Alvaro buildings also host green rooftops. Obregon, Cuauhtémoc, Miguel Hidalgo and A group of urban planners, Efecto Verde, has Cuajimalpa to introduce greenhouse horticulture proposed covering with low-maintenance 40 percent of the city’s urban surface by 2030. Efecto on social housing estates. The city has received Verde recently installed a 265 sq m green roof on requests from at least 400 housing estates for the Papalote Children’s Museum (below), made up of assistance in creating their own urban gardens. 1 593 pots with a variety of plant species. Meanwhile, civil society has made a significant de r

contribution to popularizing agriculture in the Ve

GROWING o GROWING GREENER city. One notable initiative is the Romita Urban GREENER At left, plants growing in containers at Huerto Romita. Above, a CITIES IN LATIN fect CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA meal with music to celebrate the garden’s sixth anniversary Demonstration Garden (see page 28), which E AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN conducts gardening workshops for the general CARIBBEAN public in the capital and other Mexican cities, 28 receive consequently, little incentive to invest in along with the rise of convenience grocery stores and develops urban agriculture projects with 29 MEXICO CITY or other improvements in the agro- and the increasing availability of imported private companies. MEXICO CITY ecosystem. The government could do more to food, guarantee ready access to food for the vast In urban areas of the borough of Iztapalapa, encourage sustainable agriculture by creating majority of the population. Buying food, rather residents’ organizations have started small- mechanisms for land redistribution, such as than producing it, remains the most attractive scale horticulture projects, while the Miravalle providing low-interest credit for young farmers or proposition for most inhabitants. community assembly in Sierra de Santa Catarina buying land and leasing it to new farmers. However, urban agriculture has been placed has established gardens for the production of firmly on the policy agenda of the Federal vegetables, nopal and medicinal plants using Fully urban agriculture is still at an infant stage District government through the efforts of recycled containers, rainwater harvesting and in Mexico City. There is no widespread tradition SEDEREC, and through initiatives of NGOs, organic composting. Another emerging trend of producing food in built-up areas, and the high neighbourhood assemblies and youth groups. is the establishment of fresh produce markets density of buildings limits the availability of SEDEREC’s Programme for Small-scale – such as the centrally located El Cien and space for agriculture. In addition, the city’s well Sustainable Agriculture in the city is promoting Tianguis Alternativo – which provide outlets for developed system of subsidized food marketing, organic production in home and community organic producers.

Civil society has made a significant contribution to popularizing agriculture in the city of an economic shock or natural disaster. Antigua and Barbuda has a long tradition of Environment launched in 2009, with assistance Both happened in 2008. Global food price backyard (or “kitchen”) gardens, used to grow from FAO, a National Food Production Plan. inflation led to steep increases in the local food for the family and a little extra for sharing As well as providing for the rehabilitation and cost of food, which accounts for almost half with friends and neighbours. But that tradition upgrading of agricultural infrastructure – such was in steady decline, as people shifted away as agricultural stations, laboratories, farm , of spending among the poorest households. from fruit and vegetables to processed foods and dams and – the plan called for action In October that year, Hurricane Omar diets rich in fat, sugar and salt. At the same time, to boost the contribution of traditional home brought that swept away farmland farming areas have been depopulated as rural gardens to national food security. and livestock, and caused heavy crop losses. residents drifted to the , Saint John’s. Both events prompted the government to Almost 60 percent of the population now resides That initiative has grown into the National accelerate its plans for boosting the country’s in the districts of Saint John’s City and Saint Backyard Gardening Programme, which With a population of 90 000 and total annual food production, John’s Rural, and most of that “rural” population is managed by the Ministry’s Agricultural is likely to be engaged in urban pursuits. Extension Division. The programme is now including action to Gdp of some US$1.2 billion, the twin‑island Along with urbanization and the of active in all districts of the country, including state of Antigua and Barbuda ranks among promote traditional home the sugar industry, agriculture’s contribution to rural areas, with 2 500 registered households the world’s “high income non-Oecd” gardening. Six years later, the national GDP has slipped to just 2 percent, participating. Including members of those countries. But it also has one of the highest the National Backyard dwarfed by the tourism and banking sectors. households, the programme currently benefits rates of income inequality in the Caribbean. Gardening Programme Less than 3 percent of the labour force works directly an estimated 7 500 people. A study in 2007 found that 28 percent of the produces 280 tonnes of vegetables annually in agriculture. Farming suffers from intense Backyard farmers are encouraged to register competition for land from housing and tourism with the Ministry of Agriculture so they can GROWING country’s population was indigent, poor or and is seen as key to achieving “zero hunger” GROWING GREENER development, a lack of year-round production access support services on request. Support GREENER CITIES IN LATIN at risk of falling into poverty in the event in Antigua and Barbuda. CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA and processing technologies, and adverse includes the advice of eight technical officers AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN environmental conditions, including chronic and six community facilitators, as well as the CARIBBEAN water shortages and widespread . supply of vegetable seeds, seedlings, fruit trees 30 Although horticulture is now the dominant and inputs, free of charge or at minimal cost. 31 ANTIGUA agricultural activity, in 2008 it was meeting In 2011, the programme distributed fertilizer ANTIGUA AND AND BARBUDA barely more than a quarter of local demand. The and 250 000 assorted vegetable seedlings to BARBUDA country’s bill for imported fruit and vegetables backyard farmers. It has also introduced modern, rose from US$4 million in 2000 to US$12.8 million productivity-enhancing technologies, such as drip in 2008, when the volume of imported vegetables irrigation, vermicomposting, , and reached more than 5 200 tonnes. That year, local microgardening in drums and on table pallets. vegetable production was just 2 000 tonnes. The number fo backyard gardeners has grown The impact of food price inflation and along with the effects of the global economic Hurricane Omar in 2008 underscored the recession, which has reduced local employment vulnerability of Antigua and Barbuda’s food opportunities and incomes. The participant base system to external shocks. To strengthen the now includes religious organizations, community country’s food producing capacity, the Ministry groups, schools, para-military services and of Agriculture, Lands, Housing and the prisons. There is no class distinction among

essian M illes G in brief: ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA participants, who include lawyers, doctors, the production of seedlings, and grafting trees. Thanks to the National Backyard pilots, accountants, nurses, civil servants As well as promoting vegetable gardening, the Gardening Programme, almost and businessmen. But there is a clear gender Extension Division encourages poultry keeping in 10 percent of Antigua and dimension: home gardening is dominated by schools and apiculture in backyards. Barbuda’s population eat women, who outnumber male gardeners by more The National Food Production Plan and home-grown food. The target than 3 to 1. As regards family size, 55 percent the Backyard Gardening Programme have is to harvest 1 800 tonnes of of registrants have from one to three family considerably improved Antigua and Barbuda’s vegetables a year in citizens’ members, and 43 percent from four to six. Only food security. Vegetable production in rural areas backyards. 2 percent of the registrations came from families reached 3 200 tonnes in 2012, an increase of more of more than six persons. than 60 percent since 2008. Over that period, The gardens are used to grow traditional local urban and peri-urban production grew even more vegetables, such as eggplant, cucumbers, okra, rapidly, from 500 to 900 tonnes. thyme and chives, as well as tropical crops that Backyard gardens accounted for about are also imported, such as tomatoes, carrots, 280 tonnes, or 7 percent of the country’s sweet peppers, onions and cabbage. Most vegetable production. Another 620 tonnes came vegetables are consumed fresh, with little or from peri-urban vegetable growers who have no processing, although hot peppers are often expanded their acreages and, thanks to the use 1 In the capital, Saint John’s, from top-left, clockwise: Students of the Princess Margaret School show off poultry and eggs, produced in their chicken shed; one of sundried or refrigerated, okra and spinach are of improved seed, integrated pest management the city’s vegetable growers with celery that she sells at the public market; officials blanched, and fruit is processed into drinks. and packaging, are supplying lettuce, spinach help children start their own vegetable garden at the Mary E. Piggot Primary The amount fo land being used for backyard and other high-value crops to hotels and GROWING School; backyard horticulture along Fort , northern Saint John’s. GROWING GREENER gardening cannot be easily quantified. Most , and making high-volume sales in GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA gardens are very small, ranging from 1 to public markets. AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN 10 sq m, and many producers grow vegetables Home vegetable production is also seen as a CARIBBEAN in recycled containers of various shapes and food security bulwark in case of extreme weather 32 2 At the Hawksbill Bay hotel, the sizes. However, using an average productivity events. When Hurricane Earl struck Antigua in 33 ANTIGUA project held a display of locally grown coefficient, the Extension Division calculates August 2010, flooding “drowned” large fields of ANTIGUA AND pumpkin, cabbage, cassava and yam. 1 AND BARBUDA that urban and peri-urban gardening occupies a vegetables in rural areas and caused crop losses of BARBUDA land area equivalent to about 20 ha. around 20 percent. However, backyard production 2 Of the 2 500 households engaged in backyard was not significantly affected, since home gardens gardening, more than two-thirds consume are smaller in size, more intensively managed and most of what they grow, and give some away to quick to regenerate. friends, colleagues and neighbours. The main Backyard gardening is now so popular that the benefits are savings on food purchases, and government has designated 21 April the official improved household nutritional status. Around National Backyard Garden Day. Government 650 also use their gardens as a source of income, support to urban and peri-urban agriculture is by selling produce at local markets and shops. included in the National Food and Nutrition 3 Home production has also created jobs in the Security Policy, the National Poverty Reduction processing of produce into sauces, jams and jellies, Strategy, the National Economic and Social

km 10

3 An extensionist visits a backyard gardener who grows thyme, a favourite in Caribbean cuisine, on tables in the southern of Falmouth. Backyard gardens accounted for about 280 tonnes, or 7 percent of the country’s vegetable production Photographs: Owolabi Elabanjo (1,2), Julius Ross (3) /IPS

Zero hunger by 2015 n introduce improved production and post-harvest igital

Antigua and Barbuda’s backyard gardens play a key role D technologies. The country’s Bendal agricultural ian in an ambitious plan to achieve “zero hunger” in the Brow station needs upgrading in order to increase the Br nd

country by 2015. Launched in February 2013, the plan o mass production of seedlings for distribution. A takes up UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s Zero esm

Hunger Challenge, which calls for action to ensure, D supply of small tractors would also help larger- worldwide, 100 percent access to adequate food all year scale, peri-urban horticulture. round, zero stunting among children of less than two One of the major challenges to the years, 100 percent growth in small farmer productivity and income, the sustainability of all food systems, and programme’s sustainability is access to resources, zero loss or waste of food. especially for vulnerable families. While there are The plan, which was prepared jointly by the credit institutions that lend to farmers, borrowers Government of Antigua and Barbuda, FAO and four need , which low-income families have other UN and intergovernmental organizations, aims at eliminating hunger and extreme poverty in the island very little of. state within two years. Its strategy is to strengthen and There is also a eedn for community diversify the agriculture sector, improve the nutrition in the use of greywater on vegetables, which is and health status of the population, expand social not a common practice. Since water is a scarce protection, create employment and income generating opportunities for the poor, and ensure good governance and expensive resource in Antigua and Barbuda, A couple admire their home garden in Saint John’s of hunger and poverty programmes. t it is important to reduce growers’ dependency r backyard gardening is seen as a “critical element” on the domestic supply through small-scale

in increasing food availability at the household level. einha Transformation Plan and, most recently, the Zero greywater recycling. The plan is expanding the scale of the programme, M with special focus on women and youth. Community Hunger Challenge Plan of Action (see page 34). Because most of the crops grown in backyards GROWING facilitators are working with extension officers in six GROWING

GREENER lfgang The national Medical Benefit Scheme, with are consumed fresh, training is also needed in GREENER

CITIES IN LATIN backyard gardening demonstration centres, where o CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA W the assistance of the Ministry of Agriculture, food safety and in integrated pest management, AMERICA AND THE vulnerable households are trained in establishing AND THE CARIBBEAN backyard plots and the use of technologies such as drip has launched “Grow what you eat”, a school to eliminate the use of synthetic pesticide. In CARIBBEAN irrigation and microgardening. The plan also calls for gardening programme that is now active in four addition, there are problems in post-harvest starting vegetable gardens in Antigua and Barbuda’s primary schools. management and storage, which lead to high food 34 33 schools, and including produce from backyard and 35 ANTIGUA losses. ANTIGUA AND school gardens in the national school meals programme, AND BARBUDA which provides meals daily for 3 000 students. The government has set a target of producing Finally, creating networks of gardeners would BARBUDA at least 1 800 tonnes of vegetables annually help them to share experiences, technology and in citizens’ backyards. In order to do so, the information, and to organize group visits to see programme will need to be considerably expanded what others are doing and how to make home- and to draw on the lessons learned so far. level innovations more sustainable. Among Continued government support is crucial. priorities for future development, therefore, is the Backyard agriculture needs to be factored into formation of a backyard producers’ association, the national budget so that it is included in which would assist them in sourcing inputs and allocations made for the provision of services marketing output cooperatively. Farming areas have been depopulated as rural residents drift to the capital, Saint John’s (top). While Antigua and Barbuda is to agriculture as a whole. Funds are needed known as a yachtsman’s paradise, in 2007 some 28 percent of to increase the supply of material inputs, its population was indigent, poor or at risk of falling into poverty such as seed and irrigation systems, and to

Training is needed in integrated pest management to eliminate the use of synthetic pesticide O he ilot roject

T P P for Strengthening Urban AST R

and Peri-urban Agriculture and Food Security NT in the Central District – which comprises O

Tegucigalpa and its neighbouring sister city LAIF/C of Comayagüela – was the first of its kind in Honduras. Led by FAO and the district mayor’s office, its aim was to contribute to the food Honduras is among the 10 years. Almost half of the urban area security of people living in extreme poverty world’s poorest countries consists of informal settlements. Most of in urban and peri-urban areas. The project’s immediate target was to increase the daily and has one of the highest Tegucigalpa’s marginales are found consumption of fruit and vegetables, which was rates of urban poverty on very steep slopes, prone to , estimated at 110 g per capita, by installing and in the Latin America and lack even the most basic services. They maintaining community and family gardens. and Caribbean region. also suffer the highest rates. Four of TheUS$ 480 000 project was implemented in In 2010, almost 60 percent of the country’s those settlements were chosen in 2009 for three neighbourhoods in the eastern part of the 4 million city dwellers had incomes below a pioneering project to establish household city, Villanueva, Los Pinos and Nueva Suyapa Built on steep hillsides, Tegucigalpa’s informal settlements are the national poverty line. The capital, gardens. The project’s impact has been far- (work in a fourth neighbourhood, Monte de los prone to landslides, and lack basic services, such as piped Olivos, had to be abandoned owing to the threat drinking water, sewage and schools Tegucigalpa, is emblematic of the country’s reaching – in improving food and nutrition of gang ). urban development challenges. Since 1970, security, strengthening communities, and The three neighbourhoods have many families must collect and store their water supply GROWING GROWING GREENER the population has increased fivefold, from helping to shape public policy on urban similarities. Both Nueva Suyapa and the nearby in containers, barrels and tanks. Soils are of poor GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA 220 000 to an estimated 1.2 million, and development. settlement of Villanueva were established to quality and many families do not have sufficient AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN is expected to exceed 1.7 million within people displaced by hurricanes and other space to grow food near their homes. Another CARIBBEAN natural disasters, and have grown, with rural- common problem is pervasive insecurity – gangs 36 urban migration, into communities with a total regularly conduct “war tax” collections, extorting 37 TEGUCIGALPA population of 42 000. Los Pinos began with a money from residents and business owners. TEGUCIGALPA land invasion in the 1980s and its population has But, amid the daily hardships of life in Nueva grown to 10 000 with the arrival of settlers from Suyapa, Villanueva and Los Pinos, there was one the countryside and people who lost their homes beacon of hope: the high level of solidarity and in landslides in other parts of Tegucigalpa. community participation among women, which More than half of the area’s adults have no was to be one of the key factors in the success of formal jobs and, among the poorest households, the gardening project. average income from informal employment A baseline study had found that 72 percent of amounts to US$6 a day. Around US$3.60 is spent households in the three neighbourhoods were on food. Thebarrios lack basic services, such as headed by women. Many women had had their piped drinking water, sewerage and schools. Water first child at the age of 15, and were the sole is available from the municipal network only providers for households which, on average, once a month for three hours, which means that numbered five people, including children and vo a Br mas S/To R EUTE R in brief: TEGUCIGALPA the elderly. Among the minority of married participants were trained in the use of a variety women, many reported that their husbands “did of home gardening practices and technologies A project introduced high- 1 Harvesting lettuce yielding – but low-cost from a backyard garden not work” or were absent, having emigrated or – bed preparation, vermicomposting, seedling – gardening in some of in Monte de los Olivos. having found seasonal jobs outside the city. A production, micro-gardening in containers, Tegucigalpa’s poorest barrios. Families participating large number, especially in Nueva Suyapa, had hydroponics and integrated pest control – for the in the project grew Result: bumper harvests of more than half of the separated from husbands or partners. production of fruit, vegetables and other crops. radish, coriander and lettuce, and fresh vegetables they For many of the women, a typical day started Training was held once a week, with big savings on family food bills. consumed. at 4 a.m., when they began preparing tortillas to courses divided into eight modules conducted sell from door to door during the day, for US$0.25 over a period of two months. Trainers used a each. Some women had temporary “government “learning by doing” approach, plus a manual jobs” sweeping the or cutting grass, for on home gardening prepared by an FAO project which they earned around US$110 a month. After among vulnerable communities in Colombia. cleaning the house and supervising children’s They stressed the importance of diversifying homework, their typical day ended at 9 p.m., production and of consuming garden produce in after preparing and serving dinner. the home. Nevertheless, a high proportion of the women Since participants in the training sessions had found time for ​​voluntary and community work, different levels of competence in agriculture, the usually with churches and civic organizations. DTCs served as showcases that allowed them Their primary motivation: que la gente tiene to choose technologies most suited to their mucha necesidad (“that people have many capacities and needs. The practical knowledge of GROWING GROWING GREENER needs”). In Nueva Suyapa, for example, women rural people who had settled in the area made a GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA host foreign volunteers, who visit each year to great contribution to the training process. AMERICA AND THE In Villanueva, many women use AND THE CARIBBEAN 2 assist in community projects and teach orphaned In the project’s second phase, the participants CARIBBEAN old tyres filled with gravel to purify children. In Villanueva, some women support applied what they had learned by establishing kitchen greywater, and re-use it on their gardens. children with after-school coaching. their own home gardens, with technical experts 38 1 39 TEGUCIGALPA It was women such as those – poor, under- following progress and providing guidance. The TEGUCIGALPA 4 employed, but interested in the initiative – who objective was to establish gardens with at least 2 made up the vast majority of the 1 220 people five vegetables, of different colours, that would 3 who volunteered to join the gardening project. satisfy the minimum nutritional requirements of More than half were women aged 20 to 39 years; the households. more than 40 percent were aged from 40 to In the third and final phase, each trained 60. When the project began, 70 percent of the participant received inputs of seed and a barrel 3 A table garden made from participants did not grow anything around their or tank for storing water. Those inputs were not discarded building materials in Los homes, but said they were willing to learn. provided free of charge: the home gardeners Pinos. The tables are filled with good km 10 were required to deposit 50 percent of their value quality soil. Learning took place in demonstration training in a fund – known as a caja urbana, or “urban centres (DTCs) which the project established box” – designed to serve as a source of credit for in each of the three neighbourhoods. There, the future purchase of inputs. Each participant

4 At left, project participants learn good horticultural practices at the Nueva Suyapa demonstration training centre. Because soil quality is more easily enhanced in small spaces, they used various containers to optimize production. At The practical knowledge of rural people who had settled right, for example, women make hanging tubes – dubbed “sausages” and “canoes” – from plastic sheeting. in the area made a great contribution to the training process Photographs: Karla Andino López z From school garden paid around US$60 for a water tank and US$16 By the end of the project in December 2011, pe

to microenterprise for a barrel. more than 1 200 people had been trained in o Lo

In the barrio of Cerro Grande, in Tegucigalpa’s sister The project approach was to promote low-cost gardening, food security and nutrition. They ndin gardening technologies that were suited to the had also participated in workshops on food A city of Comayagüela, a local heard la r

about the gardening project and requested assistance a

local soil and climate, were easy to implement, preparation, where they learned new ways of K in starting up their own school garden. The project and used local inputs. In Tegucigalpa, the project preparing and consuming vegetables. (One of the trained teachers to train students, and installed a water storage tank, an irrigation system and a greenhouse for tested various solutions to two major constraints project outputs was an “urban garden cookbook” producing seedlings. to production: the lack of water and the poor developed by the gardeners from an exchange of The students now not only grow fruit, vegetables and quality of soil. recipes during the workshops.) herbs in their garden, but process and sell their produce Several technologies were proposed to Follow-up studies found that almost as pickles, jams, sweets and fortified tortillas to relatives and in the local community. There has also been a overcome water shortages: drip irrigation 90 percent of the people trained had established positive “multiplier effect” – some 40 families of Cerro using disposable containers, applying mulch gardens and were growing at least six basic crops Grande No. 2 school students have started up their to conserve , and using greywater – radish, coriander, lettuce, beetroot, carrot and own backyard gardens. that had been filtered with a system made from cucumber. Many had started planting other e

rr recycled tyres filled with charcoal and gravel. The vegetables, such as tomatoes, spinach, hibiscus, filters remove from the greywater soap and fats squash, bell peppers and basil. Another popular z aldassa derived from washing dishes, cleaning clothes crop was cassava, which is well adapted to local pe B and taking baths, making it safe to use on the soil and climatic conditions and requires low gardens. The system was widely adopted in maintenance. Some family gardens were found o Lo Vanessa Villanueva and Los Pinos thanks to its low cost to contain up to 30 different species of fruit trees, ndin GROWING A GROWING la

GREENER (around US$25), and the good quality of the water vegetables and medicinal plants. r GREENER a

CITIES IN LATIN K CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA after filtering. The project also assisted in the More than half of vegetables consumed by AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN construction of 300-litre wells made from tyres the families participating in the project came CARIBBEAN and used to store filtered greywater or rainwater. from their own gardens. Furthermore, the 40 Because soil quality is more easily enhanced average family had increased its daily per capita 41 TEGUCIGALPA in small spaces, various containers were used to consumption of fruit and vegetables from 110 g at TEGUCIGALPA optimize production. They included hanging the beginning of the project to 260 g. tubes, dubbed “sausages” and “canoes”, made After monitoring the prices of vegetables in from plastic sheeting, and baskets, plastic local shops and markets, the project estimated bottles and fruit juice cartons. For 80 percent of that the value of the gardens’ contribution to the participants, the preferred containers for growing typical family diet ranged from US$20 to US$36 a crops were old tyres, which they found more month. Some home gardens produced a surplus productive and easier to irrigate. The project that women shared with relatives and neighbours encouraged the cultivation of fruit as well as or sold through shops. Home production had also vegetables. It provided 285 avocado, guava, lemon reduced many married women’s dependence on and mango trees, which participants planted their husbands for the money needed to buy food. The active participation of women was one of the key factors in Students at Cerro Grande No. 2 school have fun while pumping around their homes. Including household members, the increase in the success of the FAO gardening project in Tegucigalpa water to their garden’s irrigation system fruit and vegetable consumption and income had

Family gardens contained up to 30 different species of fruit trees, vegetables and medicinal plants benefited more than 6 000 people, more than 50 percent of the value of inputs into the To build up capital, the gardeners deposited All cajas require members to deposit monthly 10 percent of the total population of the three fund. Urban boxes were created in all three income from the sale of vegetables, seedlings savings – usually of at least US$1 – and some neighbourhoods, at a cost to the project of US$80 neighbourhoods under the guidance of project and snacks, and organized fund-raising activities exclude members who fail to save. Interest on per head. staff, who advised on the formation of their such as raffles. The banks provide loans to savings accounts is 12 percent a year, which has boards of directors and the drafting of their members and neighbours, ranging from US$15 helped many women build up readily available From the outset, the gardening project sought regulations. In all, nine banks with a total to US$100, that are used to buy equipment and cash reserves. At the end of each year, members to promote strong community participation. membership of 200 were formed, with the aim inputs for home gardens or raw materials for collect half of the interest and return half to the It identified key leaders and actors in each of offering financial services to members and microenterprises (for example, ingredients for bank as capital for further investment. community and involved them in project neighbours. making tortillas, tamales and enchiladas). The In 2013, the four banks held a total capital of activities. Many later became facilitators, Two years after the end of the project, four banks are also a source of cash that can be used more than US$4 000. A recent evaluation found encouraging others to take up gardening. Project are still operating: “Blessing of God” and to buy medicines when family members fall sick. that, through the banks, the gardening women staff also organized visits by participants to “Women struggling for a new dawn” in Nueva Interest rates are 3 percent for members and have been able to discover their own capabilities, gardens in other neighbourhoods so they could Suyapa, “Planting hope” in Villanueva and 5 percent for neighbours, far lower than rates assert economic independence from husbands share ideas and technologies. “United development partners” in Los Pinos. of commercial banks, NGOs and moneylenders, and partners, and win the respect of their Throughout the process, the women of Nueva As the names suggest, all attribute their success which start at 12 percent. neighbours and children. Suyapa, Villanueva and Los Pinos formed and sustainability to “good organization and new friendships that have strengthened their ” and the trust that exists among The impact of Tegucigalpa’s urban gardening Gardening women have won economic independence communities and led them to join together their members. and the respect of their neighbours and children project has been felt beyond Nueva Suyapa,

in other social and economic activities. In z Villanueva and Los Pinos. It also influenced Villanueva, for example, six gardeners formed pe the decision of the Government of Honduras,

GROWING o Lo GROWING GREENER a group, “Among women”, which has obtained in 2011, to extend its National Programme for GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA a US$100 loan for their small clothes-making ndin Sustainable Rural Development to urban areas, AMERICA AND THE A AND THE business. la for the benefit of vulnerable urban populations. CARIBBEAN r CARIBBEAN a

But the most important community K The programme, which is led by the Ministry of 42 development innovation to emerge from the Agriculture and Livestock, is now a key part of 43 TEGUCIGALPA project are the cajas urbanas, the self-managed the country’s National Vision 2010-2038, which TEGUCIGALPA credit and savings funds. The idea was an calls for the eradication of hunger and extreme adaptation of rural banks, which had been poverty, massive job creation and the sustainable established in rural areas of Honduras by an FAO use of natural resources. food security project. Farmers were required to Among the Ministry’s priorities: to promote deposit part of the proceeds from the sales of food security through participatory projects with produce to form the initial capital of the bank. urban communities, and to improve their access In the Tegucigalpa gardens project, to financial resources by expanding the rural participants were asked instead to pay at least banks programme to urban areas. When it , it pours in Nicaragua. After training, participants received a basic Almost all of the country’s annual rainfall is toolkit consisting of a shovel, a pick and a recorded between May and November, while wheelbarrow to use in establishing their home much of the dry season, from December to April, gardens, and a set of weeders, rakes and drills for is practically rainless. That presented a challenge gardening operations. The demonstration centres to a project aimed at introducing backyard were also a source of vegetable seedlings for gardening in Managua’s Los Laureles Sur district planting, and of technical advice, when needed. Among Central American countries, food and reducing levels of poverty, but as and in the municipality of Ciudad Sandino. The project technical staff spent two days a week Nicaragua has made the firmest commitment fundamental to its policies for developing the Los Laureles Sur has both urban and peri- working in the training centres and four days urban areas and was chosen because of its high providing direct advice to gardeners at their to urban and peri-urban agriculture. The family economy and for achieving national rates of food insecurity and malnutrition. A homes. expansion of Upa is a key strategy in its food security and food sovereignty. The plan census of first-year primary school children had Around 75 percent of the 430 people who national development plan for 2012-2016, is to establish home gardens and community found that 17 percent were affected by moderate joined the project were women, usually and a recently launched seed banks, provide urban food producers to severe stunting. Ciudad Sandino, located household heads who were motivated by government programme with training, access to inputs and assistance west of the capital, has a population of around the desire to improve the nutrition of their aims at establishing in marketing their produce, and to develop 90 000 and is predominantly urban and poor, families. In many households, all members 250 000 home gardens in irrigation technologies to overcome seasonal with most residents living on less than US$2 a of the family participated in the day. Households in both areas were consuming garden, or building containers and preparing cities around the country. water scarcities. Much of the groundwork less than 60 g of fruit and vegetables per substrates for microgardening. Some project By recent estimates, for that forward-looking national policy capita per day, or barely 15 percent of the level participants turned their own gardens into mini GROWING GROWING GREENER more than a quarter of urban Nicaraguans and the home gardening programme was recommended by FAO and WHO. demonstration centres, where still today many GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA live below the national poverty line. The laid by a project that began in 2010 in two The project, which was funded by Spain and provide training for neighbours. AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN government sees Upa not only as a means of Managua’s poorest and most densely implemented by FAO in partnership with the To enable year-round cultivation of vegetables, CARIBBEAN of improving the urban poor’s access to populated areas. Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and the city it was necessary to find a reliable source of water 44 halls of Managua and Ciudad Sandino, invited for use during the six-month dry season. But 45 MANAGUA local residents to sign up for courses in organic in both Los Laureles Sur and Ciudad Sandino, MANAGUA gardening at demonstration and training centres streams that cause flooding during the wet season (DTCs) created on municipal land in the two dry up during the dry months. Using the city’s project areas. piped water supply to grow vegetables was also Each centre is divided into two zones: one for out of the question: few houses had connections gardens and displays of gardening technologies, to the network and, in any case, due to high rates including vermiculture and biofertilizer units, of leakage and wastage, water in Managua is greenhouses for seedlings and water storage heavily rationed. Some neighbourhoods receive tanks; the other with a training area, offices service for only two hours a day. And nearby and tools and equipment. Training modules Lake Managua is so polluted from decades covered soil preparation, seeding, agro-ecological of untreated sewage discharge that it will be management of pests and diseases, irrigation decades before a recently built treatment plant technologies and management, and food safety. renders it suitable for use in irrigation. hn S. Kro n o aak H o ill

in brief: MANAGUA To water the backyard gardens, therefore, the r project tapped the city’s most reliable source of u

Managua residents learned M o d eco-friendly gardening practices clean, plentiful water – those wet season rains. r

in training centres, and then It did so by installing in the homes of all project dua E applied them in their own participants a rooftop system with the capacity backyards. Thanks to year- 1 for capturing and storing some 10 000 litres of round production, many families rainwater per year. doubled their consumption of The project calculated that harvesting enough vegetables. rainwater for a family vegetable garden required a roof area of at least 10 sq m. Each family received 2 a 5 000 litre storage tank connected to a plastic pipe that channels rainwater to the tank from the roof. The pipe has a T-coupling to allow water from the first rains of the wet season to be drained off (that water is likely to contain dust The project provided 430 rainwater harvesting systems, each linked to a 5 000 litre storage tank and the wastes of domestic animals and birds that have accumulated on the roof). The cylindrical storage tanks, which measure centres in Los Laureles Sur and Ciudad Sandino from 1.6 m to 2.5 m in height and width, were achieved in 2012 total production of more than km 10 made by a in Managua from two 1.5 tonnes of vegetables, mainly tomatoes, carrots GROWING GROWING GREENER reinforced layers of high-tech plastic resin. The and eggplant. Applying what they learned in GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA outer layer is coloured black to block the sun’s the DTCs, project participants grew in their own AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN rays and prevent the formation of algae, while the gardens tomatoes, sweet peppers, onions, lettuce, CARIBBEAN inner layer is composed of a white antibacterial chard, radish, spinach, beets, eggplant, squash, 46 polymer. A tap at of the tank is celery, cucumbers, green beans and sweet potato, 47 MANAGUA connected to a hose or used to fill watering and herbs such as mint, parsley and basil. MANAGUA cans. The tanks, which cost the project S$U 580 In all, the project invested some US$620 000 each, including pipes, filters and installation, are in training, infrastructure, water harvesting 1 At the training centre established recyclable and have a useful life of 10 years. systems, and the establishment of the in Ciudad Sandino (at right), the Since each tank can be filled two times or demonstration gardens and training centres. An project demonstrated a simple drip more during the wet season, the 430 tanks evaluation in 2012 found a high rate of adoption irrigation system made from recycled plastic bottles. Above, lettuce is installed by the project are able to capture in a among Managua’s urban gardeners of low-cost, being grown in space-saving plastic year a total of 4.3 million litres of water, which resource-conserving and environmentally friendly tubes. The project also promoted the is no longer lost as runoff but used instead to production technologies and practices. use of organic fertilizer made from grow vegetables and to help recharge the city’s Growers were using drip irrigation from household wastes, and pest control with sticky traps. aquifers. recycled plastic bottles, and applying mulch Using rainwater harvesting tanks and drip made from grass and straw to conserve soil irrigation systems (see page 48), the training moisture. They enriched the soil of their plots

2 Used bottles (left) form the perimeter of a garden at the Los Laureles Sur training centre. Some project participants turned their gardens into colourful, mini demonstration centres (above), where they provide training for their neighbours. At right, project officials visit a family garden. Harvesting rainwater for a family vegetable garden required a roof area of at least 10 sq m Photographs: Eduardo Murillo Drip irrigation made easy and microgardens with compost, manure and nutrition of an estimated 2 500 family members, include urban and peri-urban agriculture in its To optimize the use of harvested rainwater, the project an organic fertilizer made by anaerobically but also saved them money that they would have National Human Development Plan (NHDP) for devised a low-cost drip irrigation system. Constructing fermenting household wastes, and sowed certified otherwise spent on buying food. While most 2012-2016, and to launch a US$3 million “healthy the system requires very simple equipment: discarded plastic soft-drink bottles and lids, a three-inch nail, seed of locally recommended varieties. To control households produced only a “relatively modest backyard” programme to encourage urban food a hammer, a sharp knife, and plastic drippers used in pests and diseases, they applied lime and ashes to surplus”, 17 percent of those in Ciudad Sandino production. micro-irrigation systems. the soil before sowing, and to leaves during crop and 10 percent of those in Los Laureles Sur TheN HDP reaffirms the government’s first The nail is used to punch a hole in the lid, which is growth. To combat whiteflies, they grew grass were able to generate income from the sale of priority: to ensure that all Nicaraguan families, fitted with a dripper and screwed onto the bottle. An incision is then made in the bottom of the bottle so around their gardens and set sticky traps vegetables to neighbours and in local markets. especially the poor, have access to sufficient, it can be filled with water through a funnel (removing that used cooking oil as glue. The project also helped the Ministry of nutritious, healthy and safe food. As part of its the bottom of the bottles is not advised because they The evaluation also found that the average Education develop microgardening in containers strategy to achieve food security and sovereignty, quickly become clogged with dust and debris). The bottles can be mounted in the garden on 30 cm-high consumption of vegetables in gardening families in 10 schools. After training, some 2 000 the plan seeks to increase the production, wooden poles, or attached to hanging baskets and other had increased by 60 percent, reaching around students began cultivating crops such as cabbage, productivity and incomes of farming families, containers used in microgardening. 100 g per person per day. The most dramatic lettuce, tomatoes and peppers in tyres, bottles communities and cooperatives. Explicitly

o improvement was in the Israel Galeano barrio of and even old television sets. The project printed included among small and medium food ill

r Los Laureles Sur, where consumption increased 1 500 manuals on establishing school gardens and producers are those in urban areas. u by more than 160 percent. used them in short courses for 17 other schools in The backyard gardening programme, which o M o d

r To encourage home gardeners to diversify Managua. is implemented by the recently created Ministry

dua production and consume more fruit and of the Family, Community, Cooperative and E vegetables – and encourage their neighbours to The success of the Managua gardening project Associative Economy, promotes healthy food do the same – the Managua project organized prompted the Government of Nicaragua to production among urban and peri-urban GROWING GROWING GREENER food fairs, where visitors sampled a variety of households, using appropriate technologies and GREENER CITIES IN LATIN A trader at Managua’s Mayoreo fruit and vegetable market. CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA dishes made from fresh, home-grown produce. Many gardeners earn income by selling vegetables to with the participation of families, young people AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN Home gardening has not only improved the neighbours and in local markets and public institutions. CARIBBEAN The Ministry has trained 13 000 youth workers alma 48 P to help participants in the programme and, 49

MANAGUA aul with FAO assistance, is establishing a total of 13 MANAGUA /S

The amount of water released is regulated by O nurseries in Managua and in provincial capitals adjusting the bottle’s position from vertical to FA 45 degrees, or by inserting a sponge in the neck. for the production of seedlings and for use as The size of the irrigation bottles is adjusted as the training centres. crop grows. A 1.5-litre bottle of water is sufficient to The Ministry reports that since the meet the daily needs of a tomato or bell pepper plant programme was launched in Managua’s Nueva for 20 days after transplanting. It is then replaced with a 2-litre bottle and, after 35 days, by a 3-litre bottle. Nicaragua barrio in May 2012, it has helped When flowering and fruiting begins, irrigation – and more than 76 000 households establish gardens bottle size – is reduced. of fruit trees, leafy vegetables, spices and local And one last piece of advice from the Managua plants such as malanga, chayote and achiote. project team: wash the bottles well before using them in the garden: sugar residues attract ants that can damage The target for 2013-2014 is to create a further your crops. 120 500 gardens in all of the country’s provinces, including 60 000 in Managua alone. In April 2000, Ecuador’s political and families. Yet Quito’s urban agriculture was economic capital hosted a meeting of unrecognized in municipal regulations, only local government representatives from “tolerated” by planners, and not considered nine countries of Latin America and the in the programmes of the country’s Ministry Caribbean. The outcome was the landmark of Agriculture. Much – but not all – of Quito Declaration, the first to call on the that has changed over the past 14 years. region’s cities “to embrace urban agriculture” Thanks to a city-wide as a means of reducing poverty, food participatory urban insecurity and environmental degradation. agriculture project, Quito At the time, food production was widespread is one of the region’s in Quito itself. Between 1980 and 2000, “greener” capitals, with waves of Andean indigenous migrants had 140 community vegetable almost doubled its population, from 780 000 gardens, hundreds of family and institutional to 1.4 million. In inner-city barrios and gardens, thriving small-scale , settlements built on surrounding hillsides and a network of farmers’ markets that sell and ravines, many of them had resorted locally grown organic produce. It all began in to small-scale agriculture to feed their the neighbourhood of El Panecillo.

GROWING GROWING GREENER GREENER CITIES IN LATIN l anecillo CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA E P (pictured at left) is a loaf-shaped used to develop a municipal programme aimed AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN hill 200 m high in Quito’s historic centre. Most at improving the food security of vulnerable CARIBBEAN of El Panecillo cannot be built on, owing to its populations in Quito’s urban, peri-urban and 50 steep slopes, and the surrounding area is home to rural areas. That programme, the Participatory 51 QUITO some 1 900 low-income families, including many Urban Agriculture Project (AGRUPAR), was QUITO internal migrants. launched in 2002, and was initially managed It was there that a pilot programme, launched by the city’s Directorate for Sustainable in September 2000 and co-funded by the Human Development. Since 2005, it has been municipality and international partners, helped implemented by the municipality’s Economic to increase food production in home gardens, Development Agency, Conquito, whose mandate promoted the recycling and re-use of organic is to create an entrepreneurial, sustainable and wastes, and established a community plant innovative city that generates employment and nursery. It also developed a microcredit system distributes wealth equitably. and implemented four projects – designed Today, AGRUPAR is one of Conquito’s most with community participation – for produce successful initiatives. It brings together some processing and marketing. 12 250 urban and peri-urban farmers and 380 The lessons learned in El Panecillo were community-based organizations, supported by eisch M laude C in brief: QUITO local and national government departments, The Quito government’s urban universities, development cooperation agencies agriculture programme provides and NGOs, and the private sector. Its primary residents of the city’s 32 focus is on enhancing food security and urban parishes with seeds and promoting food processing, access to microcredit, seedlings, inputs and equipment, microenterprise management and marketing. management training, and AGRUPAR is operational in all eight poultry, guinea pigs and bees. administrative zones of the Metropolitan District of Quito. Agriculture is practised by community groups, families and schools, in centres for the 1 In Itchimbía parish, central Quito, there is space for raising chickens and growing tomatoes. Many people take up agriculture in order to save money on elderly, single mothers, abandoned children, food purchases. migrants and refugees, in social rehabilitation and health centres, in centres for the disabled 5 At a school in Chillogallo, in southwest Quito, children grow their own vegetables in a plot they named and in religious communities. At last count, the “Gardenland”. project had helped establish 1 072 active gardens – including 140 community gardens, more than 800 family gardens, and 128 gardens in schools and other institutions – as well as 314 livestock production units. Annual food crop production is estimated at 400 tonnes. GROWING GROWING GREENER A demonstration garden and Project participants include rural people GREENER CITIES IN LATIN 2 CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA greenhouse created by the AGRUPAR who have migrated to the city and for whom AMERICA AND THE project in Chimbacalle, in the city AND THE CARIBBEAN gardening and raising animals is a means of CARIBBEAN centre. surviving in an often hostile environment, and 52 maintaining their rural roots and traditional 53 QUITO knowledge. Many others are underemployed QUITO workers who take up agriculture in order to save money on food purchases and make extra income 6 Customers at one of the city’s 14 organic produce markets, in Quitumbe, see “where their money goes” from the sale of surpluses. Around 86 percent of 1 and how it benefits urban farming families. participants are women. The average income of households joining 2 the project is around US$350 per month, well 3 Cabbage, carrots and lettuce 3 grown in urban gardens provide below the minimum needed to feed a household, healthy food for children. which is set at US$600. Most participants have 4 completed only primary school. 5 Joining AGRUPAR usually requires the formation of a group of at least six people 6 – friends, relatives, neighbours or residents

7

4 The roadside Eugenio Espejo community garden produces beets, chives, lettuce and flowers. km 10 7 A family greenhouse in Turubamba parish, southern Quito. In 2013, around 100 micro-greenhouses had been set up in the city.

Photographs: AGRUPAR R Farmer meets consumer UPA to the AGRUPAR project – some US$250 000 maintaining with compost and green R

AG a year – meets the cost of training, technical manure, rotating crops, protecting soil with at bioferias advice and logistics. It also covers part of cover crops and live barriers, and irrigating with A notable AGRUPAR innovation has been the opening the costs of seed, inputs and equipment, and potable water or harvested rainwater. Animal of organic produce markets – or bioferias – that have animals such as poultry, guinea pigs and bees. husbandry is promoted as a source of income, become sources of healthy food for Quito residents and a practical example of Ecuador’s solidarity economy. However, while Quito’s city government remains protein and manure. The city now has 14 one-day bioferias, open weekly the main source of funding, around half of Where little land is available for horticulture, between Thursday and Sunday. investment in productive infrastructure – such as AGRUPAR promotes alternatives such as vertical To ensure the widest possible availability and micro-greenhouses and small sheds for animal gardens on walls, and microgardening in recycled consumption of organic food produced in urban gardens, bioferias are located in low-income husbandry – comes from participants. containers, such as bottles, boxes and tyres, neighbourhoods and peri-urban zones, as well as in The project actively promotes production which permits food production on terraces, better-off parts of the city. that meets Ecuador’s standards for organic balconies and patios. Direct sale of produce through the markets encourages fair prices and creates a high level of trust agriculture, which require holistic production The project estimates that about 47 percent of between producers and their customers. Gardeners systems that enhance biodiversity, biological garden produce is sold; the rest is kept for home get to know the people who buy their produce, while cycles and soil health, prohibit the use of GMOs, consumption. Participants earn at least US$55 consumers see “where their money goes” and how it and control pests without chemicals. The a month from the sale of surpluses and make a benefits urban farming families. in 2012, the bioferias of Quito sold more than AGRUPAR project is registered as a producer and further saving of at least US$72 a month on food 100 tonnes of organic produce (valued at US$176 000), Residents of the Valle de los Chillos, a peri-urban area east of marketer of organic produce at national level and purchases. Total savings are 2.5 times the value of Quito, have started community gardens with assistance from which amounts to one quarter of the project’s total the AGRUPAR project shares the cost of certification with producers. the government’s human development voucher, estimated garden production.

More than 90 percent of gardens are less than which provides US$50 a month to vulnerable R GROWING GROWING

GREENER of institutions – who apply for assistance in 500 sq m in size, and a little over half are less households. UPA GREENER R CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA establishing their garden. They need to have than 100 sq m. The cost fo establishing a basic Urban agriculture has helped diversify the diet AG AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN enough space for an in-ground plot or for 100 sq m urban garden for organic production is of urban farmers and their families. Surveys have CARIBBEAN microgardening, access to clean water, and the around US$80, including tools, seed, fertilizer, identified in family diets more than 100 types 54 commitment and spare time (at least 12 hours a fencing and access to water. Incorporating of fresh and processed products, including 55 QUITO week) needed to care for their crops. drip irrigation and a micro-greenhouse costs vegetables, herbs, roots and grasses, flour and QUITO The staff ofGR A UPAR then provide seeds an additional US$480. By 2013, drip irrigation canned meat. AGRUPAR has worked closely with and seedlings, conduct technical training on systems had been installed in 70 gardens, a research centre to identify and disseminate agricultural production, and help to develop and growers were using around 100 micro- potato varieties that are better adapted to urban participants’ management skills. People who greenhouses. conditions and have high levels of zinc and iron. maintain an active garden can access further Among the environmental benefits of urban training in nutrition, food processing and Crops grown in the city’s huertas range from agriculture is the conservation of biodiversity marketing, and the breeding of animals. potatoes, maize and quinoa to vegetables – – some 50 edible plant species are maintained Between 2004 and 2012, the project provided mainly swiss chard, broccoli, cabbage, tomatoes in Quito’s urban gardens. In addition, each training for more than 7 350 people. Services and carrots – as well as aromatic plants, spices, gardening family recycles on average 12.5 kg are provided under a symbolic pricing policy, and fruit such as lemons, passion fruit, babaco of kitchen scraps per week as compost. An with each training session costing US$0.50 per and blackberries. Gardeners are encouraged to estimated 1 820 tonnes of organic wastes An organic produce market at La Carolina park, in the north of person. The municipality’s annual contribution use environmentally friendly cultivation practices: are recycled each year by AGRUPAR project urban Quito

Among the benefits of urban agriculture is the conservation of biodiversity participants. The increased availability of fresh to establish 35 grassroots investment societies, to participation by urban farmers themselves in the needs to become a key element in other produce also means less need to transport it from which members each contribute between US$10 provision of labour, land, materials, tools, seeds, municipal programmes for education, health, rural areas, which generates fuel savings and and US$20 in start-up capital. Thanks to the high seedlings, inputs and basic infrastructure. environmental protection and social inclusion. reduces air . profitability of the sale of organic vegetables, the Since an estimated 30 percent of urban Quito AGRUPAR could also serve as a model for similar producers have built up savings that they invest in is vacant land, development of agriculture in the programmes in other cities, and the basis for a As urban food producers achieve household greenhouses, irrigation systems and livestock. city will also require a review of its cadastre to national policy and programme for UPA. food security, AGRUPAR encourages them to form Market opportunities are also emerging with identify municipal areas that could be allocated Yet, 14 years after the seeds of the programme microenterprises based on horticulture, animal Ecuador’s “inclusive business” movement, which for agricultural use, and measures to extend the were sown in El Panecillo, agriculture in husbandry, food processing and the production encourages large businesses to link up with small- of urban space to producers. Quito still lacks a regulatory framework that of organic inputs, and trains them in business scale suppliers, such as farmer organizations, would recognize urban farmers as legitimate planning, marketing, and accounting. provided their produce meets quality standards, Quito’s experience has shown that intensive stakeholders in the city’s social and economic In fact, adding value to surplus production is delivered on time and is accompanied by an agriculture is feasible in an urban environment, development, and allocate vacant urban land for has recently become one of the most innovative invoice. But those opportunities present many and that it helps reduce malnutrition in poor food production. features of Quito’s urban agriculture, generating urban farmers with a dilemma: entering profitable households, strengthens household food security While Quito’s Development Plan, 2012- revenue and providing full- or part-time value chains creates tax obligations and could and generates employment and income. 2022, calls for an equitable, sustainable and employment for half of the project participants. mean the loss of the government’s monthly For the municipal government, AGRUPAR is a participatory city – and envisages a “green Quito” Through community organizations, urban human development voucher. flagship project of its social inclusion policy and that would improve environmental quality and farmers have entered various links in the value Future development of UPA in Quito will see its vision of competitive economic development. help to mitigate the effects of climate change – it chain, not only as primary producers but also as an increasing focus on sustainable intensification The project’s expertise has been used to help makes no specific mention of urban agriculture, intermediate or final processors of products such and the use of more productive technologies. establish school gardens in support of the or even huertas. GROWING GROWING GREENER as meat, canned goods, dairy foods and snacks. With greater diversification and quality municipality’s programme for “healthy schools”, Continuing constraints to UPA development in GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA Many farmers now supply certified organic certification, marketing options will expand and the Ministry of Agriculture recently Quito reflect the absence of policy and financial AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN chili and tomato paste to local food processing beyond farmers’ markets to supermarkets and partnered with AGRUPAR in implementing the support from the national level. In Ecuador, CARIBBEAN companies, and free-range chicken meat to specialized outlets. national nutrition strategy in areas with high agricultural development programmes focus 56 restaurants. Certified organic vegetables, such as Increasing the area covered by the project will levels of child malnutrition. on rural areas. It is difficult for urban farmers 57 QUITO carrots, radishes, beetroot, lettuce and broccoli, require not only greater support from local and Given Quito’s current poverty rate of in Quito to register their associations, which QUITO are sold through farmers’ markets (see page 55). international partners, but also a higher level of 27 percent – and projections that the city’s restricts their access to land, since municipal land Farmers’ associations offer home delivery of Where it all began. Local residents still harvest lettuce population will grow from the current 2.2 million is granted only to legally recognized entities. organic food baskets, which contain vegetables, on El Panecillo to more than 2.8 million by 2022 – agriculture There are no specialized services to provide them fruit, herbs, pickles, jams and bread. R with technical advice or credit and they are UPA To help producers meet food quality and safety R excluded from national programmes for input standards, AGRUPAR has introduced improved AG supply and the regularization of land tenure. processing technologies and the use of containers, For that reason, the project has proposed the packaging and labels, and facilitated access to inclusion of urban and peri-urban agriculture in higher-volume markets, such as private and public Ecuador’s food sovereignty law, adopted in 2009, institutions. which establishes the legal obligation of the State For those urban famers who lack the capital to ensure that individuals, communities and to invest in micro-enterprises, the project helped peoples achieve food self-sufficiency. Intensive agriculture was the foundation Although an estimated 17.5 percent of Lima’s of the civilizations that emerged on Peru’s arid residents – or more than 1.5 million people – are central coast 7 000 years ago. The abundant poor, the living conditions of many more have of the Rímac River and the rivers of improved remarkably in recent years. Since Chillón to the north and Lurín in the south – 2000, Peru has had one of the region’s fastest along with the region’s shallow water table, its growing economies, and 60 percent of the fertile valley soils and stable climate – favoured capital’s population is now considered “middle Rising at an altitude of 5 200 m in the at the rate of almost 200 000 a year, Lima the irrigated production of cotton, maize, beans, class”. Economic growth and higher incomes Peruvian Andes, the River Rímac carves a has become increasingly vulnerable to sweet potatoes and vegetables throughout the have fuelled the buying up of year. In the early , agricultural land for housing, industry and infrastructure, while path of 200 km down to the coastal , , which will be aggravated in what is today the metropolitan area of Lima urban land prices have soared (according to one through the city of Lima and into the Pacific by climate change. Meanwhile, rising totalled some 600 sq km. report, the average price of land for new office Ocean. The Rímac is the lifeline of Lima’s incomes are creating demand for a greater Lima is now the fifth largest city in Latin buildings and in Lima rose by almost water supply, providing variety and higher quality of food, even America, home to almost one-third of Peru’s 50 percent in 2012-2013). most of the drinking as urban expansion pushes agriculture population, and – with an annual rainfall of just Along with economic prosperity and urban water of its 9.6 million onto less productive land. A recent urban 25 mm – the world’s second biggest desert city growth, Lima’s agricultural area has shrunk inhabitants, and used water management study proposed a after . Since 1950, the mass migration of to about 125 sq km. Urbanization has taken rural people from the country’s highlands has out of production some of its best farmland to irrigate much of its “grey‑to‑green” solution: to reduce stress increased its population nine times over. In the and, in recent years, has claimed large tracts 12 500 ha of peri-urban on Lima’s water resources – and boost past 30 years, the urbanized area has expanded of uncultivated land in the lower reaches of GROWING GROWING GREENER farm land. It is also the Lima region’s main food production – by treating and re-using by more than 200 sq km and it is expected to the Rímac, Lurín and Chillón River basins. GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA means of waste disposal – the discharge of 300 million tonnes of wastewater a year to increase by more than 16 sq km a year until at Agriculture is being displaced to areas which AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN untreated effluent from mines, irrigate the city’s green belts and farmland. least 2020. lack the fertility, adaptability and performance CARIBBEAN and human settlements has led to levels of of coastal valley soils, which will lead not only to 58 contamination that have been described more lengthy distribution channels, but also to 59 the risk of shortages of some produce. LIMA as “catastrophic”. As its population grows, LIMA Population growth has also increased pressure on the city’s water resources, with further negative consequences for agriculture. Around 80 percent of water captured from the three rivers, and almost all of the city’s groundwater – making an annual total of some 600 billion litres – are destined for human consumption and industry. In addition, Lima’s human population and its factories produce large volumes of solid and liquid wastes that are dumped into canals and rivers, leading to high levels of contamination of crop irrigation water. Until very lmeida A id v a D in brief: LIMA The Government of Metropolitan Lima has launched a programme to promote urban agriculture in all 43 of the city’s districts. But action 1 is also needed to protect its fertile peri-urban farmland from exponential urban growth.

Río Chillón

5 Harvesting crops from a rooftop community garden in Lima’s Centro Histórico. The garden was installed as part of Lima’s urban agriculture programme.

GROWING GROWING GREENER 4 GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA 1 Farmers in their field of quinoa in the Chillón River Valley, 15 km from the AMERICA AND THE centre of Lima. Agriculture around the city produces a wide range of crops, Río Rímac AND THE CARIBBEAN including vegetables, fruit, ornamental plants, maize and fodder. 2 CARIBBEAN 60 61 LIMA LIMA 5 6

6 A freshly planted vegetable garden in the 2.5 ha Parque de la 2 At Lurigancho, on Lima’s 3 Urban farmers sell vegetables, Muralla, near the city centre. outskirts, farming communities raise cakes and sweets in María del pigs for meat and use biodigestors to Triunfo, one of the city’s low-income turn manure into methane gas. residential districts.

3 Río Lurín

7 7 Students of the Divina Misericordia School in Villa El Salvador, where an FAO project helped create a vegetable garden.

4 A farmers’ market at a town along the Rímac River. By 2025, urban sprawl is expected to have expanded beyond the Rímac, Chillón and Lurín River basins. km 10

Photographs: Lima Regional Directorate of Agriculture (1,4), IPES/RUAF (2,3), Metropolitan Municipality of Lima (5,6), FAO/J. Razuri (7)

O

recently, less than 10 percent of the 550 billion FA marginal and often illegally occupied communal systems for the production of high-value litres of wastewater generated each year was areas, where it provides employment for a large vegetables for sale to supermarkets or at treated. number of settler families (see page 62). Pig organic food fairs. farmers work in precarious conditions, and While no reliable data is available on the Agriculture is practised in peripheral zones several studies have found that harmful residues number or the socio-economic conditions of north, east and south of Lima, and most in the animals’ feed pose a health risk to both the residents of Lima involved in urban and peri- extensively in the districts of Carabayllo, producers and consumers. urban agriculture, it is practised in areas with Puente Piedra, Pachacamac, Lurín, Lurigancho Within the city’s built-up area, food generally high rates of poverty. Studies have Chosica and Ate Vitarte. It is the main source production is practised in family plots as small found that farming families are more likely to of income for many settlers from rural areas, as 4 sq m and in community gardens of up to have a diversified diet based on fresh, home- and provides temporary employment for Lima’s 1 000 sq m, mainly in the southern districts of grown produce supplemented by purchased urban poor. Many work as unskilled labourers Chorrillos, Villa El Salvador and Surco. As well foods. for landowners, while others rent a small plot for Pig farms win reprieve as growing vegetables and fruit, many residents In fact, the local production of a wide range cultivation and sell the produce. Although farm Isolated settler communities in the hills around raise guinea pigs and poultry on garden wastes of plant and animal foods is believed to play an sizes range up to 600 ha, about 60 percent of Lima have developed a highly efficient system of pig and scraps from the kitchen. important role in child nutrition in Lima, where holdings are less than 1 ha and 43 percent are less production in response to increasing demand for foods Urban farmers use almost no chemicals rates of child malnutrition are half the national of animal origin. However, the inexorable expansion of than 1 000 sq m. the has often brought pig farmers into conflict and irrigate their crops with drinking water. average. Peri-urban farming produces a wide range with new neighbours and the health authorities. Production is usually for home consumption – of crops – mainly vegetables, fruit, ornamental That is what has happened in the Saracoto Alto only a few farmers have installed hydroponic Sustainable development of agriculture in and plants, maize and fodder. In 2007, more than settlement in Lima’s Lurigancho district. When the first around Lima requires stronger government GROWING pigsties were built there in the 1980s, the area was still GROWING GREENER 5 000 ha of irrigated land in the Rímac, Chillón at a safe distance from population centres. Out of sight support. First, the benefits of food production GREENER CITIES IN LATIN JIFSAN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA and Lurín River basins were being used to of health inspectors, settlers organized themselves in in urban areas need to be recognized and AMERICA AND THE grow vegetables for sale in the capital’s markets. an informal association and raised their animals with prioritized in national policies. AND THE CARIBBEAN little regard for . It was common practice, for CARIBBEAN Production systems are very dynamic, with example, to dump dead pigs in the dry bed of the nearby For many years, the institutions most active in 62 farmers sowing simultaneously a wide range Huaycoloro River. promoting urban agriculture and its inclusion on 63 LIMA of short-cycle vegetables to take advantage After urban sprawl finally reached the foothills in the political agenda were NGOs, research centres, LIMA of changing market demand, and practising the early 2000s, complaints about the health risks to international organizations and some private neighbours, consumers and the producers themselves continuous crop rotation to optimize land use. prompted the Ministry of Health to order the companies. Their activities persuaded the local A 2007 study of peri-urban crop production immediate closure of the pig farms, which were the governments of Lima’s Villa María del Triunfo, found that less than 200 ha of cropland were main source of income for 140 families. Chosica Lurigancho and Villa el Salvador The families appealed to the newly created irrigated with water that had been filtered by Lurigancho district office for urban agriculture, which districts to incorporate agriculture in their urban local treatment plants. The rest drew on river convened a roundtable dialogue between the farmers’ development programmes, sometimes as part of water and untreated wastewater, which are often association and municipal authorities. They signed an civic beautification projects. highly polluted with , parasites and agreement under which the office organized training for A more recent positive development was the the farmers in pig management, especially sanitation. faecal bacteria. Since then, many farmers have adopted good production adoption by the Metropolitan Lima Municipal Health concerns are also associated with the practices, such as vaccinating their animals, providing Council in September 2012 of an ordinance thriving small-scale pig farming industry that them with a healthier diet, safely disposing of pig wastes Agronomists attend an open-air workshop on good horticultural for the promotion of urban agriculture, which has developed, using municipal wastes as feed, in and building concrete sties. practices, at a strawberry farm outside Lima it defines as “a strategy for environmental

Production systems are very dynamic, with farmers sowing a wide range of short-cycle vegetables Lettuce, beets, carrots ima and Sanitation has established policies and L carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, it f

and broccoli procedures for urban development, but has o y permits more intensive use of land and improves it At the Divina Misericordia school in the southern Lima issued no regulations concerning agriculture in plant vigour. Wastewater is something Lima has district of Villa El Salvador, an FAO project helped urban areas. In developing cities such as Lima, in abundance. establish a school garden used by students to grow agriculture will only be profitable, competitive unicipal The good news is that Lima no longer lettuce, beets, carrots and broccoli. Teachers, students M and parents built the garden from scratch, transporting and sustainable when there are also clear discharges more than 80 percent of its sewage litan

mechanisms for zoning land for agricultural use, o water directly into the ocean without prior soil to the site and installing an irrigation system. p i ro r along with tax benefits for producers, supportive filtering or treatment. In February 2013, u et z pricing of inputs, and assistance in accessing M the Peruvian government inaugurated the Ra

/J. profitable and stable markets. US$160 million Taboada treatment plant, the O

FA Action is also urgently needed to protect largest in South America, with the capacity to and enhance Lima’s peri-urban agriculture, treat 75 percent of the municipal area’s effluent which suffers major limitations, including a lack before discharging it into the sea through a of fertile land and clean water for irrigation. 3.5 km-long underground pipeline. Projections indicate that by 2025 the metropolitan Work also began in 2013 on another plant area will have a population of 11.5 million and in La Chira, in the south of Lima, which is that urban sprawl will have expanded beyond the expected to be completed late in 2014, boosting Rímac, Chillón and Lurín River basins. coverage to 100 percent. The government also Along with urban growth, it is expected announced “future plans” to use the treated water that the pressure on land and water resources A family that grows together in a community garden for watering and gardens. GROWING in central Lima GROWING GREENER currently used for agriculture will increase That revolution in wastewater treatment GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA exponentially. sector for ensuring Lima’s food and nutrition opens the way for the re-use of the city’s liquid AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN At the same time, Lima’s population security, and as one that generates other benefits and solid wastes as irrigation water and organic CARIBBEAN growth and economic development is driving for society by conserving natural resources and fertilizer for the production of food on the 64 unprecedented demand for a greater variety safeguarding public health. city outskirts, especially in uncultivated and 65 LIMA and higher quality of food. Recent years With the creation of the national Ministry of abandoned farming areas. A recent urban water LIMA have seen the spread of neighbourhood food Environment in 2008, Peru has caught up with management study, funded by the European management, food security, social inclusion and warehouses, wholesale produce markets and international standards in . Commission, calculated that by re-using slightly local economic development”. The ordinance, large supermarkets in all areas of the capital. Since municipal governments are responsible for more than half of its treated wastewater, Lima which is applicable in all 43 districts of Lima The increased sophistication and modernization local implementation of environmental protection could irrigate parks and green areas of 28 000 ha Province, also establishes a metropolitan urban of markets presents an opportunity for urban regulations, Lima should promote agriculture as and some 10 800 ha of farmland. agriculture programme which will include the and peri-urban agriculture to become the an activity that improves environmental quality That rate of irrigation, which amounts to use of public spaces for food production. main supplier of fresh, healthy “local food” for through its productive re-use of the city’s sewage 8 million litres per hectare per year, would However, there is no clear national public consumers. and solid waste. help increase yields and the quality of produce, policy that recognizes and promotes urban When appropriately treated, wastewater from and generate jobs and income. By reducing agriculture or regulates its incorporation into The challenge is to create the necessary domestic sources can be used safely to irrigate competition from agriculture, it would also the overall strategic planning of Peruvian cities. conditions to allow urban and peri-urban fruit trees, vegetables and ornamental plants. increase the supply of clean drinking water The national Ministry of Housing, Construction agriculture to realize its full potential as a key Since it contains nutrients such as organic available to city residents.

Pressure on land and water resources currently used for agriculture will increase exponentially Even on a sunny, summer day in El Alto, the and peri-urban horticulture. One of the first average temperature rarely exceeds 13°C. But initiatives of the municipality’s Environment inside the hundreds of mud-brick greenhouses Department was to create a Unidad de that dot the city, gardeners work in temperatures Microhuertas Populares. of around 30°C, which create ideal growing Residents needed to have at least 30 sq m of conditions for luxuriant beds of lettuce, Swiss free space for a greenhouse, and at least two chard, spinach, tomatoes, rosemary, coriander hours of free time daily for gardening, to join in Thirty years ago, El Alto was a dormitory of families were indigent. Around 40 percent and strawberries. project activities. Other requirements included , inhabited by families and of El Alto’s children under five years were In the neighbourhood of San Roque, on the a permanent source of good quality water and city’s outskirts, 90 women cultivate 15 different “natural light for at least five hours a day”. migrants from rural areas, on the plateau malnourished, the consequence of extremely types of vegetables and herbs, mainly for home Participants were also expected to contribute that lies at an altitude of 4 000 m above the low consumption of animal protein, fruit and consumption but increasingly with an eye to city their labour and 40 percent of the cost of city of La Paz. Since then, its population vegetables. To improve food and nutrition markets, where their organically grown produce materials for the infrastructure. has almost tripled, from security in the city, Fao and El Alto’s fetches good prices. Recently, some of the women From the outset, the project had an “open 300 000 to 890 000. municipal government launched a project, built three new greenhouses, and plan to sell door” policy that encouraged the participation of Today, it is the second funded by Belgium, aimed at promoting 70 percent of what they grow at local fairs. At community organizations, public agencies and biggest municipality in the year-round production of vegetables in current prices, sales of vegetables from a typical other interested parties. That approach helped to 40 sq m greenhouse would earn them at least create a network of collaborators, including the the Plurinational State of family gardens. That experiment in urban US$560 a year. agronomy faculties of two universities, Bolivia, after Santa Cruz, agriculture has had a lasting, positive impact El Alto’s backyard greenhouses have become organizations, microcredit institutions, youth GROWING GROWING GREENER and together with La Paz forms the country’s in the city’s poorest neighbourhoods and symbols of urban agriculture on the Bolivian rehabilitation centres and private companies. GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA most populous urban agglomeration. In the has helped find a place for Upa in Bolivia’s altiplano, the 125 000 sq km Andean plateau that AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN early 2000s, more than 70 percent of the National Food and Nutrition Policy. is home to an estimated 4 million people. In fact, The project established three demonstration CARIBBEAN population lived in poverty and 12 percent the region’s low and irregular rainfall, average and training centres (DTCs), where agronomists 66 night-time temperatures near zero and year- tested and evaluated 54 species of vegetables, 67 EL ALTO round frosts make production of many garden fruit, herbs and spices for greenhouse production, EL ALTO plants – including lettuce, Swiss chard, spinach and 14 different types of containers for use in and tomatoes – virtually impossible without microgardening. greenhouses. Through workshops in the DTCs, participants Between 2004 and 2008, the El Alto learned basic gardening skills and were sensitized gardening project invested US$700 000 in to the need to improve the quality of family establishing, in nine districts of the city, 1 187 diets. In all, the project provided training to family greenhouses and training low-income some 2 000 home gardeners, the majority of residents in horticultural production techniques them women, in greenhouse construction adapted to the city’s agroclimatic conditions. and maintenance, hydroponic production, To ensure sustainability, it also sought to assist composting, biological pest and disease the municipal government in drafting strategic management, irrigation, and best practices in guidelines for the further development of urban post-harvest handling. lhen A in brief: EL ALTO Solar-heated greenhouses – known locally as pots, shoes and helmets – fixed to the walls and In one year, a typical greenhouse carpas solares – were essential for gardening in hanging from the ceiling. in El Alto produces six crops El Alto’s rigorous climate. The project developed Since gardeners and their families were in of chard and radish, and almost two basic models: a structure with a sloping roof daily contact with crops, pesticides were not 1 tonne of tomatoes. Gardeners of agrofilm or corrugated plastic, facing north, used. Among safe alternatives introduced by the save US$60 a month on food and a simple greenhouse made with iron project were wild lupines – very abundant on the purchases and make US$15 from hoops and agrofilm for windier areas. (It also altiplano – to discourage aphids, and capsicum to the sale of surpluses. designed a fully portable model for use by people ward off whiteflies. The project also introduced in rented accommodation.) the composting of wastes from kitchens and The ground area of the greenhouse, at 24 sq m, greenhouses to make organic fertilizer (because is sufficient to meet the needs of a family of composting units were in open fields, exposed to five. Construction costs were around S$U 580 per night-time frosts, decomposition took up to six greenhouse, with the project covering around months). A gardener in her greenhouse. Known locally as carpas solares, greenhouses are 60 percent; beneficiaries provided labour and To reduce water consumption, the project essential for horticulture in El Alto’s rigorous climate. locally made building materials, such as sundried promoted practices such as mulching which, by mud bricks. slowing the rate of soil moisture evaporation, was By retaining warm air heated during daylight found to reduce water requirements from 5 litres hours by solar radiation, the greenhouses per sq m to around 3 litres. Drip irrigation from allowed continuous production of a wide variety plastic bottles, tailored to the root development The garden inside at 24 sq m of vegetables and up to six harvests per year, stage of each crop, reduced irrigation needs to GROWING GROWING GREENER greenhouse can produce enough depending on the crop. Extra warmth was 2 litres. By carefully managing the water cycle in GREENER CITIES IN LATIN vegetables for a family of five. CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA provided by sawdust-fuelled stoves, and by water their greenhouses, some gardeners were able to AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN containers painted black, which accumulated heat obtain good harvests using just 1 litre of water per CARIBBEAN during the day and released it during the night. sq m per day. 68 Tests showed that the temperature inside To ensure the availability of good quality 69 EL ALTO greenhouses was normally 10°C higher than inputs, the project helped to establish a network EL ALTO outside. During freezing nights on the altiplano, of community seed shops – which distribute seed when the thermometer dropped to -5°C, bought in bulk by the municipal government – the temperature inside was 4.2°C. Daytime and provided the capital to set up 18 family-run greenhouse temperatures sometimes reached input supply stores. It also encouraged home 32.6°C. raising of guinea pigs, which are native to the Daytime greenhouse temperatures reach 32.6°C, creating ideal conditions In their carpas solares, families cultivated Andes and are a rich source of high quality for vegetables in hydroponic gardens up to 32 recommended plant species, including protein, by introducing improved breeds and containers. -rich vegetables that were previously and production methods to 250 families and unknown in El Alto, such as spinach. To conducting trials of greenhouse production of km 10 increase greenhouse output, families were forage to feed them. trained in growing vegetables in a wide range The El Alto greenhouses proved to be highly of used containers – including old CD players, productive, with growers able to harvest six crops

The project introduced nutrient- Surface mulch and drip irrigation from The project promoted home raising rich vegetables that were previously plastic bottles reduced water needs by of guinea pigs, a rich source of high unknown, such as white radish. up to 80 percent. quality protein. The project introduced the composting of wastes from kitchens and greenhouses to make organic fertilizer Photographs: Juan José Estrada Paredes, IPES/RUAF (top, bottom right) a year of chard and radish, and five crops of Creative hanging gardens Another key factor was the project’s local to national level. Similar projects have been tomatoes. In one year, a 24 sq m greenhouse can El Alto families were trained in growing vegetables in participatory approach to capacity building, launched since in other cities of the altiplano. In produce almost 1 tonne of tomatoes, 460 kg of a wide range of used containers – including old CD which focused not only on vegetable production neighbouring La Paz, the municipal government players, pots, shoes and helmets – fixed to the walls and lettuce and 260 kg of paprika. hanging from the ceiling. but – above all – on raising awareness among and FAO helped to establish 150 peri-urban As production increased, many families began low-income residents of the importance of greenhouses of 60 sq m each; big enough to to generate surpluses and to sell their produce nutrition and the need for healthier family diets. produce surpluses for sale. In the city of Oruro, informally. Following a feasibility study, 70 The effectiveness of nutrition education was another initiative established a demonstration families were trained in post-harvest handling underscored by an evaluation in 2010, which and training centre that is being used to train and packaging and the project helped to create found that the intake of calcium, iron, B vitamins 1 000 low-income families in greenhouse a brand, “Verdurita”, for the marketing of high- and vitamin C among beneficiary families was horticulture. quality vegetables in El Alto and La Paz. By “notably superior” to the baseline. The money Another El Alto initiative that has been

December 2008, a stable group of 20 women edes households once spent on buying vegetables is extended through projects to other towns and r a

were selling produce to outlets such as restaurants P now used to buy meat, eggs and milk, which cities of Bolivia is the raising of guinea pigs and

and supermarkets, earning a monthly income of ada were previously eaten only “on very special other small animals, and its community seed r

US$32 per greenhouse. st occasions”. shops have been replicated in both urban and é E é s The support and political will of the El Alto rural areas. Jo Six years after termination of the project, home municipal government were also decisive. During In 2009, Bolivia recognized the right to uan gardening in greenhouses remains a widespread J project implementation, the municipality’s food in its constitution, and the government activity in the city. A survey conducted in 2013 gardening unit used its own resources and is finalizing a National Food and Nutrition found that production of vegetables saved the personnel to build 150 greenhouses, and is now Policy that is expected to include a programme GROWING GROWING GREENER average gardening family some US$60 a month responsible for promoting and coordinating all for urban and peri-urban agriculture. Bolivia’s GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA on food purchases. Around 70 percent of agricultural activities in the city. Ministry of Productive Development and AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN gardeners also sell surplus produce, generating Plural Economy are already developing such a CARIBBEAN edes

cash income of about US$15 a month. In r The most lasting benefit of urban and peri- programme, in collaboration with FAO. When a 70 greenhouses where crops are also grown in P urban agriculture in El Alto has been placing it is launched in 2014, the programme will 71 ada

EL ALTO containers, monthly output can be worth up to r UPA high on the political agenda in Bolivia, from provide technical assistance and inputs for family EL ALTO US$100. st greenhouse production in 13 municipalities, é E é s edes r

What accounts for that sustainability? First, Jo both for home consumption and, eventually, as a while the project encouraged group approaches P a source of fresh produce for major cities such as uan J ada

to marketing, training and technical assistance, r La Paz, Cochabamba, Santa Cruz and Sucre. st

it found that vegetable gardening was more have continued to provide support to the E é In El Alto itself, the municipal government s

productive and sustainable when carried out development of urban agriculture in El Alto, and Jo adopted as a public policy in August 2013 uan

by individual households – horticulture is an are replicating the greenhouse technology that J the promotion of agricultural and livestock intensive activity, and collective production was was developed in the demonstration and training production in its urban and peri-urban areas. The more difficult to organize. centres. For example, one local private company main objective of the policy is to reduce levels of The project’s “open door” policy also proved established a 120 sq m garden that is used by its malnutrition and to generate employment and to be one of the keys to its success. Many of the employees and also serves as a demonstration Vegetables grown in El Alto greenhouses are sold in La Paz economic resources for El Alto families, through organizations that participated in its activities centre. markets under the trade name “Verdurita” the sale of vegetables and small livestock.

The project raised awareness among low-income residents of the need for healthier family diets Brazil has become the international transfer scheme for low-income families, free benchmark for measuring national meals in every public school, and support commitment to food security. Its Zero to small-scale family farming had reduced Hunger programme, launched in 2003, made the number of people facing food insecurity eradicating hunger and fighting poverty from 50 million to 30 million. Numbers fell key objectives on the most sharply in the country’s urban areas, domestic agenda. The from 24.5 million to 14.8 million. Many of government adopted a the programmes implemented under Zero national food security Hunger were pioneered in the 1990s in the and nutrition policy that Brazilian city of Belo Horizonte. Over recognizes the inalienable the past two decades, the city government right of all citizens to sufficient, good quality has crafted a highly acclaimed system of food, and implemented it with a combination food and nutrition security that serves of emergency measures and programmes to 200 000 subsidized meals per day, markets redistribute income, boost food production 45 000 tonnes of fruit and vegetables a year, and create employment. Within six years, and actively encourages urban and peri- initiatives such as the Bolsa Família cash urban agriculture.

GROWING GROWING GREENER GREENER CITIES IN LATIN elo orizonte is the capital CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA B H of Minas mayor whose programme promoted inclusive AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN Gerais state and Brazil’s sixth largest city, with social and economic development, focusing on CARIBBEAN a population of 2.5 million. While the city itself ending hunger and poverty, creating jobs and 72 is 100 percent urban, it forms the core of the investing in education and health. Among his 73 BELO Belo Horizonte Metropolitan Region, which government’s first acts was to create a municipal BELO HORIZONTE comprises urban and rural areas with a total food supply agency, SMAB, charged with HORIZONTE population of more than 5.7 million, making it preventing and reducing malnutrition among Brazil’s third most populous urban agglomeration vulnerable groups, bringing food to parts of the after São Paulo and . city that were neglected by commercial outlets, Like other Brazilian cities, Belo Horizonte and increasing food production. suffered high rates of poverty and hunger in the With an initial annual budget of some early 1990s. It was estimated that 38 percent of US$18 million, SMAB designed a series of families in the metropolitan region lived below interventions based on the principle that all the poverty line and 18 percent of children aged citizens have the right to an adequate quantity less than three years were malnourished. Infant and quality of food throughout their lives, and mortality was a high 35.3 per thousand live births. that it is the duty of government to guarantee In 1992, Belo Horizonte elected a new that right. One of its earliest initiatives, which

nd o um o Dr e L in brief: BELO HORIZONTE provided enriched flour through health clinics Belo Horizonte invests to pregnant and nursing women, and to mothers US$27 million a year in food of young children in low-income communities, security programmes that is credited with helping reduce the city’s under-5 benefit more than 300 000 child mortality rate by 72 percent between 1993 citizens daily. An integral part and 2005. of its vision of inclusive social Today, SMAB has grown into the Secretariat development is urban and for Nutrition and Food Security (SMASAN), with peri-urban agriculture. a staff of 180, including 30 nutritionists, a budget of US$27.2 million a year, and programmes that benefit more than 300 000 citizens daily. Although its approach has evolved over the 2 years – for example, big improvements in child nutrition led to discontinuation of the enriched 4 flour distribution – its basic mandate remains 3 that of ensuring food and nutrition security in Belo Horizonte, especially among low-income 4 Diners at Restaurante popular No. 1, located on do Contorno Avenue, in the city centre. residents. 5 It does that through a comprehensive set of programmes aimed at providing access to food GROWING GROWING GREENER 1 The produce market in José – including free food distributions and school GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA Verano da Silva Square, Barreiro, sells meals, subsidized food sales and the regulation AMERICA AND THE 20 basic items at a fixed price. 1 AND THE CARIBBEAN of prices in food markets (see page 78) – and CARIBBEAN 6 increasing agricultural production in both 74 surrounding rural areas and within the city itself. 75 BELO BELO HORIZONTE Food production is recognized as a legitimate HORIZONTE land use in Belo Horizonte and is promoted by km 10 the municipal government’s Urban Agriculture Support Policy, which sees it as contributing to “the full development of the social functions of the city”. At last count, SMASAN’s programme for 5 The city has eight sales points for organic fruit and vegetables, such as this one on Avenida Paulo Camilo urban and peri-urban agriculture, operational Pena, Belvedere. since 1998, had created 185 vegetable gardens and 48 orchards across Belo Horizonte. They include gardens in schools and early childhood centres, three fully commercial gardens, and non-

2 Lunchtime at the Municipal School in Pedreira Prado Lopes. Each year, the city provides healthy meals 3 Public restaurant No. 2, in Ceará St., Santa Efigênia, provides low-priced to 80 000 students. 6 This community garden in Vila Pinho meals to the general public. Breakfast costs US$0.25. sells most of its produce to local schools for students’ meals.

Photographs: Makiko Taguchi (1,2,4-6), SMASAN (3) commercial gardens in health and social families operating two of the community gardens irrigation. In 2012, more than 90 four-hour

centres, nursing homes, shelters and other public earned US$4 800 from the sale of vegetables to aguchi training workshops were conducted, with the facilities (for example, inmates of the city’s schools. The profits enabled them to buy their T o participation of 1 100 people. akik

Gamelleira prison have a garden and donate what own inputs and equipment, with only minimal M Support to urban agriculture in Belo they grow to charity). support from the municipality. Horizonte is not limited to SMASAN programmes. The staff ofMA S SAN includes agronomists Another source is the city’s five “centres for and agricultural engineers, who can call on One of the most effective tools for promoting agro-ecological living”, set up since 1993 by the support from the state agricultural urban agriculture in Belo Horizonte has been municipal parks administration. Located mainly extension service. Together, they manage the school gardens, which increased in number from in peri-urban areas, the centres are managed by supply of free or heavily subsidized inputs – such 60 to 126 between 2008 and 2012. Children are local residents and provide courses in organic as seed, fruit tree seedlings, organic fertilizer and invited to attend workshops on microgardening, gardening, waste recycling, nutrition and . soil amendments – and supervise the installation and those joining the programme receive They have helped 98 families establish their own of irrigation systems and greenhouses. technical assistance from SMASAN to set up gardens. The centres also maintain nurseries – To qualify for assistance, at least 10 citizens their gardens. Gardens have been established called “living pharmacies” – for the production must form a group and apply for the of in schools and kindergartens with a total of In Afonso Arinos Square, one of the 30 sales points and distribution of medicinal plants. a public area for their gardening project. The 96 000 pupils, who spend on average one hour a where farmers sell fruit, vegetables and root crops directly The municipal government also provides majority of farmers in community gardens have day caring for the plants. The gardens are used to to consumers support and incentives to family agriculture in incomes that amount to less than two minimum grow cabbage, lettuce, aromatic plants and herbs, the metropolitan region’s rural areas. Public wages, more than half are women, and the and serve as open-air centres for environmental lemon and tangerine) free of charge to schools, procurement of food from smallholder family predominant age group is over 60. Gardening is and food education. institutions and community groups, primarily farmers for Belo Horizonte’s school meals GROWING GROWING GREENER usually a part-time activity, a way of saving on In the meantime, the secretariat’s orchards in low-income favelas on sloping land, where programme and public restaurants is not only GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA food purchases, and a source of relaxation. programme, Pró-Pomar, distributes fruit tree trees are also needed to prevent soil . encouraged but now mandatory under federal AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN The city’s 48 community gardens average seedlings (typically cherry, carambola, orange, Members of the community are selected to care law. SMASAN also manages a programme called CARIBBEAN around 150 sq m and are used to grow leafy for the trees and all citizens are invited to help Direto da Roça (“Straight from the field”), which

76 vegetables and herbs for home consumption. aguchi themselves to the fruit. In 2011-2012, SMASAN provides 30 sales points within the city where 77 BELO Cultivation practices are largely organic. T o provided 1 300 tree seedlings for planting in small-scale farmers can sell leafy vegetables, BELO HORIZONTE HORIZONTE Pesticide is prohibited, and soil is usually akik schools and community areas. It is estimated that fruit and root crops directly to consumers. M fertilized with manure and earthworm humus 30 000 people consume fruit grown in Licences are obtained through public bidding. purchased from outside the city. Since treated Pró-Pomar orchards. By agreement with SMASAN, prices are fixed at wastewater is not available for irrigation, Low-income urban and peri-urban residents an “affordable” level, which means savings for gardeners use the city’s drinking water supply. also benefit from a programme for growing food customers and higher volume sales for producers. The three large commercial gardens are and medicinal plants in areas without enough Farmers sell either their own produce or operated by 30 families and are located in the space for a full garden. On request, SMASAN that of a cooperative. The quality of produce neighbourhoods of Barreiro, Macaúbas and Vila provides self-organized community groups with is controlled through laboratory tests and on- Pinho. They sell most of their organically grown training in microgardening, as well as compost farm visits by SMASAN staff, who also advise produce to local schools for students’ meals, to and seeds. Participants are expected to supply farmers on good agricultural practices and the public at on-site sales centres, through fruit the garden containers, such as wooden crates organic production. In 2012, one cooperative and vegetable markets, and door-to-door. In 2013, Belo Horizonte children in one of the city’s 126 school gardens and discarded tyres, and plastic bottles for drip and 25 individual farmers sold through the

Gardens have been established in schools and kindergartens with a total of 96 000 pupils programme more than 700 tonnes of fruit and Broad stakeholder participation has been a rural farmers who have converted to organic

vegetables, worth an estimated US$870 000. feature of Belo Horizonte’s approach to UPA aguchi production. By offering a major new sales outlet, development. SMASAN’s programmes are guided T o the fair is expected to encourage the expansion akik

Belo Horizonte’s food and nutrition security by a Council for Food Security, representing M of commercial gardening and, SMASAN hopes, system handles some 45 000 tonnes of food municipal, state and federal governments, attract more young people to urban agriculture. consumed in the city each year. Although the labour unions, food producers and distributors, Currently, there are no urban farmers in Belo contribution of urban agriculture to that total is consumer groups and other NGOs. Strategies and Horizonte under the age of 30, and making small – around 50 tonnes – the programme has action plans for urban agriculture are developed food production an economically profitable had positive impacts. Vegetable consumption by a civic forum, the Urban Agricultural activity is seen by SMASAN as one of the key has increased among families and students Space, which brings together 33 civil society challenges facing UPA development. Nearly directly involved in gardening, and an estimated organizations and government agencies. all community gardens are subsidized by the 9 000 city residents have access to pesticide-free Among the forum’s achievements was to municipal government and, without that support, produce at a reasonable price. persuade the municipality in 2010 to revise most urban producers could not compete with Urban agriculture has strengthened social the city’s land use plan to include urban vegetable growers in rural areas. Urban land networks. The high level of community agriculture as a non-residential land use, on and production inputs – such as town water involvement in urban farming – through a par with commerce, services and industry. and compost bought from outside the city – are production groups and local councils – has been That recognition establishes urban farming as expensive, and the city’s services sector offers an important factor in the steady growth in total an economic activity and urban farmers as a better paid and less physically demanding jobs. At the Vila Pinho community garden, an urban farmer consults output and the area under gardens. professional category. with an extensionist on solutions to pest problems While SMASAN’s immediate priorities include further investment in training for urban food GROWING GROWING GREENER Belo Horizonte’s alternative food system The forum also campaigned successfully for producers, in the longer term it plans to reduce GREENER CITIES IN LATIN the approval, in September 2011, of the Municipal production costs by improving wastewater CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA Belo Horizonte’s Secretariat for Subsidized food marketing least 20 products at fixed, reduced AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN Nutrition and Food Security manages Belo Horizonte has four public prices. Abastecer licensees also help Urban Agriculture Support Policy, an important treatment, introducing rainwater harvesting CARIBBEAN 19 programmes aimed at ensuring restaurants and one cafeteria that to increase access to fresh produce step forward as, until then, SMASAN agriculture systems, and working with the city’s waste its citizens’ access to high quality and provide low-priced meals to the by selling fruit and vegetables at programmes were regulated by municipal management service to improve the quality of 78 affordable food. general public. The majority of discounted prices from vans in the 79 BELO ordinances. The policy provides a firm foundation compost. BELO HORIZONTE customers – 80 000 a month – are city’s peripheral areas. In 2012, a HORIZONTE Food and nutrition assistance low-income or homeless. SMASAN total of 43 300 tonnes of food was for further development of urban agriculture. Another measure on the SMASAN agenda is In 2012, the school meals nutritionists design the menus to supplied through Abastecer. The municipal government increased funding for to guarantee urban farmers’ use of public land programme served 46 million meals provide 20 different meal choices. In SMASAN’s programmes for urban, peri-urban and for at least five years. It is also lobbying for the to 80 000 students in schools, 2012, some 3.3 million meals were Nutrition education and careers kindergartens and adult education served, at an average price discount in the food sector rural food production from US$160 000 in 2012 to zoning of parcels of urban land specifically centres. Since 2011, at least of 60 percent. SMASAN organizes classes in $240 000 in 2013, and is integrating agriculture for agriculture, which would relieve intense 30 percent of the food in meals is food and nutrition for the general into municipal programmes for housing, welfare, competition for land for development. bought directly from family farms. Food supply and market public and for people working in its health, education, employment, training and With lower production costs and security of SMASAN has 56 service points for regulation programmes. The city’s Lagoinha preventing child malnutrition. In The Abastecer (“Supply”) programme food market serves as a training environmental protection. tenure, Belo Horizonte’s farmers could take 2012, the city’s food bank distributed allows licensed traders – currently centre offering 40 different courses It has also decided to establish, in the centre advantage of their close proximity to urban 380 tonnes of food to social numbering 33 – to sell fruit and in food processing and preparation, of Belo Horizonte, a weekly “urban agriculture consumers and the premium prices paid for organizations for the preparation of vegetables in designated areas, on including baking, confectionery communal meals for 366 000 people. the condition that they offer at making, and international cuisine. fair” for the direct marketing of fruit, vegetables, locally grown, organic food that has health, cereals and flowers by urban growers and by social and environmental benefits.

An estimated 9 000 city residents have access to pesticide-free produce at a reasonable price With 1.35 million inhabitants, the Rosario The programme’s immediate objective was metropolitan area is Argentina’s third largest to meet the emergency needs of unemployed urban agglomeration and one of its most slum-dwellers. But it also had a very clear vision prosperous. Linked to the rich farmland of Santa of establishing urban agriculture as a permanent Fe Province by road and river, its handle activity in the city. Given that an essential most of Argentina’s exports of wheat, soybeans prerequisite was the long-term availability Spring visitors to the Argentinian city technologies they use for vertical gardening, and vegetable oil. Exports of soybeans in 2013 of suitable land, several local government of Rosario, on the Paraná River, 300 km solar drying of produce and anaerobic waste reached 50 million tonnes, worth US$17.5 billion. departments collaborated with the National north of Buenos Aires, should not miss the recycling. Celebrated annually since 2004, Just 13 years ago, Rosario was a rusting University of Rosario in a survey which found week-long “Rosario grows roots” festival. “Rosario grows roots” is a showcase of industrial city in a nation whose economy had that 36 percent of the municipal area was vacant Last year’s festival included guided tours urban agriculture in a city which is, itself, collapsed. Many of the city’s steel, chemical space. of vegetable gardens along the city’s main internationally recognized as an example and paper factories had closed, and one-third of Areas that could not be built on and were, the workforce was unemployed. By December therefore, suitable for farming included land railway line, workshops of how agriculture can be integrated 2001, around 60 percent of the population had along railways and highways, low-lying, peri- on organoponic successfully into urban development. With incomes below the poverty line, 30 percent were urban land subject to flooding, and designated gardening, and open- a strategy of recovering and transforming living in extreme poverty, and hyperinflation greenbelts that had not been realized owing to air cooking classes at the city’s underutilized resources, the city had increased the price of staple foods four times lack of funding. a 46 ha garden park. It government’s urban agriculture programme over. Desperation in Rosario’s slums led to the To provide gardeners with security of tenure, ended with a Sunday has helped to reclaim brownfields for food looting of supermarkets by hungry people in the city mayor approved in September 2004 search of food. an ordinance that established a rapid process GROWING fair in the riverside Plaza Suecia, where production and recreation, create permanent GROWING GREENER In February 2002, the municipal government for formalizing grants of vacant urban land GREENER CITIES IN LATIN members of the Rosario Gardeners’ Network employment in agriculture for low-income CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA responded to the crisis by launching an urban to residents for agriculture. The Secretariat AMERICA AND THE displayed their organically grown vegetables residents, and boost the city’s supply of AND THE CARIBBEAN agriculture programme in collaboration with two of Municipal Planning then worked with CARIBBEAN and medicinal plants, along with the chemical-free fresh food. key partners. One was the national Pro‑Huerta international partners to draft proposals for 80 (“Pro-Garden”) programme, established in 1990 integrating agriculture into Rosario’s urban 81 ROSARIO to foster small-scale, self-production of fresh development plan. ROSARIO food, mainly in low-income urban and peri-urban Meanwhile, the programme was implementing areas. The other was a Rosario GON , the Centre another key part of its long-term strategy: for Agro-ecological Production Studies (CEPAR), establishing a system for the direct marketing which had promoted vegetable gardening in the of gardeners’ produce. Within six months of the city’s slums since 1987. start of the programme, the first urban farmers’ The initial plan – to provide 20 gardening market was in operation, and two more had been groups with tools and seeds, and then gradually opened by 2004. extend the programme throughout the city – was The first phase of the urban agriculture soon overwhelmed by requests for assistance. programme was so successful that, in 2004, Funding for equipment, inputs and training Rosario was awarded the UN-HABITAT workshops was increased, and within two years, International Award for Best Practices in some 800 community gardens were producing urban development. An evaluation found that vegetables for an estimated 40 000 people. some 10 000 low-income families were directly z ibis ro K ro eand L IN BRIEF: ROSARIO Rosario has incorporated agriculture fully into its land use planning and urban development strategies. It is building a “green circuit” of family, community and commercial gardens, and multifunctional garden parks.

1 Last year’s celebration of urban agriculture ended with a Sunday fair in Plaza Suecia, beside the Paraná River. 6 Gardens along the railway line through 7 Urban farm families in La Tablada garden park, established on 3 ha of the city’s northern district produce riverside land granted by the National Roads Authority. vegetables, ornamentals and aromatic plants.

GROWING GROWING GREENER GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN CARIBBEAN 6 2 Some 70 families work in this garden park, established in the Bosque de los 82 Constituyentes, Rosario’s 260 ha . 2 83 ROSARIO ROSARIO

1 8 One of Rosario’s first garden parks, Molino Blanco, reclaimed from 3 5 ha of -prone land on the city’s southern boundary.

3 The seeds of more than 600 4 This parque-huerta, Hogar España, 7 local and native plant varieties are is found on land belonging to a 4 conserved at the Ñanderoga Seed senior citizens’ centre on the edge of 5 Bank for sowing in the city’s gardens. Rosario. 8 9

9 Found in a barrio with the same name, the Miraflores parque-huerta was established with funding from the Santa Fe provincial government.

5 The city’s agro-ecological nursery, in Saladillo, is a prime source of seedlings, compost and liquid fertilizers. km 10

Photographs: Javier Couretot (1,5,9), Sergio Goya (2), Victoria Benedetto (3), Marie Monique Robin (4), Silvio Moriconi (6,7), HACC, (8) bin

involved in gardening, and that producers were Soybean advances on city’s o R earning from sales up to US$150 a month, well “vegetable belt”

above the poverty line. Two-thirds of gardeners In 1996, Argentina approved the cultivation of nique

were women and, for the vast majority of them, genetically modified soybeans. Since then, the country’s Mo ie annual soybean production has quadrupled, from r agriculture was the main source of income. a 12.4 million to more than 50 million tonnes, while M the harvested area has grown from 6 million ha to Since that year, urban agriculture in Rosario 20 million ha. has evolved along with Argentina’s economic Argentina is now the world’s third largest producer recovery, and the re-emergence of the city as of soybeans, and is the leading exporter of soybean meal and soybean oil. Most of Argentina’s soybeans are grown a centre of industry, commerce and services. in Santa Fe Province, and are processed in the Rosario Today, the number of city residents practising municipal area for export. horticulture is around 1 800, of which 250 are Soybean production has displaced other traditional export crops, such as wheat and sunflower, as well full-time commercial producers organized in the as the production of milk, fruit and vegetables for the Rosario Gardeners’ Network. domestic market. In Rosario Department, around The past decade has been a phase of 70 000 ha of land were sown with soybeans in 2013, consolidation for the urban agriculture programme. The focus has been on securing land and infrastructure for permanent cultivation on a larger scale, shortening marketing chains, establishing agro-industries and farmers’ GROWING GROWING GREENER markets, increasing the supply and quality of GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA organically grown produce, and promoting AMERICA AND THE Late afternoon at La Tablada garden park. Plots are assigned AND THE

horticulture as an integral part of efforts to na of local, national and international public

CARIBBEAN y annually, free of charge, to gardeners provided they use agro- CARIBBEAN

rehabilitate brownfields, create greenbelts and Re ecological production practices and private institutions, including RUAF, the

improve the in disadvantaged ro municipality’s services for and ed

84 P 85 ROSARIO neighbourhoods. parks and gardens, the Faculties of Engineering, ROSARIO compared to just 3 600 ha under vegetables and Underpinning the entire programme is a solid legumes. Horticulture around the city of Rosario is The promotion of urban agriculture is a policy and Agricultural Sciences at the political and institutional commitment, from under increasing pressure as farmers lease their land of the Rosario city government, implemented University of Rosario, and the public/private national to local level. The city’s commercial for soybean production, which is more profitable and by its Secretariat of Social Development in sector Rosario Foundation. gardeners have been enrolled in the National more easily managed, and has lower labour costs. cooperation with Pro-Huerta and CEPAR, and The city’s “vegetable belt” is also threatened by urban Registry of Family Farmers, which entitles expansion. aimed at “integrating men and women into social Rosario is one of the few large South American them to development assistance, social benefits To reduce the city’s growing dependence on produce enterprises for the production and processing cities that have incorporated agriculture fully into and old-age pensions. Pro-Huerta continues to grown in other regions of the country, Rosario’s of food for family, community and market their land use planning and urban development provide training, seed and tools, and the Santa Fe Metropolitan Strategic Plan includes support to small- consumption”. strategies. Its Land Use Plan 2007-2017 makes scale horticulture in semi-rural areas. The aim is to provincial government funds the installation of promote the adoption of good production practices The urban agriculture programme has an specific provision for the agricultural use of infrastructure as part of its support for family and, by creating small producers’ associations, to annual budget of some US$380 000 and is staffed public land in the spatial organization of the city and community gardening in urban and peri- improve growers’ access to the city’s markets. by 25 agronomists and gardening promoters. and its territory. Under its Metropolitan Strategic urban areas. Its activities are supported by a wide range Plan 2008-2018, Rosario is building a “green

Rosario’s Land Use Plan makes specific provision for the agricultural use of public land circuit”, passing through and around the city, But the centrepiece of Rosario’s green circuit inside the 260 ha Bosque de Los Constituyentes conserves the seeds of more than 600 local and consisting of family and community gardens, is the city’s innovative garden parks – five large, nature reserve; along the Rosario-Buenos Aires native plant varieties that are adapted to Rosario’s large-scale, commercial vegetable gardens landscaped green areas covering a total of 72 ha in the low-income Miraflores barrio; growing conditions. and orchards, multifunctional garden parks, of land, which are used for agriculture and and on 3 ha of land belonging to a senior citizens’ and “productive barrios”, where agriculture is for cultural, sports and educational activities. centre, Hogar Español, on the edge of farmland Virtually all permanent agricultural areas in integrated into programmes for the construction Horticulture is practised on 24 ha of the total southwest of the city. Rosario have been established in degraded areas of public housing and the upgrading of slums. area, divided into plots averaging 900 sq m, Plots are assigned annually, free of charge, that were once considered unsuitable for food In 2014, the green circuit consisted of more for use by some 280 commercial gardeners, and to gardeners in return for a guarantee that they production. Many sites had been used as garbage than 30 ha of land used to grow vegetables, smaller plots where 400 residents grow vegetables will grow crops continuously throughout the dumps, and soils were often contaminated fruit and medicinal and aromatic plants. The for home consumption. year, using agro-ecological production practices. with heavy metals. The programme has used a cultivated area includes a green corridor along the One of the city’s first parques-huerta was The majority of gardeners come from nearby variety of agro-ecological techniques – including railway line through the city’s northern district. inaugurated in 2008 on flood-prone fields in low-income neighbourhoods. They include planting legumes and grasses and incorporating Four fenced plots, which total 2 ha, are equipped Molino Blanco Sur, a neighbourhood of 800 ex-factory workers and fisherfolk, and many plant residues, wood chips, compost and manure with irrigation systems and greenhouses and families on the city’s southern boundary. The internal migrants from rural areas, who have – in order to improve soil fertility, structure and used by residents and schoolchildren from the park incorporated 5.6 ha of existing vegetable contributed positively to the programme thanks organic matter content. surrounding area to grow vegetables, ornamentals gardens and included, along one of its sides, to their knowledge of farming and intensive crop Crop production on the restored land also and aromatic plants. a demonstration area which provides space production. follows closely the principles of agro-ecology, Group productive gardens are used for the for small-scale horticulture in front yards, Agricultural activities in the city are supported which promotes family-based agriculture intensive production of seasonal vegetables and a organoponic microgardening, and protected by an agro-ecological nursery, which raises that is socially just, economically viable and wide range of aromatic plants, such as citronella, . seedlings and produces compost and liquid environmentally sustainable. Growers produce GROWING GROWING GREENER sage and rosemary. The gardens, which average Other garden parks are situated on 3 ha of fertilizers, and the Ñanderoga , which their own basic inputs, such as fertilizer and GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA 2 ha in size, are divided into plots of from 500 riverside land granted by the National Roads seed, and use no synthetic pesticide or fertilizer. AMERICA AND THE to 1 000 sq m, each cultivated by a gardener Authority in the Saladillo Sur neighbourhood; An open-air cooking class, using fresh organic vegetables, They grow vegetables intensively in high-yielding AND THE CARIBBEAN at the Molino Blanco garden park CARIBBEAN or a family. Each productive garden provides organoponic beds of compost substrate, maintain 86 employment for around 20 people, and includes soil productivity with vermicompost, green 87 ROSARIO a seedling nursery, irrigation infrastructure and a manure and mulching, and plant their crops in ROSARIO training area. rotations, to prevent pest attacks and diseases. Flowers, vegetables, herbs and medicinal As a result, the vegetables and aromatic plants plants are grown in smaller plots called huertas- grown in Rosario’s gardens are 100 percent jardines, which maintain plants, shrubs and trees organic and chemical-free. In place of that have been adapted to Rosario’s climatic certification by private agencies, the city has and growing conditions, and provide seeds and developed a system of “social certification”, with cuttings for the city’s gardening community. produce safety and quality being guaranteed In collaboration with Pro-Huerta and the by the municipality, the Gardeners’ Network, Gardeners’ Network, the urban agriculture Pro-Huerta and a network of 450 consumers, programme has also created training areas, called Vida Verde (“Green Life”), which was established eco-huertas, where citizens can learn the basics of in 2008 to promote fair trade in locally grown organic food production at home. organic food. ni o ic o Mor o i v il S t o UAF R Visual communication All production areas have facilities for washing et r u

To promote its brand, “Rosario Natural”, the urban vegetables prior to sale, and the garden parks IPES/

agriculture programme commissioned Rosario’s School are equipped with solar dryers designed by the Co r ie

of Visual Communication to design publicity materials v a and packaging for garden produce. These are some of University of Rosario’s Faculty of Engineering. J the proposed . In addition, the urban agriculture programme

o has created three “social agro-industries” – small- i r

sa scale processing units managed by community o R

, , groups, which provide work for people excluded V

ISC from the formal labour market, and add value to primary production. The units prepare vegetable trays and baskets, process produce into pie fillings, soups, jams and sweets, and make a range of natural cosmetics, such as soap, gel, lotions and shampoo, from garden herbs. Produce is sold directly from gardening sites, in weekly baskets home-delivered to consumers, to city restaurants, and through weekly “agrochemical-free vegetable fairs” that have been established in public areas in all six of the city’s districts. It is estimated that sales in GROWING GROWING GREENER 2013 amounted to 100 tonnes of vegetables and GREENER CITIES IN LATIN CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA 5 tonnes of aromatic and medicinal plants. Above: A community garden in one of Rosario’s peri-urban AMERICA AND THE AND THE CARIBBEAN barrios Right: Visitors browse the city’s agro-ecological nursery CARIBBEAN Rosario has shown that, when there is political 88 will and a clear policy of social inclusion, it sharing experiences; for many women, it has 89 ROSARIO is possible to build, in a very short time, a brought economic independence and enhanced The Rosario Gardeners’ Network recently ROSARIO successful programme for urban agriculture. In social relations. There is widespread public launched a project, funded by the Ministry of just 12 years, the programme has transformed appreciation of urban farmers as guardians Labour, to share the benefits of urban agriculture and made productive use of the city’s resources of the land, whose work improves the living with the most disadvantaged group in Rosario: by rehabilitating wastelands, recovering and environment and contributes to the food and the city’s unemployed youth. The network has revitalizing public spaces, and creating an nutrition security of all citizens. assigned plots to 140 young people, aged between alternative, sustainable supply of nutritious, Gardeners are officially recognized as 20 and 29 years, and is training them in agro- chemical-free food. entrepreneurs in Rosario’s solidarity economy, ecological production methods. The objective It has also brought important benefits to the which allows them to apply for municipal funding is to qualify the young gardeners as organic city’s low-income residents, allowing many of for their own investment projects. In 2013, twenty gardening specialists, which will allow them them to become engaged in civic construction of them were certified as professional “organic to join the formal labour market and meet the and local development. The garden has provided gardening specialists” by the Ministry of Labour, growing demand for their services in the public an occupation and a space for learning and Employment and Social Security. and private sectors.

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