Urban food security in Sierra Leone
As a continuation of ETC/RUAF's earlier work in Freetown, and directly linked to the new RUAF-FStT programme, RUAF's partners ETC and IWMI-Ghana collaborate in Sierra Leone with the Italian NGO COOPI in a 4-year Urban Food Security project in Freetown/Western Area (2009-2012), implemented in partnership with Sierra Leone Youth Empowerment Organisation, the Sierra Leone National Association of Farmers, Njala University and other local and national institutional and civil society stakeholders participating in the Freetown Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture Platform, FUPAP. (More)
SARNISSA-Sustainable Aquaculture Research Networks In Sub Saharan Africa Sustainable Aquaculture Research Networks in sub Saharan Africa (SARNISSA, 2008-2011; funded by the European Commission) was originally devised and set up by 3 African (Worldfish Center Cairo, IRAD Cameroon, Bunda College University of Malawi), 4 European (University of Stirling and CABI UK, CIRAD France, and ETC Urban Agriculture The Netherlands and one Asian partner (Asian Institute of Technology, Bangkok) to address one of the key constraints to the development of aquaculture within Sub Saharan Africa (SSA). (More)
SWITCH Sustainable Water management Improves Tomorrow's Cities' Health. The SWITCH Project aims to contribute to the development of efficient, sustainable and interactive urban water systems and services by developing an integrated, flexible and strategic approach towards sustainable urban water management. (More)
Senior stakeholder dissemination and engagement under the PAPUSSA (Production in Aquatic Peri-urban Systems in SE Asia) project
The EU funded PAPUSSA project (2003-2006) is a collaborative research project of European organisations and Asian partners in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam, Phnom Penh in Cambodia, and Bangkok in Thailand. The PAPUSSA project is coordinated by the Institute of Aquaculture, University of Stirling, Scotland. The overall objective of the PAPUSSA project is to provide a detailed, holistic situation analysis of peri-urban aquatic food production systems in 4 cities in Southeast Asia followed by pilot studies in each which will test improved strategies and monitor impacts on the system, producers, consumers and the institutions involved. (More)
Social Organisations of Urban and Peri-urban Producers: management models and innovative partnerships for policy advocacy
This action-oriented research project (2005-2006) coordinated by IPES- Promotion for Sustainable Development (Peru) and ETC-UA (the Netherlands) analysed the organisational and management models of eight organisations of urban producers in Latin America and Europe and the strategies these organisations have applied to influence local policies and secure their access to land and other resources. The input of ETC-UA in this project focused on the coordination of the European case studies (the Netherlands and Hungary), development of an inter-regional action agenda for strengthening producer organisation, organisation of an north-south exchange visit and development of a promotional DVD (the latter in collaboration with FAO). (More)
Making the Edible Landscape: integrating urban agriculture into urban development and design
This project (2004-2006), that is coordinated by the Minimum Cost Housing Group- School of Architecture of the McGill University in Montreal, Canada, sought to creatively involve local authorities, architects and urban planners in a collaborative and participatory process to integrate urban agriculture (UA) in processes of neighbourhood improvement, slum upgrading and construction. The input of ETC-UA in this project concentrated on supporting local processes in the 3 participating cities (field coordination) and related capacity development activities, monitoring and evaluation. (More)
RUAF-phase 3 (2009-2010): From Seed to Table (FStT)
The RUAF partners have started the new phase of the RUAF programme From Seed to Table (2009-2010), which builds on the results of the Cities Farming for the Future programme. As indicated above, the RUAF-CFF programme has been successful in effectively tackling some of the constraints limiting the development of safe and sustainable urban agriculture, notably the integration in urban policies and programmes and improved access to land, by facilitating capacity development among local authorities and other local stakeholders and facilitating multi-stakeholder policy making and action planning on urban agriculture. Both the enhanced integration of urban agriculture in urban policies and planning, and the strong participation of urban farmers and other stakeholder in this planning process, have paved the way for the current RUAF-FStT Programme, focussed on supporting poor urban farmers to develop safe and sustainable production, processing and marketing systems. In doing so, the FStT project will contribute to:
- Enhancing the income and food security of farming households by implementing "From Seed to Table" Projects (stimulating the transition from subsistence to more sustainable forms of urban agriculture)
- Strengthening the organisation of urban farmers groups and organisations and their capacities to innovate their farming systems and market chains and participate in multi-stakeholder dialogue and planning
- Enhancing the access of urban producers to (innovative forms of) credit and financing of urban agriculture activities, and
- Further consolidating the recently established City Multi-stakeholder Forums on Urban Agriculture in the partner cities and advance in national policy formulation on urban agriculture. (More)
RUAF-phase 2 (2005-2008): Cities Farming for the Future (CFF)
The CFF programme -the follow up to the first phase (1999-2004) of the RUAF core programme- seeks to make a contribution to urban poverty reduction, urban food security, improved urban environmental management, empowerment of urban farmers and participatory city governance by capacity development of local stakeholders in urban agriculture and facilitating participatory and multi-stakeholder policy formulation and action planning on urban agriculture, including safe reuse of urban organic wastes and wastewater. (More)
RUAF-phase 1 (1999-2004): Resource Centres on Urban Agriculture and Food Security
The RUAF-phase 1 was basically a global information and communication project aiming to enhance awareness of policy makers and development organisations of the importance of urban agriculture for urban poverty alleviation, nutrition and food security, waste recycling, etcetera, to improve access of local stakeholders in urban agriculture to research data and project experiences and to facilitate regional networking and exchange of information on urban agriculture. (More)
Soil and Water management in urban Agriculture Production in Urban Areas in CEE/NIS countries (SWAPUA)
The SWAPUA project aimed to contribute to policy development on urban agriculture by increasing the knowledge on presence and types of urban and peri-urban agriculture in CEE/NIS countries, identification of main problems and possible solutions, especially with respect to soil and water management in urban and peri-urban agriculture. (More)
Small projects
Urban Agriculture in Istanbul, Turkey
The main target of the project is to support and train unemployed, poor women of Gürpinar in developing agricultural activities (e.g composting, processing, marketing and organisation) and to sustain these urban agricultural activities in the future.
Preparation of Two Publications on Gender and Urban Agriculture This project aims to take the knowledge development in the area of gender and urban agriculture a step further, by publication of experiences gained in various countries regarding gender in urban agriculture as well as by developing a set of guidelines on how to strengthen attention to gender issues in planning, implementation and monitoring of urban agriculture research and action projects.As a continuation of ETC/RUAF's earlier work in Freetown, and directly linked to the new RUAF-FStT programme, RUAF's partners ETC and IWMI-Ghana collaborate in Sierra Leone with the Italian NGO COOPI in a 4-year Urban Food Security project in Freetown/Western Area (2009-2012), implemented in partnership with Sierra Leone Youth Empowerment Organisation, the Sierra Leone National Association of Farmers , Njala University and other local and national institutional and civil society stakeholders participating in the Freetown Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture Platform, FUPAP. The programme aims to improve the livelihoods of 400 small-scale commercial urban producers, 400 urban subsistence producers and 700 youth, by promoting income generation, job creation, food security and environmental management through urban agriculture.
Policy Dialogue on “Urban Agriculture for Green, Productive and Social Inclusive Cities” at WUF IV 2008 Nanjing The main objective of the dialogue and supporting activities are to expose national and local policy makers and donor organisations to recent experiences on the development of safe and sustainable urban and peri-urban agriculture; to present accepted principles and the necessary foundation for the development of pro-active policies on urban and peri-urban agriculture at national and municipal level; and to stimulate networking and partnerships for future work on urban and peri- urban agriculture. ETC Urban agriculture did the overall coordination of the dialogue session and developed most conference material. Project partners: International Network of Resource Centres on Urban Agriculture and Food Security (RUAF), United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), International Development Research Centre (IDRC), CGIAR-Urban Harvest Programme (UH), Chinese Urban Agriculture Association (CUAC), Agricultural Bureau of Nanjing (AB). Contact: Henk de Zeeuw (h.dezeeuw@etcnl.nl)
Monitoring and evaluation
Since 2007, ETC-UA supports local IDRC partners in Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco in the development of project monitoring plans. In 3-4 day workshop partners are supported in the actual development of such a plan, while at the same time being trained in the use of various participatory and low-cost monitoring tools. To ETC-UA, monitoring refers to a continuous and systematic process of collection of information about the performance of an ongoing project. Monitoring is thus an integral part of project management and is basically aimed at continuous learning, in a way that lessons learned allow for improvement of project (and partner) performance. To this objective, indicators are being developed with the project partners to facilitate monitoring of expected outputs, outcomes and impacts. Gender mainstreaming receives specific attention. Development of the monitoring plans helps the teams to better plan for - and to a certain extent- rethink and adjust the proposed objectives and activities for their projects. The monitoring plans thus also turn into an important planning tool, apart from providing a cadre for monitoring and evaluation.
For more information: m.dubbeling@etcnl.nl
Development of policy briefs
ETC-UA organizes short training sessions on 'Development of (research-based) Policy Briefs". One such session was organized in 2008 for DANIDA staff and members of the Danish Health Research Network based in Copenhagen, Denmark. Similarly partners of the PAPUSSA network were trained in development of policy briefs on peri-urban aquaculture. Few politicians or senior policymakers have scientific backgrounds. It is also impossible for them to
have up-to-date knowledge on all issues relevant to public policy. Yet they must frequently make vital policy decisions on science, technology or budget expenditures that have widespread implications for society, such as agricultural innovations, housing developments or land use management legislation. Policy makers need to be adequately briefed about such subjects, and able to communicate their ideas about them, both to colleagues and the wider public. Scientists and civil society representatives (Non Governmental Organisations-NGOs, Community Based Organisations-CBOs, religious groups and
others) also have a stake in ensuring that accurate information about their work is effectively communicated to policymakers, as they may need to put forward recommendations on an issue about which they have specialist knowledge, they may want to put forward recommendations on issues of direct relevance to their own situation and livelihoods (or those of others they
represent), and/or they may primarily be interested in justifying their own research and projects and secure future funding. In all cases, the aim is to provide decision makers with enough information to make informed decisions, while avoiding the temptation to try to make the decisions themselves. This requires careful and well-planned engagement in processes of policy review,
design and formulation. The elaboration of research-based policy briefs is one strategy that can be used to engage with and inform policy papers. Based on concrete and ample experience, ETC-UA provides participants tips and guidelines on how to design, write and disseminate such policy briefs.
For more information: m.dubbeling@etcnl.nl