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Support For Urban Farming Grows

Posted by Alaina Browne, May 16, 2007 at 2:45 PM

Aid organizations such as UNICEF, the World Food Program, and the Food and Agriculture Organization are increasing their support for urban farming programs.

For the first time, global population estimates this year show that more people live in cities than in rural areas. By 2020, according to the international Resource Centre for Urban Agriculture and Forestry, some 75 percent of the world's city dwellers will live in developing countries – many of them in poverty. Already in parts of sub-Saharan Africa, according to the UN, almost three-quarters of city residents live in rapidly growing slums.

These trends present a huge challenge when it comes to food and nutrition. Bringing rural-grown produce to people living in infrastructure-poor cities is difficult. In any case, many impoverished city dwellers do not have money for fresh groceries. Many aid workers worry about a wave of city-based hunger.

Last week I learned about one of the urban farming programs happening here in the U.S. (and many other topics!) while attending Taste³. The Victory Gardens 07+ project is a pilot project taking place in San Francisco inspired in part by the Victory Gardens program of WWII which produced as much as 40% of the domestic food supply in 1943.

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Tags: urban farming