Conclusion

Abstract

This book discussed some of the research in this space from cities in the ‘North and South’. Exploring examples from the past of ‘War’ and ‘Victory Gardens’, where domestic cross-sectoral and multi-actor allegiances formed to address an international or global crisis, provides a bridge to current urban social processes for city-community engagement in food systems change. In the former, world war provided the context for national, local and grassroots partnerships and, for the latter, the crisis is unpredictable in the global food system due to oil price shocks and climate change. Urban activism in North cities are engaged in hard fought campaigns for the preservation of urban space for non-economic uses, such as urban food production, and other social uses. The emergence of urban food activism in South cities, particularly is SSA, is impaired by poor urban governance that does not promote and encourage city-community partnerships in the use of space for social use value.