Publications: Hungry Cities Papers

The COVID-19 pandemic has continued to spread worldwide, threatening people’s health as well as their food security. Yet, empirical research investigating its impacts on food security is scant. Limited attention has been paid to the local food security management implications of an infectious disease pandemic. To narrow these gaps, this study investigated the development of…

Even though urban poverty is a key component of the development agenda in Nairobi with a focus on job creation, provision of basic infrastructure (such as roads and clean drinking water), food security has traditionally been omitted by city planners and managers despite its centrality to people’s health and wellbeing. One of the consequences of…

This discussion paper analyzes the impact of a multiplicity of actors, policies, and practices on the food security of refugees and asylum seekers in South Africa’s urban spaces. Building on recent work that focuses on the legal production of illegality, institutionalization of precarity, and the reproduction of bordering practices by the state and citizenry, the…

After decades of famine and thousands of deaths caused by food shortages and starvation, China was able to achieve food security for the majority of its population through ensuring food availability. Despite this, during COVID-19, the government needed to heighten their responses to ensure food security and faced several challenges in doing so. This paper…

Over the past decade and a half, food policies have undergone much change as decentralization and the reliance on free markets have escalated. Increasing levels of research into the traditional wholesaling system prompted Indian lawmakers to embark upon reform. Using evidence obtained from doctoral research in Bangalore, India, this paper demonstrates that the traditional system…

Like many emerging economies in the Global South, China is experiencing major transformations of its national and local food system characterized by the rise of supermarkets. There has been an ongoing debate on the relationship between the supermarket and the wet market in developing countries. Drawing on data from a city-wide supermarket mapping and surveys…

The geographical concentration of poverty in informal neighbourhoods across cities is a common socio-economic feature of the urban form. Many of these impoverished areas also suffer from limited access to urban infrastructure. Given the expense and planning necessary to develop urban infrastructure, these areas are socially vulnerable in part because of their exclusion from urban…

South-South migration is an important, though poorly researched, component of the global migration regime. This discussion paper focuses on the movement of migrants from one country in the Global South to live and work in urban areas of another. While they move from one country to another for a variety of reasons and with variable…

China’s food retailing sector is transitioning towards a digitalized consumer society in the context of widespread food safety anxiety. At the forefront of this transition is an innovative form of food retailing called New Retail Businesses (NRBs). Based on field research and interviews with key stakeholders in Nanjing, this study outlines distinctive features of NRBs…

The key urban food governance question in African and other Southern cities is understanding the role that appropriate infrastructures could play in delivering positive outcomes in the urban food system. This discussion paper looks at urban food governance needs in African cities and reflects on the governance actions required in order to respond to wider…