Urban Agriculture in Cape Town: Building Sustainable Livelihoods

Abstract

Much debate surrounds the economic viability of urban agriculture as a livelihood strategy for Africa’s urban poor. This debate appears most polarised in South African cities, where key critiques revolve around urban agriculture’s low level of contribution to urban food systems and household income. This study aims to find out what the value of this sector is to those who participate in it, if its economic performance is indeed so negligible. To address this question, the author studied all four non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in Cape Town who promote urban agriculture among the city’s poorest households through intensive training and extension services. Using in-depth interviews with the senior leadership of these NGOs as well as the cultivators trained and supported by them, the study finds that direct provision of food and income is far less of a consideration for the cultivators than the body of scholarship makes out. By taking a sustainable livelihoods approach, this study reveals that urban agriculture’s contribution is in fact holistic, building social capital and human capital as well as harnessing physical and natural resources, all of which improve economic viability, but not necessarily in traditional economic terms. The study concludes that an emphasis on profit maximisation tends to exclude the poorest of the poor from urban agriculture, while the more holistic sustainable livelihoods approach empowers the economically marginalised.