Can cities ensure their residents have access to healthy, locally sourced and affordable food? Warsaw, Berlin and Paris are exploring various solutions – from community gardens and urban farms to sustainable public procurement. How can local authorities, residents and community organisations work together to build fairer and more crisis-resilient food systems?
In September, the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw hosted a debate on urban food systems, organised by our foundation as part of the 18th edition of the ‘Warsaw Under Construction: Sovereign and Well-Fed’ festival. The panel was chaired by Katarzyna Jagiełło, an expert on climate, biodiversity and sustainable food systems. The discussion was attended by representatives from various levels of public policy, the academic community and urban practice: Antoine Guillou, Deputy Mayor of Paris for Green Spaces and Sustainable Food; Małgorzata Tracz, Member of the Sejm and a member of the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development; Sébastien Goelzer from the Vergers Urbains association, which promotes urban agriculture in Paris; Ruta Śpiewak from the Institute of Rural Development and Agriculture of the Polish Academy of Sciences; Saskia Richartz from the Berlin Food Policy Council; and Toni Karge, an urban planner and expert on urban agriculture at the Berlin Senate. The panellists shared their experiences and ideas for more resilient, democratic and sustainable urban food systems.
The aim was to uncover the network – unnoticed until reliable – which ensures the functioning of the entire urban population: food production and distribution. In an era of global political, climate and environmental crises, supply chains are facing ever-greater challenges. Heatwaves, droughts, food insecurity, high greenhouse gas emissions, unsustainable agricultural practices – how can large cities respond to these challenges and develop more resilient and sustainable food systems?
Each of these cities is implementing programmes to promote community gardening, local food initiatives and sustainable public procurement. Compared with the other cities, Warsaw is at an earlier stage of developing its food policy. The city does not yet have an official strategy in this area. In practice, this means that civil society currently plays a key role in developing this aspect of the green transition. Although Paris and Berlin have adopted food policies, a significant proportion of the work still relies on volunteers who devise, design, test and implement innovations in this field.
Urban agriculture – a viable alternative or a solution available only to a select few?
With more and more people living in cities, questions about where food comes from and how it can be produced closer to home are becoming increasingly important. Allotments, community gardens and urban farms have long demonstrated that some crops can also be grown within city limits. Today, similar initiatives are developing worldwide, increasing the proportion of food produced directly within cities. They serve not only as hubs for local integration but also help in the fight against rising temperatures and in preserving what remains of urban biodiversity. Sébastien Goelzer and Toni Karge have described urban schemes introduced in Paris and Berlin – these facilitate access to land for allotments, incorporate them into spatial planning and reinforce their importance as an integral part of urban green spaces. Thanks to these programmes, people can also acquire knowledge about food production and learn how to grow plants – this is part of our human heritage and, at the same time, a skill essential for survival.
However, the effectiveness of these programmes is hampered by slow administrative processes and a lack of funding. Particularly in Poland, where no official policy on urban gardening has been adopted, such initiatives are rare and depend on the commitment of volunteers. For the time being, such initiatives tend to involve people with greater social, cultural and financial capital, which may limit equal access to local, good-quality food. However, the more public space is covered with edible plants, the more accessible it becomes.
"We must create a different kind of landscape – an edible landscape. I believe it is important to ensure access to food and make it visible, rather than confining it solely to allotments or enclosed gardens. I believe food must be everywhere" - Sébastien Goelzer
Some of these projects aim to scale up production and transform allotments into fully-fledged farms. Małgorzata Tracz presented the Wrocław City Farm to the audience – the first project of its kind in Poland. The City Council, in collaboration with the University of Life Sciences, has transformed 6 hectares of wasteland into a farm producing 70 tonnes of organic food annually, with plans to expand operations to 30 hectares. It also fulfils social objectives: it supplies local nurseries, whilst providing high-quality employment for people at risk of social exclusion. All panellists agreed that local authorities should ensure that local food-producing initiatives have easier and cheaper access to land and should strive for better funding systems. Under the Common Agricultural Policy, support in many European countries still depends largely on farm size and takes less account of production methods, climate impact or the quality of the food produced.
Although these spaces bring many social and environmental benefits, it is clear that in cities of this size it is not possible to achieve full self-sufficiency in food production within the city limits due to the limited availability of land and its high prices. Local food initiatives and allotments are, moreover, decentralised and relatively small in scale, which makes it difficult to scale up production to the necessary levels. City officials must find other solutions to complement this model. Saskia Richartz has called for fundamental changes to public infrastructure and regulations concerning unhealthy food, which no number of community gardens will be able to replace in the long term.
"Sometimes I think, with all due respect to gardening, that this is a distraction on the part of public officials, because the scale of the problem is enormous' - Saskia Richartz
Green public procurement in Paris: municipal authorities setting a good example
For Parisians, fresh, high-quality food is an essential part of their identity and lifestyle. It is therefore no surprise that the City of Paris has been working on its food policy for almost 30 years. Antoine Guillou explained that, in order to have the desired impact on the city’s supply chains, they began by changing the sources of supply for meals distributed by the local government itself – a total of 30 million portions a day in nurseries, schools, hospitals and canteens. An ambitious plan to transform public procurement was adopted, aiming to achieve a 75 per cent share of organic food (currently already at 50 per cent) and a 50 per cent share of locally sourced products (within 250 km of Paris). This represents a shift in mindset – public procurement can take into account not only economic factors (the lowest price) but also environmental, health and social considerations.
This strengthens regional supply chains and smaller farms, which are still being squeezed out by industrial mass production reliant on pesticides and synthetic fertilisers. The problem is therefore not solely on the demand side – supply is being squeezed out by cheaper competitors offering non-organic products. Paris City Hall is developing a network of public procurement bodies and local authorities situated along the Seine. This partnership aims to establish common standards and a system that ensures stability for farmers.
Berlin has created a training programme for public canteens, aimed at shifting menus towards higher-quality food whilst maintaining relatively low prices by incorporating more plant-based products; however, there are as yet no clearly defined targets. In the Polish context, where this debate has only just begun, Ruta Śpiewak shared her pessimistic outlook regarding the pace of reform: “I fear that in 20 years’ time there will be no farms left capable of supplying high-quality food.”
How can we support local supply chains, promote preventive healthcare, tackle food poverty and still make savings? Findings from the pilot programme in Berlin
One of the pilot programmes carried out by the Berlin Food Policy Council – a non-governmental organisation that developed Berlin’s food policy and pushed for its adoption – shows that a more holistic approach to the food system is also the most realistic. Due to the lack of permanent funding for projects and the interdependence of many issues, other available administrative budgets were considered, and one of them seemed particularly promising: the health prevention fund. Under a pilot scheme, low-income families receive a ‘prescription’ from a doctor for a subscription to fresh organic produce in exchange for a small fee. They become members of local food initiatives and are encouraged to get involved in local activities; sometimes, if they do not have a permanent job, they join organic farms as workers.
"We have just carried out research into food poverty in Berlin – a large, affluent metropolis – and it turned out that 10 per cent of residents skip meals (...) because of financial issue" - Saskia Richartz
The programme has demonstrated a positive impact on both physical and mental wellbeing, including improved eating habits, lower blood pressure and reduced social isolation. By targeting low-income groups, this programme improves food equity by increasing access to high-quality produce. With an annual cost of around 500 euros per family, this is a highly cost-effective initiative that can yield significant long-term savings for the healthcare system by preventing health problems linked to diet, stress and loneliness. Another initiative, similar in some respects, has been introduced in Strasbourg, where pregnant women receive parcels containing organic, nutritious produce from local farms.
Recommendations
This discussion has highlighted a number of courses of action that cities can take to ensure greater food security, reduce agriculture-related emissions, improve residents’ health and lower temperatures during heatwaves. Firstly, sufficient affordable land must be made available for allotments and organic farms. Secondly, targets should be set for more sustainable public procurement based on short supply chains. Thirdly, local food initiatives and organic farms should receive better funding. Fourthly, education on food systems and low-carbon diets should be developed. Fifthly, edible plants must become a permanent feature of the urban landscape. Implementing these measures requires cooperation between local authorities, residents, farmers and community organisations, but it can make cities more resilient to crises, fairer and more people-friendly.
The views and conclusions expressed in this report of the debate are those of the debate participants and do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Foundation.