More than 50% of the world’s population - around 3.9 billion people - live in urban areas, yet poverty is mostly rural. In fact, almost 80% of those living on less than US$2 per day live in rural areas and 63% of the world’s poor work in agriculture. The Middle East and North Africa region is not an exception.
However these dynamics are changing and by 2050 the number of people living in urban areas is expected to rise to 66%. Despite this, very little is known about the direct and indirect consequences that these changes will have on our food systems. The relationship between urban and rural areas is changing in countries all over the world. Cities are extending into peri-urban and rural areas, further blurring the lines between what was traditionally considered ‘urban’ and ‘rural’. At the same time, many areas previously classified as rural or peri-urban are growing rapidly, often in an unplanned manner, resulting in increased rural-urban linkages.
Will an ever increasing number of urban consumers have enough food? Will agricultural production be sufficient to feed everybody? Is the expansion of urban areas threatening crop-land and productivity? What polices are needed to ensure food security and nutrition for all across the rural-urban continuum?Answers to these questions are not straightforward. They require us to re-think the nexus between rural and urban areas, socio-economic development and food systems, re-think traditional policy approaches focusing exclusively on urban or rural areas and move towards more integrated planning of rural and urban spaces.
Increased rural-urban linkages present multiple opportunities for achieving food security and nutrition in complex and interlinked ways throughout food systems. For example, they can help achieve productivity increases as a result of better access to technology or greater investment; they can generate employment and income generation; and they can facilitate access to more diverse and nutritious products, services and infrastructure. But these dynamics can also work in the opposite direction and result in exacerbating poverty, exclusion and, ultimately, food insecurity and malnutrition.
IFAD’s 2016 Rural Development Report clearly evidences the role of agricultural growth as a stimulus to inclusive rural transformation to ensure inclusive economic growth, sustainable development, and food security.
But how can governments support inclusive rural transformation? Investments are key, of course. Both more and better investments, public and private, domestic and international, are essential to realize the full potential of rural areas in terms of productivity, employment and, more generally, sustainable development.
The right policies are essential. Achieving inclusive rural transformation will only be possible if policy-makers adopt an integrated approach to address the challenges of urbanization and rural transformation while taking full advantage of the opportunities that they present. Such integrated policies would promote agricultural productivity particularly that of smallholders, promote rural development and income diversification, strengthen social protection mechanisms, and improve infrastructure and investment in education and health. Good policies at national, regional and global level would ensure that rural transformation does not happen at the expense of marginalized groups and individuals. This is where an intergovernmental body like the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) comes in.
CFS promotes global policy convergence to eradicate hunger and stop malnutrition in all its forms. CFS works with all stakeholders – not only governments – and enables them to participate in policy formulation to ensure CFS work is connected to reality and results in concrete recommendations that will address the needs of the food insecure.
CFS policy recommendations are adopted by governments, but they have been developed inclusively, through a multi-stakeholder process that ensures everyone’s voice is heard. This participatory approach gives CFS policy recommendations their broad legitimacy.
The Voluntary Guidelines on the responsible governance of tenure of land, fisheries and forestry (VGGTs); The Principles for Responsible Investments in Agriculture and Food Systems (RAI); and the policy recommendations on Connecting Smallholders to Markets, all endorsed by the Committee, are just three examples of CFS policy instruments. They demonstrate how governments can work together and with all stakeholders to support country-led efforts to produce policies for inclusive rural transformation which ensure food security for all.
Another way governments and other stakeholders work together in CFS is by sharing lessons and good practices, and discussing challenges and how to address them. CFS provides a space for participants to exchange practical examples and to understand the catalysts and constraints to making rural transformation work for food security and nutrition. These exchanges are important for connecting the work of CFS to reality on the ground. For example in its last Plenary session, in October 2016, CFS held a Forum on Rural Transformation and Urbanization, which debated the major trends and drivers of the changes observed in rural and urban settings and their implications for global food security and nutrition. During the course of 2017 CFS will also be compiling experiences and effective policy approaches in addressing food security and nutrition in the context of changing rural-urban dynamics with a view to deriving lessons and key policy messages.
We cannot ignore the fact that rural areas are already profoundly transforming. We need to be able to manage this process or we will find ourselves overwhelmed and the most vulnerable will suffer. By driving this transformation, countries can better achieve their ultimate goals of ending poverty, boosting equality, increasing food security, ensuring good nutrition and rising social inclusion.
