Urban agriculture

Today, India has about 30 % of people living in urban areas. The urban population is likely to increase to 50% by 2050. Such an explosion in urban population raises questions of food security and economic issues hastened by other issues such as climate change. 

Urban agriculture is one of the sustainable tools which can help in solving this issue, becoming the “savior of rapid urbanization”. Not very widespread in India, research on urban agriculture has been growing steadily in France in the past ten years. It has been more and more recognized as an efficient tool for creating more resilient cities, help fight climate change by creating cooling areas, help retain water in soils, create biodiversity spots within the cities and create bio-waste that can be reused as natural fertilizers. On top of all, it is a very powerful tool to create social bonds within the inhabitants of a neighborhood.

There are several forms of urban agriculture. Some are geared towards producing sufficient amounts of food to feed a population in need (subsistence agriculture). Others are more geared towards creating social bonds. The other forms are hybrid, oscillating between these two primary objectives.  

 In this series of conferences, we wish to discuss the benefits as well as shortfalls of urban agriculture in various contexts, keeping in mind that this practice cannot be applied in a uniformed manner across different territories.

This series of conference will take place in the presence of two representatives of the French Association for Urban Agriculture, created in 2016, that will be invited to come from France for a week-long stay:

Flore-Anaïs Brunet is the Urban Agriculture Project Manager at the “Le Mouvement des Régies,” a national network of 130 social inclusion and community development associations operating in underprivileged areas in France. With a background in horticulture and landscape engineering, along with numerous study trips to Latin America and Europe, she specializes in socially-oriented urban agriculture after working in a botanical garden and landscape design offices in Paris and Berlin. 

She possesses strong skills in network facilitation, event organization, and project support for multifunctional urban agriculture initiatives in low-income neighborhoods. She is also certified in permaculture. As the vice-president of AFAUP since 2019, she has a national understanding of the urban agriculture sector in France and represents socially-oriented urban agriculture projects, associations, and inclusion organizations.  

She particularly enjoys forging connections at various levels, fostering collective thinking, and facilitating professional networks to contribute to more fertile and peaceful communities.