As the global population zooms toward an estimated 9.7 billion people at mid-century, a 34-percent increase in 35 years, more and more of them will live in cities. “By 2050, 66 percent of the world’s people are expected to live in cities, fueling unprecedented demand for food,” says a report by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. Paradoxically, urbanization will transform agriculture worldwide, says the report, “Growing food for growing cities.” With the proper support, prosperous, more-productive farms will supplant subsistence agriculture. Alternately, “there is a risk that many will be left behind” and stuck in poverty for decades to come, says the report, to be released today at the council’s annual symposium on agriculture.
“Feeding cities presents a major opportunity to improve the plight of millions of small-scale farmers and rural residents trapped in subsistence agriculture and joblessness,” says the report. “Developing the food systems that link farmers to cities will have an enormous impact on rural poverty alleviation and agricultural development.”
There will be “far fewer farmers to feed far more people,” said former agriculture secretary Dan Glickman, co-chair of the Chicago Council’s global food program. Glickman and co-chair Doug Bereuter were scheduled to present the report; Glickman gave a preview to North American Agricultural Journalists. With the change in demographics, farmers are “going to have to scale up to some degree — not giant farms — to feed” city dwellers, he said. Medium-size farms could become the norm, succeeding farms too small to provide a healthy family income. “The gender issue is big,” said Glickman.
The report includes women among the farmers in peril of being passed over by the reshaping of agriculture as the wellspring of a flood of food flowing to distant cities. “Especially vulnerable are farmers in areas far removed from cities and farmers who lack the resources needed to increase production and meet the standards often required by urban markets,” said the report. Women, who are the vast majority of farmers in Africa, “are often already more marginalized than their male counterparts and may find it difficult to access these new markets.”
“U.S. leadership will be essential,” says the report, which makes 13 recommendation grouped into four overall areas. The recommendations include U.S. leadership in, and coordination with, private-sector investments to build rural economies and create jobs. The proposal is similar to the Feed the Future initiative of the Obama administration that calls for public-private partnerships to address local food security. The report also urges the USDA to establish an undersecretary post dedicated to trade and overseas agriculture. The 2014 farm bill authorized such a post. Execution of the idea apparently will depend on the new administration taking office in January.