Envisioning Opportunities for Agriculture in Peri-Urban Areas

Peri-Urban Food Production and Its Relation to Urban Resilience

“…Previous research, however, stresses that transforming a traditional farming business into a multifunctional enterprise is not as straightforward as it seems [24]. Significant investment in terms of time and money and a range of specific skills are necessary to achieve multifunctional agriculture.…”

“…Significant investment in terms of time and money and a range of specific skills are necessary to achieve multifunctional agriculture. Approaching multifunctionality as a territorial concept instead of a farm-level concept might offer opportunities for the future development of peri-urban areas [24,69]. This would, however, require a shift from individual actions to collective and coordinated actions in order to organize the entire set of functions in an efficient way.…”

“…For example, it can create increased landscape and species diversity, recreational opportunities, attractive living environments, and it may play a role in adapting to climate change and reconnecting urban regions to food production. These soft location-based factors have become more relevant due to international competition between urban regions [23,24].…”

“…Besides agronomic knowledge, they also need good marketing and management skills to set up a business models that fully exploits the vicinity of the city. Contradictions in legislation are complicating the development of such multifunctional farming activities (see [24]). …”

“…Data on changes in the number of farms, farmland area, farm type and crops grown were based on national agricultural statistics and the Flemish version of the European land parcel identification system. After analysing these data, they were used as the starting point for a group discussion with the stakeholders [24].…”