Transition support system approach for urban food security in the future : The case of Ghana

Abstract

Marijke Kuiper, Lindsay Shutes, 2019. Transition support system approach for urban food security in the future; The case of Ghana. Wageningen, Wageningen Economic Research, Report 2019-057a. 44 pp.; 25 fig.; 7 tab.; 22 ref.The population of the world is becoming increasingly urbanised due to a combination of natural population growth and rural-urban migration. This will pose major challenges to feed the future population and meet the Sustainable Development Goals. Meeting these complex challenges requires an integrated approach. The transition support system (TSS) approach integrates decision support tools and stakeholder analyses for these complex issues. This study has focused attention on the application of decision support tools of the TSS approach that visualises the urgency of future food security as a proof of concept. To this end, the future food security of the city of Accra, the capital of Ghana, has been taken as a case study. The use of Global-Detector and its maps illustrated a quick way to downscale data and projections from MAGNET (Modular Applied GeNeral Equilibrium Tool) and perform spatial analyses without the burden of acquiring additional data. Downscaling of macroeconomic results of future projections provides insights into future urban food security. Given these insights, stakeholders might urge policy or interventions. The results of the exercise are largely determined by the availability of data and maps; in particular, the more detailed information is available, the more accurate the results of our exercise will be.

Food Secure Metropolitan Areas: The Transition Support System Approach

“…With time, the area required to suffice the demand for vegetables and fruit in greater Accra under the Ecotopia scenario increased gradually. In addition, the area for fruit and vegetables production per grid cell decreases as the areas are turning increasingly green from panel (a) to (c) in Figure 5-see [55] for more elaborated analyses. In the expert meeting these maps were discussed.…”

“…The main issue for urban food security is how the consumption of these commodities will develop under different scenarios and whether Ghana can stay self-supporting with respect to their production of these commodities. This was explored through virtual production maps based on the results of projections with the global economic model MAGNET, see for more details on databases and software use [55].…”

“…The virtual production maps of Accra were obtained with an iterative procedure to search for production areas in the vicinity of Accra, so that supply of commodities would meet the demand in the Accra area. Figure 5 shows an example of vegetable and fruit production projections under the Ecotopia scenario in 2010, 2030 and 2050 [55]. In 2010, the virtual production circle of vegetables and fruits for a self-sufficient greater Accra was a 35 km radius (area of 56,900 ha and 5.9 million people living in this circle).…”