By Lorraine Amollo Ambole

I have always wanted to grow my own food. But I live in the city of Nairobi, which is a concrete, dust, smog jungle. Would anything grow here? Well, apparently yes. According to the Mazingira Institute many people in Nairobi have been growing their own food in the city for decades. Not in the postmodern, allotment-garden, locavore kind of way. These urban farmers in Nairobi simply take advantage of any available space to grow food because it’s cheaper. It is the kind of urban farming that takes on from traditional subsistence farming, which is fairly common in rural areas of Kenya.

Until the recent past, most Kenyans could lay claim to at least a small piece of ancestral land, which was then used to grow food. Following colonial rule by the British, some communities were removed from their ancestral land and thus denied their livelihoods as subsistence farmers. The country is now industrialising and many people pursue other livelihoods, although farming still remains a major occupation in rural and peri-urban areas.

As Nairobi expands, urban farming has become more and more difficult within the city. The urban population therefore largely depends on commercially produced food that is highly sensitive to international price shocks. Poor households are particularly vulnerable to maize price shocks as they spend about 20% of their food expenditure on maize. It is therefore not uncommon to find slum dwellers in Nairobi who can only afford one meal per day, if at all.

In answer to this glaring food insecurity problem, there are recent government supported initiatives in slums such as Kibera vertical farms. In such initiatives, slum dwellers learn how to grow vegetables in sacks, thus making use of the available spaces within the densely populated Kibera. In one area, a dumpsite has been converted into a thriving garden that provides cheaper vegetables for the locals and a decent income for the farmers. According to Real Impact, an NGO that offers training in urban farming, vertical bag gardening not only uses less space but also requires less water, less labour and is cheaper than conventional farming.

One major concern of having urban farms in poorly serviced slums like Kibera is the possibility of environmental contamination in the food. Studies already show that food grown in some of Nairobi’s slum areas are contaminated with heavy metals such as lead. Such revelations could scare off middle and high income earners who want to eat locally-produced organic food and to support urban farmers from slums.

In my case, this concern brings me back to the point that I should be growing my own food in my own sack that I can monitor closely. And there are already so many empty spaces around my neighbourhood, where I can place such sacks. I have even contemplated growing the food inside my own apartment though I don’t know how that would work. Everything I have tried to grow so far has died, including a cactus plant. I have a black thumb for sure. My poor horticultural skills aside, I think I’m onto something. I could perhaps start a social media campaign for people in my neighbourhood to become urban farmers.

Being the largest of its kind in Kenya, my neighbourhood: Nyayo Estate Embakasi, consists of over 2500 units that are currently occupied, and more than 2000 others that will be occupied in the near future. These units are mostly organised in blocks of 8 apartments that are clustered around shared spaces. Undoubtedly, there are excellent opportunities for community gardens within this vast estate. The residents in Nyayo Embakasi are more or less in the middle class, which means they can afford to buy their groceries, and might therefore worry little over food insecurity.

But like anyone else in Nairobi, they too would be interested in community engagement initiatives that promote sustainable lifestyles. Urban gardening in Nyayo would offer great opportunities for such engagement. The residents are already organised around issues of security and home ownership, and so it would not be a stretch for them to have community gardens. The estate guidelines however clearly stipulate that gardening is professionally managed by a designated firm, whose idea of gardening is flowers and grass that should not be stepped on. So my erecting sacks around the neighbourhood could be seen as a nuisance if not downright illegal.

It’s an idea worth considering though, and maybe other middle and high income areas would pick up on it, and green Nairobi and get their food while they are at it. As for the urban farming that’s ongoing in Nairobi slums, there is need to mitigate environmental contamination and ensure the produce is fit for consumption. The urban farmers in slums could also link up with organic food outlets outside of the slums so as to provide a steady market for their produce. Perhaps even the rooftops of commercial buildings in Nairobi can be used to grow food, if Nairobi County can pass a Paris-style legislation for greening rooftops in new commercial buildings. Nairobi, after all, has one of the highest growth rates per annum in Africa, and so sustainable food production should be at the top of our planning agenda.

Lorraine Amollo Ambole is a tutorial fellow at the School of the Arts and Design at University of Nairobi, Kenya. She is also a PhD candidate at the School of Public Leadership at University of Stellenbosch in South Africa. Her current research interests are: social design, community participation and transdisciplinarity. She also enjoys writing about Nairobi, her hometown. You can contact her about urban gardening in Nairobi at:  [email protected] or [email protected].  

 

 

Nairobi Planning Innovations is very pleased to interview Dr. David Nilsson, an urban environmentalist who has been working with long-term change and development issues in sub-Saharan Africa for the last 16 years. Now based in Sweden, he works as a consultant and as a researcher at KTH Royal Institute of Technology. David previously lived in Nairobi for many years and was involved in an important study by UN-Habitat and the Institut Francais de Recherche en Afrique (IFRA) on  “Access to Water in Nairobi” . The project started in 2011 and generated important insights into equity issues as regards to water and sanitation access in the city. It will be the focus of our interview.

NPI: What was the motivation for doing the “Access to Water in Nairobi” project?

Just like so many other cities in developing economies, access to urban infrastructure services in Nairobi is extremely unequal. Reducing inequality is one of the most pressing challenges - perhaps the most pressing - if we are to live up to all nice words about human rights and sustainable development. The fact that huge inequalities persist in Kenya is an insult to the Bill of Rights. This project set out to develop an innovative method to analyse and visualise how large the service segregation is when it comes to water in Nairobi. But we also wanted to explain what is behind this inequality.

NPI: This research effort collected an impressive amount of data on water and household incomes. Can you briefly explain how you collected this data?

The project used a groundbreaking method, developed by IFRA, where open-source satellite images were spatially analysed and combined with a modest household survey sample of some 800 households. First of all, a set of characteristic indicators in the city landscape was identified, such as housing density, percentage of public space, tree cover, roofing material and so on. Using the satellite images, it was then possible to create a typology of different urban settings within the city based on these indicators. Once this ”map” of different urban types had been established, it was used to target the socio-economic survey. Being the first time we did this, a lot of work went into method development. But the method has a great potential for making the mapping of inequalities on the ground so much easier.

NPI: What were the most startling findings from this work?

I think that what surprised me most was not the fact that the poorest people in Nairobi pay so much for the little water they consume – this is well known - but that the rich people consume so much and pay so little. In large parts of the city – typically in the upmarket areas to the West and Northwest – consumers use well above 160 litres per capita per day. This is in line with average consumption in well-watered regions of the world, like my home country Sweden. But Kenya is a water scarce country. And now we have the richest 10% of Nairobi’s population using 45% of all the water available for consumption. This made me reinterpret my understanding of Nairobi’s water challenge from one of scarcity and poverty, to a problem of unsustainable consumption by a rich minority.

NPI: What impact do you think your work has had on Nairobi? Do you think the Nairobi Water and Sewerage Company will take into account the concerns raised about equity and wastage? Does it have incentives to do so?

The prime concern of the company is to improve economic performance and day-to-day operations, so it makes perfect sense for them to reduce wastage and illegal water use. But they have too few incentives to really focus on equity. It is the County, Athi Water Board, and the national regulator who need to create such incentives for the operator. Today the regulator, the Water Services Regulator Board (WASREB), ranks water operators almost exclusively on their economic performance. If the national regulator doesn’t take service equality seriously, why should the water company care? But I know that Nairobi Water and Sewerage Co is struggling to provide better service also to poor people. In the end, Nairobi’s one million unconnected offers a potential market, although the rich and already connected users of course is a much more lucrative market segment.

NPI: Based on your expertise and experience in Nairobi, including this project work, what are the most pressing interventions that need to happen if the city is “to achieve by 2030, universal and equitable access to safe and affordable drinking water for all as well as access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all” (SDG 6)?

Several things need to happen as there is no universal cure. First of all, accountability in the sector has to be severely strengthened to root out corruption and to ensure that ordinary people’s voices are heard. Civil society will hence be crucial as watchdogs, but politicians and technocrats also need to show some leadership. Secondly, donor agencies need to put their money where their mouth is and stop funding large-scale supply-oriented solutions while there is still rampant inefficiency, wastage and inequality on the distribution side. Yes, Nairobi has recurrent water shortages. But large-scale bulkwater transfer solutions now advocated by the World Bank and others will first and foremost benefit rich Nairobians and foreign technology suppliers. Thirdly, we need locally engaged and genuinely committed research and development activity on the ground. Innovation actors in Nairobi can - and must - develop solutions that work here. Unfortunately there’s no off-the-shelf solution that can be imported to fix things up quickly.

NPI: What kinds of policies around Water and Sanitation should Nairobians advocate for in your view to achieve SDG6?

None. There is too much emphasis on policy development. I have studied the water policy landscape in Kenya since before the Water Bill of 1929. Nowadays, governments and donors seem to believe that to achieve a societal goal, it always starts with a policy or the passing of a law. At the same time we all know that enforcement and policy effectiveness is a totally different story. I think to achieve SDG 6, Kenyans should not spend another ten years refining policies and legislation, but instead nurture a vivid debate in society about equality, and if the city should be for everyone. A culture of accountability, of hard work and of  “harambee”, is much more crucial than any policy in the world.

NPI: Thank you so much! I hope this interview will contribute to the needed debate on water and inequality in Nairobi. NPI readers can learn more from the Access to Water project here including the recommendations that came out of this work.

 

 

 

Jacqueline M Klopp, Columbia University and Jeffrey W Paller, Columbia University

Recently, world leaders gathered in New York to commit to the new sustainable development goals. For the first time, a specifically urban goal is among the 17 goals to be achieved by 2030.

This goal is to “make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable”. It reflects growing recognition that human development depends on how well urbanisation is managed. According to Dr Joan Clos, Executive Director of UN-Habitat and former mayor of Barcelona, the global view of “cities as containers of problems” must change. Cities are, in fact, “accelerators of development”.

This is important for Africa, where despite high urbanisation rates the development focus has been primarily rural. Consider Ghana. The country’s urban population has grown from four million in 1984 to more than 14 million today. Fifty one percent of Ghanaians now live in cities. While urbanisation rates vary across Africa, Ghana reflects an overall global trend towards a predominantly urban future.

Ghana demonstrates how cities can be highly productive in Africa. One World Bank report draws an explicit link between urbanisation, productivity, and poverty reduction. Over the same period of its urban growth annual GDP growth has averaged 5.7%. The number of industrial and service jobs has increased by 21% and the capital city, Accra, has registered a 20% reduction in poverty.

Similarly, the Nairobi metropolitan region generates at least 50% of Kenya’s GDP. While it has too many unemployed youth and significant poverty, the more rural counties in Kenya are often the poorest.

The scarcity of affordable housing

As Africa’s cities grow, the challenge will be to provide adequate services and equitable access to its opportunities. Currently, large gaps exist between needed and current services and infrastructure. One result of this gap is an affordable housing crisis. This produces slums, often near expensive gated communities and suburbs.

Transit services are overstretched and spaces that connect people to work and create a more socially inclusive civic culture need to be supported, fostered or created by African architects, artists and planners with citizens and government.

Like many other countries in Africa, Ghana’s urban housing stock is growing. But, like many cities across the globe, much of this housing is for the middle and upper classes, and the housing is not growing fast enough. African real estate is hot. In Nairobi real estate investment gives a high rate of return - more than almost any other sector.

This housing demand is an incredible investment and growth opportunity if managed effectively. Given current housing inequalities the question is: how will this sector develop in an “inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable” way?

With Chinese, European Union and African Development Bank involvement, investment is flowing into urban infrastructure, especially road building all over the continent. But are these investments helping to create access to safe, affordable, accessible and sustainable transport systems for all? Are they doing all of this taking into account the needs of the vulnerable as aspired to by the new sustainable development goal?

More often than not, Africa’s cities are building high carbon, unsafe infrastructure for the minority with cars, not the majority who need or want excellent mass transit and healthy and affordable options like cycling and walking.

The biggest challenge is politics

Often the mantra about African cities is that poor planning is an obstacle to unlocking the promise of urbanisation. Much of the problem dates back to the colonial period. Planning does need to be reinvented to address the specific needs of African citizens. More often than not these citizens were and are victims of planning instead of beneficiaries.

Ghana has had a series of plans for its cities since the colonial period. The 1958 Town Plan for Accra pointed to the small and insecure land market as a problem for the provision of housing, and formed state bodies to address the issue.

The Strategic Plan of 1991 sought greater collaboration between agencies, as well as coordination with international funders - the perennial problem that is not entirely the fault of African cities. The World Bank report highlights some of the same problems, without outlining a political solution.

Like cities in Ghana and elsewhere, Nairobi has had a series of “master plans”. From the 1948 “Plan for a colonial capital” to an excellent 1973 Metropolitan Growth Strategy, which was never properly adopted or implemented. The more recent Nairobi Metro 2030 and Nairobi Master Plan reflect the heavy use of foreign consultants in planning.

These “plans” have not passed through any elected body and often reflect a high modernist vision that justifies large infrastructure projects and excludes attention to citizen priorities.

The central problem to unlocking equitable opportunities in African cities remains politics. In today’s competitive multi-party environment, leaders make political calculations that privilege short-term horizons to win votes over long-term solutions to urban problems. Most critical, many urban planning problems are the result of power struggles and, in particular, the capture of “public goods” such as land or transit routes for certain interests.

Communities must be involved

Many politicians have an interest in maintaining insecure rights around these critical public goods needed for making a city function, because they are part of networks that benefit from the status quo. In Ghana, some traditional authorities benefit from selling land multiple times.

This contributes to numerous land disputes that get stuck in an underdeveloped legal system. In Kenya, “land grabbing” wreaks havoc on land-use and transport planning. The outcome is the escalation of the cost of urban improvements and it encourages environmental disaster.

Community leaders and their followers often internalise societal norms to win elections. For example, politicians strive to be parents, employers and friends to their constituents, often using state goods and resources as patronage for their political supporters.

This undermines the achievement of sustainable and inclusive cities. Of course, some neighbourhoods can and do sustain civic cultures and public service, and it is these communities that deserve more attention.

For projects and policies to have the desired results of improved urban space, better transit or more affordable housing, incentives need to be reshaped to make it beneficial to follow sound policy prescriptions and play by the official rules.

Registering land and businesses should be profitable and not invite predation. Relocation to and development of new neighbourhoods should consider local architectural, social, and economic preferences but also equity. And providing public goods and services to all citizens including newcomers should contribute to electoral advantages.

The mayors from Johannesburg and Maputo came to New York to explicitly signal their support for the sustainable development goals, and especially Goal 11, which promotes inclusive, safe and sustainable cities and settlements. Whether progress will be made on these laudable goals will depend on politicians working in collaboration with citizens.

As people continue to move to urban areas in Africa in search of opportunity, let’s hope that they can help fashion an urban politics that gives birth to the kinds of cities that are better for all.

Jacqueline M Klopp, Associate Research Scholar, Center for Sustainable Urban Development, Columbia University and Jeffrey W Paller, Post-doctoral Research Fellow , Columbia University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Last week in New York, the world’s leaders signed a commitment to achieve a new set of sustainable development goals by 2030. Reflecting growing recognition of the importance of cities for human development, sustainable development goal 11 specifically addresses improving cities and human settlements to make them “inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable”. The seven specific targets for this goal can be read here but note that it includes affordable housing and slum upgrading and  “access to safe, affordable, accessible and sustainable transport systems for all, improving road safety, notably by expanding public transport, with special attention to the needs of those in vulnerable situations, women, children, persons with disabilities and older persons”- key areas for improvement in Nairobi- along with other critical target areas. A number of African cities, including Joburg and Maputo, have explicitly signed on to supporting these goals and also using them as part of their strategic planning.  Will Nairobi join them?

For Nairobi to contribute to achieving these goals, it will need to improve its governance performance. Recently,  the Auditor General’s report for Nairobi County Executive and Assembly for the year 2013-2014 was released. It makes for sober but familiar reading, detailing no doubt deliberate financial disorganisation, the usual appalling land grabbing and the failure to collect rates  that could be put into better service delivery if the financial system had more integrity (read the reports here). Using the new sustainable development goals and targets, Nairobi residents might assess where they want to go and  after reading the AG report demand what specifically needs to change in county gover
nance to ensure that it happens. Nairobi, with all is remarkable assets, should gear up to meeting the new urban sustainable development goal targets-but, as the AG report makes clear, this will take some changes.

What can we do to fix traffic congestion in Nairobi? Matatu driver’s perspective….

Today, Ipsos Ltd released an opinion poll on transportation in Nairobi. Funded by the Center for Sustainable Urban Development and released with the Kenyan Alliance of Resident Associations, the poll (full results here and a video of highlights here) asked over 800 Nairobi residents what their transportation experiences and concerns are. Too often it seems that transportation experts do not consult with the users of transportation services and roads-forgetting that most people walk or ride matatus. The poll looked at car owning households (401) and a representative sample of Nairobi citizens (415)  with an error bar of +/- 4.9%.

First, the poll shows that Nairobians clearly do not feel that they are consulted in transportation decision-making. When asked “when decisions about transportation are made in Nairobi City County, do you think members of the public like you are consulted?” 89% said no. Mr Martin Eshiwani of the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure who attended the release conceded that more could be done to connect with the public. The opinion poll, which is becoming more common as a tool for planners, piqued his interest.

Secondly, Nairobians agree completely on some issues. The poll indicates mass support for flexible work hours (91%) and slower speed limits generally (68%) and near schools (98%) especially.These findings are roughly the same whether your household has a car or not. Note that a lower speed limit near schools is the point of contention for some members of parliament when considering passing the Traffic Amendment Bill 2014.  The bill proposes 30 km/hr, and some MPs in the transportation committee want to change this to 50 km/hr, the existing general speed limit. Bright Oywaya of the Kenyan Road Safety task force noted that the survey supports passage of the Traffic Amendment BIll 2014 as is. She explained that if a child is hit at 30 km/hr, the survival rate is 90%. As speed increases the survival rate plummets. This is the scientific reason for the 30 km/hr limit near schools in the Bill. The results also show that a majority of children walk or take a school bus or matatu to work and that roughly a third of parents think this is unsafe or somewhat safe. Road crashes and poor driving as well as crime remain concerns for parents.

It is no surprise to many that the majority of people take matatus (71%) and walk (42%) every day. It is clear that rail and cycling are very neglected as transportation modes with very few using them on a regular basis. Even car owning households use matatus (37%) and also walk (27%). Security for those taking matatus and personal cars, waiting for the bus or walking on the streets is a major concern.

Most interesting is that about a third of people including those with access to a car would consider riding a bike to move around if there were special lanes for bikes. This reflects the growing interest among the middle class in cycling, but the current transportation infrastructure does not support this interest that if realised would help with congestion. Cyclists have started to develop a cycling map of Nairobi that indicates where they would like to see new lanes.

Air quality is also an issue with a majority of people deeming the air bad or very bad (69%) and seeing an impact on their health (93%). Transportation is a major source of Nairobi’s air pollution. Still, the majority of people without cars aspire to have one; if current neglect of walking, cycling, rail and matatu improvements continue, then the city is even in more trouble. Already, those surveyed said they lost one hour or more on a typical weekday (48%), a figure that rises to 57% among people in car owning households. Over a third of people lost a job or business opportunity because of transport problems. This may be why many car users in the city seem interested in other options.