Frame form the film “HOME” by Yann Arthus-Bertrand. 2009

Food is indisputably one of the biggest challenges facing cities in 21st century that is seldom discussed. As cities grow at an unprecedented rate, food prices hit the roof and demand outweighs supply. So what can cities do to reintegrate food systems into the urban context? How can local, regional, national and global food systems provide sufficient and healthy food to their populations in order to survive?
To this end the cultural/architecture/arts centre Stroom Den Haag has devised a two-year program (March 2009 – December 2010) Foodprint. Food for the City that focuses on the influence food can have on the culture, shape and functioning of the city, using The Hague as a case study. On June 26, as part of the program international designers, architects, artists and thinkers took part in the Foodprint Symposium, with the aim of exploring food’s role in designing the sustainable city. A recent post on the Volume blog covers the main topics of the event: urban agriculture, city farming, community food schemes and alternative marketing. The review provides insights into talks and presentations by invited speakers (Will Allen, Debra Solomon, John Thackara, Carolyn Steel, Nils Norman, and others) committed to developing and implementing methods of urban agriculture to improve self sufficiency and food safety within cities, which leads to the closing question “Will urban agriculture maintain its grassroots and self-organized character while becoming an ‘official’ practice?”
An excellent article published by The National Geographic in June 2009, written by Joel K. Bourne Jr, Global food crisis: The end of plenty, provides a beautifully written detailed account of the gravity and complexity of the food crisis from a global perspective.