The practices and politics of irrigated urban agriculture

Introduction

In this special issue we focus on irrigated urban agriculture (IUA), which we define as all agricultural practices in urban areas that use any form of urban water for crop cultivation. The term urban water encompasses all water flows in an urban context, including piped water, natural streams, stormwater flows, sewage, returns from wastewater treatment plants, and combinations thereof.

IUA is a persistent reality in the rapidly urbanizing cities of the Global South, supplying, sometimes in large part, the food needs of the city, particularly fresh vegetables which perish quickly if they must be transported any distance, often in sweltering temperatures. Since the restrictions on the movement of people and food supply that were a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, IUA has become more recognized for its contribution to the availability of fresh food within cities, particularly for the urban poor (Davies et al., 2021; FAO, 2020; Simon, 2023). Prain (2022) has estimated that 11% of the world’s irrigated cropland lies within urban clusters of 50,000 people or more, and a further 30% lies in 10-km buffer zones around cities.

Beyond producing food, the green spaces provided by urban agriculture contribute to the well-being of communities at large, not least by providing green spaces that mitigate against the intensification of urban heat islands due to global climate change. In addition, IUA provides a crucial link in closing water and nutrient cycles (Haldar et al., 2022; Langemeyer et al., 2021; Tapia et al., 2021). Considering all these factors, there is reason for optimism about the role IUA could play in creating a green, circular, and food-resilient future for cities. Furthermore, the continued growth of cities in the Global South places ever greater pressures on water and food networks emphasizing the importance of making cities inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable, as outlined in Sustainable Development Goal 11 (United Nations [UN], 2023).

Despite these potentially positive signs urban agricultural practices are often contested and the very existence of urban agriculture in the city is often ignored, or even rejected and suppressed, by the regulatory authorities, who often see it as a symbol of backwardness. These differences are rooted in different visions and understandings of what a city is and ought to be.

In the Global South, most IUA consists of informal practices that are adapted as cities develop. These are diverse sociotechnical practices in and around urban settlements, appearing throughout the city on (often temporarily) vacant pieces of land, using whatever urban water resources they have access to in order to provide food for consumers and an income for producers.

IUA is part of what can be regarded as city-making-from-below, a process (or movement, albeit largely uncoordinated) which encompasses many other informal urban practices that shape the city, including water supply, sanitation, transport, housing, markets, and energy. Through their everyday practices, urban dwellers (particularly the poorer ones) seek to appropriate the city for their own ends while engaging with systems of state control and planning in diverse and unpredictable ways (Watson, 2009).

Existing policy approaches to irrigated agriculture in cities, like many other informal urban practices, are often focused on the enforcement of strict standards and rules and/or on the promotion of high-tech solutions. Drechsel et al. (2022) conclude that the shift away from solely relying on high-tech treatment solutions is challenging, despite the World Health Organization (WHO, 2006) call to move towards a strategy of risk reduction that is more suitable in this largely informal context.

This special issue of Water International brings together empirically based insights on why mainstream policy approaches that focus on rule-enforcement and technology-driven approaches have largely failed. A contextual understanding of actual urban irrigation and cultivation practices is needed to enable and embrace appropriate innovations that make a difference to end users in urban settlements in the Global South. To this end, this special issue documents how city-making from below, through locally crafted urban practices and related policies and politics, can effectively contribute to sustainable and equitable urban water management and urban food security.

This collection of papers is related to and builds upon earlier work on ‘wastewater use in agriculture’ or ‘wastewater irrigation’ (see Wichelns & Drechsel, 2011; Williams et al., 2023). However, we consciously do not make contaminated water resources central to our analysis (Wessels, 2023).

Certainly, water quality plays an important role in irrigation practices, not only in urbanizing cities in the Global South but also elsewhere. Wastewater is increasingly regarded as a resource for agriculture that can potentially free up water for other uses (Flörke et al., 2018), yet its use can pose significant health risks to different users along the value chain, especially farmers and consumers. We posit, however, that to focus primarily on the quality of wastewater emphasizes the undesirability of urban irrigation practices, while ignoring the fact that farmers often have limited (or no) control over the quality of the water that they can tap into, making this an inherently political issue (Wessels, 2023). Although substandard water quality can pose risks to both producers and consumers, the risks can also be sociopolitically constructed, based on normative ideas about the desirability of having farmers in the city or the use of urban water to produce food.

Our own engagement with urban dwellers’ actual irrigation practices and the growing literature on what could be called ‘city-making from below’ (Bayat, 2000; Koster & Nuijten, 2016; McFarlane, 2012) inspire us to start from the lived experiences of those people who make and re-make these practices on a day-to-day basis. By examining these contested spatial narratives and their interrelated material, political, social, and discursive dimensions, this special issue also builds on the special issue of Water International on rural–urban water struggles (Hommes et al., 2019).

Following this introduction, the next section of this editorial explores four sets of conceptual notions that we think are crucial to understanding existing IUA practices and politics, as well as the possibilities for constructive governance. We then present the individual paper contributions to this special issue, highlighting their most salient findings and relating them to the conceptual notions outlined in the previous section. Beyond describing (albeit in sketch form) the opportunities that can enable the effective contribution of IUA practices to promote circularity, resilience, and healthy cities, we also sketch out the technical and/or institutional solutions that can facilitate the harmonious coexistence of diverse interests, while taking into account their case-specific particularities and the power differentials. We conclude by drawing together the insights that this special issue offers.

Irrigated urban agriculture: conceptual notions

In this section we present four conceptual notions that can help us make sense of the dynamic developments of IUA in expanding cities. These are (1) (revisiting) the concept of relational urbanity, (2) (re-examining) the crafting of diverse sociotechnical practices, (3) the fluid and connecting characteristics of water, and (4) the linkages between informality and modernity.

A relational understanding of the urban

Geographers who study urban areas and their surroundings emphasize that the urban and the rural are not distinct spaces. Rather, they see the two as being connected through myriad relations – with many ‘urbanites’ also having places in the countryside that they are connected to, which often form part of their identities. In practice, lived urban (and rural) realities are strongly shaped by networks of flows (of goods, services, or people) across space, including across the ‘rural–urban divide’. Urban and rural areas are often interlinked and interdependent in diverse ways, potentially leading to conflicts over the arrangement of these interactions (Wessels et al., 2019). These networks create flows of exchange, movement and transaction that take place across different spaces and ‘provide the distribution grids and topological connections that link systems and practices of production with systems and practices of consumption’ (Graham & Marvin, 2001, p. 11). These flows move in both directions: from rural to urban, but also vice versa.

The realization of this interconnectedness has inspired a focus on city-region food systems (FAO & RUAF, 2015; Woods & Heley, 2017). The continuous formation and re-formation of a mixed urban–rural landscape with diverse land uses, livelihoods and lifestyles is often associated with the peri-urban: ‘the in-between space’ (FAO, Rikolto & RUAF, 2022; Follmann, 2022).

These processes are equally at play in what are generally seen as ‘urban’ and ‘rural’ spaces, making it problematic to try to define and demarcate either precisely. And even if this were possible, at any given moment in time, such an exercise would probably be very soon outdated as they are subject to (often) rapid changes that are context-specific and difficult to predict.

We recognize the importance of referring to the ‘urban’ and ‘rural’, but within a relational understanding, that is, as sets of practices, relations, connections, opportunities, and challenges (Woods & Heley, 2017). We see urban agricultural practices as making use of the resources in and around cities (or city regions) that are embedded in the local urban economic, ecological, and sociopolitical system. We also acknowledge that processes of urbanization do not necessarily respect administrative borders but take place through people planning and adapting their livelihoods within a changing environment. This relational understanding of the urban is at odds with the need for administrative distinctions between the urban and the rural, which drive urban and regional planning.

The crafting of diverse sociotechnical practices

Although IUA is almost universally present in and around cities across the Global South, it is not a singular practice, but can take on many distinct configurations. In aiming to understand this diversity, it is useful to look at them as practices that meaningfully weave together a fabric of heterogeneous sociotechnical elements and processes.

These configurations are locally crafted, based on local conditions, practices, technological artefacts, organizational arrangements, and water accessibility (Veldwisch, 2023). These sociotechnical practices do not lead to fixed end results; instead, they are subject to continuous changes that lead to their ongoing reconfiguration. Often, there is a multiplicity of such socio-technical practices within a single city, which creates both challenges and opportunities for new modes of governance and modernization arrangements. Different forms of IUA can be identified on, for instance, the basis of their scale of farming, resources (land, water, nutrients, and seeds), technologies (pumps, watering cans, drips, canals, and sprinklers) and institutions (markets, rules, and labour arrangements).

The characteristics of water and its social effects

In much of the work on urban agriculture, water remains rather implicit and is often regarded as just one of several inputs. Water, however, plays an essential role, as its availability often defines whether and where agriculture can take place, as well as how agricultural practices are configured. When there is no, limited, and/or irregular rain, agriculture is dependent on irrigation. Urban water, including wastewater, is then an attractive resource due to its year-round availability and nutrient content (Haldar et al., 2020). However, it is often not readily usable, or its use is not accepted due to the presence of pollutants, including pathogens.

This characteristic of water has important implications, as many urban farmers in the Global South rely on this water as a resource for their livelihoods. The urban water sector must deal with different demands within the city in terms of quantity and quality, including treatment efforts to address contamination and the associated risks. Despite new technologies that make the exploitation of new and unconventional water sources more feasible for different uses, irrigation water is often a limited and contested resource. Different water users hold different positions of power, both with regard to their physical location (i.e., upstream or downstream users) and their sociopolitical ability to guide the flows and qualities of water in line with their own needs. This is a potential arena of conflict.

The interface between informality and modernity

Many practices of IUA in the Global South are not well aligned with the dominant ideals and frameworks of national governance. There are often gaps between what happens on the ground and what is perceived as acceptable and desirable by these governance frameworks.

One way to think about these gaps is to label these practices as ‘informal’ (and unregulated) and their governance as attempts to formalize and bring these practices under control. In practice, however, the informal and formal are interconnected and collectively shape the urban space (Koster & Nuijten, 2016). The designation of something as formal or informal says more about the authority to legitimate than describing the reality of certain practices (Ahlers et al., 2014).

In the literature on urbanism in the Global South, hybridity has been used to blur this dichotomy (Lawhon et al., 2018). In this sense the provision of services is often a mixture of flexible and diversfied sociotechnical arrangements that cater to different demands throughout the city (Letema et al., 2014). The dichotomy between informality and formality cannot, however, be erased. It carries a powerful meaning and has material effects. Informality carries the connotation of being out of step, being exceptional, and of being ‘behind’.

By contrast, the body of literature about ‘city-making from below’ posits that this ‘informality’ is a major driving force on the development/evolution of cities in the Global South and that the ‘modern city’ is more of an exception (Pieterse, 2011; Watson, 2009). Despite this, the notion of the modern city is a powerful concept that dominates formal politics, policies, and governance. These discourses of modernization have strong historical roots and remain very influential in the paradigms and imagining of what the city should be. These discourses are equally present in agriculture, as regard to, the well documented farmer-led irrigation development schemes in rural areas (de Bont et al., 2019; Veldwisch et al., 2019; Woodhouse et al., 2017).

We argue that in studying IUA, and looking for ways to govern it, it is important to recognize that these practices take shape in the interactions between modernization paradigms and alternative ideas, ideals and lived experiences. Cities in the Global South are heterogeneous landscapes composed of highly diverse spaces, some of which are deemed to be informal. The diversity of spaces and practices has contributed to ambiguities about the scale and recognition of urban agricultural practices that persistently appear and reappear as part of transitional landscapes.

The conceptual notions presented above emphasize the relations and connections between agriculture and the city that play a formative role in shaping perceptions of and practices within IUA. Recognizing the embeddedness of agriculture in the city, through the myriad of relations that cut through definitions of formal and informal practices, allows us to think about how governance approaches can anticipate these different (planned and unplanned) forces of city-making in a context that is subject to change.

Contributions to this special issue

In this special issue, we bring together six articles that show IUA as a set of sociotechnical practices in and around different cities across the Global South that make use of a variety of different urban water sources for irrigation. Here we focus on the most salient findings from each of the papers, in relation to the conceptual notions discussed above. We also explore how these articles further our understanding of informal modalities of city-making.

Ahogle and Letema (2024) in their study of Nairobi, Kenya, found five principal forms of IUA related to different local conditions and making use of different water sources with varying suitability for irrigation. These different forms of IUA can be differentiated by farming scales, the irrigation technologies employed, the actors involved, and the water sources used. The authors use the modernized mixtures approach to show the coexistence of diverse sociotechnical configurations that meet different needs. The paper also assesses the quality of the urban water sources used and the different levels of regulation that are applied.

This paper shows that small-scale agriculture in urban open spaces is the most important supplier of fresh fruits and vegetables, but that many producers only have access to water resources that should be classified as unsuitable for irrigation due to upstream urban pollution. Yet, these producers have very limited capacity to influence upstream pollution or to advocate for their rights to clean water, because their position is not recognized by the state. The article illustrates how the sociotechnical configurations of IUA cuts across formal and informal boundaries and traditional and modern systems in the city.

In another paper, Wessels et al. (2024) show how the dominant, informal, IUA practices in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, are under pressure, both physically and ideologically, whereas other forms of IUA are seemingly embraced. The analysis of contrasting views around, and the governance responses to, IUA are linked to ‘city agriculture’ and ‘apartment agriculture’, literal translations of Swahili expressions that are both applied to urban agriculture. ‘City agriculture’ refers to farmers utilizing open spaces for horticultural production, applying a mix of urban water flows. ‘Apartment agriculture’ refers to technology-intensive agricultural systems on private properties that make use of piped, clean water.

Official ideals about what the city is ‘supposed to look like’ encourage apartment agriculture, which is perceived to embody modern ideas around efficiency, cleanliness and innovation and marginalize the existence of city agriculture. However, the innovative farming methods associated with apartment agriculture imply certain requirements (e.g., financial resources, legal land rights, access to clean water sources) that cannot be met by the great majority of urban producers. This paper thus illustrates the tensions between modernist ideals around what the city and agriculture are supposed to look like and the self-organized, informal types of agriculture that are widely present and strongly embedded in the city.

Van Vliet et al. (2024) study the relation between IUA practices and their governance in Khulna, Bangladesh and Arusha, Tanzania. In both cities, farmers build practices based on the availability of land, proximity to water sources and access to markets. This temporary access to land and water is locally arranged, despite formal rules prohibiting the use of urban space and water for agriculture. This is tolerated and even promoted by both state and non-state actors. The gap between formal rules and regulations and actual policy practices is studied by looking through the lens of service regimes. The analysis shows how informal practices are institutionalized by examining combinations of technologies, user routines, and organizational forms for providing a service. As the configuration of these practices is strongly influenced by the relations with adjacent practices, the study shows the need to study IUA in a wider context of urban dynamics.

The article by Niquice-Janeiro et al. (2024) is about water quality along the pathway from crop production to market in Maputo, Mozambique. The Infulene Valley is an important production area for horticultural crops sold to different markets in the Greater Maputo region. The farmers here rely on groundwater, river water and partially treated wastewater for irrigation. Through a combination of on-the-ground observations and water quality analysis, the authors study health risks along the value chain.

Their analysis of IUA practices, with a variety of urban water sources, demonstrates that, in terms of microbial contamination, the final product quality is influenced by both water quality at the source and practices of production and marketing along the chain. Analysis of Escherichia coli in water and lettuce samples taken at both farms and markets show that contamination levels present health risks to both producers and consumers. The study shows that the urban water sources used for irrigation practices are not the only source of contamination, and washing practices at the market may also influence the quality of the produce sold. Once again, domestic effluent is a major source of the contamination and the farmers involved have limited control over how this affects their irrigation sources or their agricultural produce.

Reyes Tejada et al. (2024) also focus on Maputo as a case study and show how urban agriculture has persisted there throughout different historical periods and how urban planning and the politics that surround urban development have shaped the responses of urban farmers. Modernist ideas on what it means to be urban have played an important role in this development, which at times has stood in stark contrast with the lived reality in the city.

The authors discuss four developmental periods to show the shifts and continuities in the relationship between farming and the city. During late colonial times, segregation in access to land created a differentiation in what types of agricultural practices were found where. Where some groups were granted the right to cultivate close to the city, others were forced to resort to distant marginalized areas. In the post-independence period, urban agricultural development aimed to strengthen the city’s capacity to feed and employ itself. Being active as an urban farmer and belonging to a farmers’ cooperative or association legitimized the right of people to practice agriculture in the city.

In the neoliberal period, a move towards a market-based economy resulted in more food insecurity due to higher food prices and urban unemployment. This led to increasing competition over the available agricultural land in Maputo; land which now less accounted for in plans and visions for Maputo’s urban development. This shows how IUA should be seen in light of the different dynamics surrounding city-making, both top-down and bottom-up.

Given the future uncertainties regarding the availability of water suitable for agriculture in city regions, Haldar et al. (2024) discuss scenarios for safeguarding water quality for IUA. Taking the Bengal Delta as an example with broader implications, the paper discusses the influence and importance of socioeconomic, environmental, and technical factors in selecting appropriate urban water treatment technologies.

It is important to look beyond the technical capacity of wastewater treatment set-ups, as the combination of local factors – such as the geographical conditions, existing infrastructure, socioeconomic capacities, and political and institutional arrangements – all play an important role in influencing the extent to which treatment ambitions can be met in the near term and sustained over the long term. Four different scenarios are simulated based on the demands for high-quality water and the economic capacity for water treatment. Finding the ‘appropriate technology’ in this way supports the reuse of urban water for local food production and contributes to the circular economy. Nonetheless, water users’ demands, in terms of the availability, timing and the quality of water can differ, creating tensions in what decisions are made in the management of urban water, including the planning of water treatment.

Implications for governance

The articles in this issue engage, in a variety of ways, with the four conceptual notions presented earlier. Applying these notions to these specific cases empirically shows that IUA

• is not restricted to a particular geographically confined (urban) area;

• is very diverse, both in the technicalities of agricultural production and water use and its socioeconomic significance;

• connects people and water uses with each other and generates contestations over both the quantity and quality of water; and

• is part of an informal and only partially controllable process of city-making-from-below while contending with formal governance which aims to regulate and control it.

In relation to these four findings, we turn to exploring the implications for governance. What are the most promising attitudes and approaches for engaging with IUA that do justice to these dynamics of bottom-up development while also providing handles for dealing with higher-level societal concerns and demands?

Before turning to concrete ideas for urban co-management of IUA practices and their governance, we first look at the currently globally emerging narratives under which IUA is being seen in a more positive light, and the drivers providing direction towards its governance. These include the drive for developing (1) greener towns and cities, (2) resilient urban food systems, and (3) healthier lives and ecosystems. Under each of these narratives, IUA could be imagined as part of the solution, although they each pose different ideas on, and technical requirements of, IUA.

The recognition of IUA as part of urban greening

The recognition of IUA as part of urban greening gives a new focus for discussion, as green spaces are invaluable resources for urban health and the natural environment. Green spaces include community and rooftop gardens, small parks, walls covered with plants, greenery along riparian reserves and urban forestry, among others. The area under IUA creates considerable green space and therefore contributes to urban health, urban climate, and other environmental outcomes. Realizing this in practice requires policies and institutions that specifically create room for IUA, and facilitate access to water sources, agricultural land, and appropriate technologies. Urban greening has been looked at from a variety of angles. In the literature it is alternately referred to as green infrastructure, ecosystem-based adaptation, and nature-based solutions. IUA is increasing recognized for making a positive contribution to sustainable urban planning and development (Cuthbert et al., 2022; UNEP & UN-Habitat, 2021).

The recognition of IUA as an important contributor to resilient urban food systems

Recognition of IUA as an important contributor to resilient urban food systems has grown in the aftermath of the COVID-19 crisis, during which IUA played a vital role in the resilience of food production and supplying urban markets. The FAO’s global study on COVID-19 (FAO, 2020) found that urban areas with closer access to agricultural land were more resilient to disruptions in their food systems. Although the actual contribution of urban agricultural practices is subject to discussion, localized food systems with short, robust linkages between producers and consumers do increase the accessibility of food for different socioeconomic groups within the city (and particularly the most vulnerable).

The recognition of IUA as contributing to healthier lives and ecosystems

The recognition of IUA as contributing to healthier lives and ecosystems provides yet another opportunity for a more positive appreciation of IUA and integrating it within formal urban development. While the urban water resources used for IUA are diverse, wastewater use is common, as also shown by the examples in this special issue. The use of (treated) wastewater in agriculture can become part of the circulation of water and nutrients in city regions. IUA practices can also play a role in water cleaning as well as in buffering water, thus mitigating flood and climate risks. Green spaces in cities mitigate against the effects of pollution and can reduce the anthropogenic urban heat island effect.

Having noted that IUA resonates positively with current global narratives, we now turn to highlighting some concrete ideas for increasing the effectiveness of the co-management of IUA. This builds on an understanding that, in practice, IUA already finds itself at the intersection of top-down (formal) and bottom-up (informal) development dynamics, which creates both challenges and opportunities. The challenges associated with co-management of IUA can be partly attributed to:

• departmentalized service regimes regarding drinking water, sanitation, waste and drainage;

• the informal nature of the practice itself in utilization of space and water sources;

• a rapid turnover of people who engage in this activity (Vidal Merino et al., 2021); and

• lack of policy support or, if it exists, non-compliance.

IUA practices, as seen from the contributions in this special issue, have continued over the decades with varying levels of support or restriction, reflecting the resilience of city making from below. Thus, there is a clash between the two city-making paradigms, which can be better addressed through co-management.

The emerging conceptual tools, interests and opportunities indicate the need to revise the roles and responsibilities of the agencies involved and to embrace multisector partnerships and cooperative approaches in governance frameworks that provide institutional support. Top-down governance and formalization programmes are both doomed to fail and run the risk of ‘smother[ing] the autonomous and/or entrepreneurial character of farmer-led irrigation’ (Duker, 2023, p. 892), whereas bottom-up practices and processes of co-creating urban space by the urban poor and by urban farmers will fail if not connected to existing (or planned) formal arrangements. There is no one-model-fits-all for governing IUA because institutionalizing IUA is complex and involves multiple sectors. Therefore, the governance structures must be strategic, consultative, and integrated in order for them to be sustainable. We view co-management in governing IUA as needing (1) room for the co-creation of urban space, and (2) cross-cutting institutional support. We elaborate on these two themes below.

Room for the co-creation of urban space

For IUA farmers to be integrated in more formal developments in a way that does justice to their interests requires the recognition of their agency and their contribution to the co-creation of urban space. Further, there is a need for greater understanding of the discursive differences and their political implications in order to create room for IUA farmers to have an effective influence in the process.

In the conceptual section we argued that the practices of IUA are often out of step with modernist governance ideals, yet that it is often the informal–formal connections, or the hybridity of relations, that ‘make things work’. While modernist ideals are institutionally and technologically concretized in urban development programmes, city-dwellers are obliged to navigate through or around them creatively: co-producing urban space on a day-to-day basis (Koster & Nuijten, 2016).

Several contributions in this issue describe such processes of joint city-making (Reyes Tejada et al., 2024; van Vliet et al., 2024; and Wessels et al., 2024), indicating that the reproduction of informal practices and their integration into, or toleration within, formal city-making is already taking place. Acknowledging these processes makes it possible for policy makers to further facilitate farmers’ initiatives in developing IUA at a larger scale, and in a more inclusive and sustainable way through public sector involvement (Izzi et al., 2021).

Cross-cutting institutional support for IUA

Positing that urban development would be served better by aiming to embrace the already ongoing processes of co-creation of urban space raises the question of ‘with whom should ordinary city dwellers engage?’ There are multiple actors and entities that have interests in different facets of IUA, such as departments or ministries of water supply, sanitation, urban planning, health, environment, and agriculture, which can exist at the local regional or national levels. Land and water, the major sectors where IUA is contested, are planned and governed separately by city planning and water and sewerage agencies. Policy attention for IUA can be minimal and its governance ad hoc, depending on the political regimes in place.

In addition, implementation by institutions and other stakeholders can be selective (or non-existent). Mechanisms of joint responsibility, and for strengthening awareness, at the local level can be a way forward. Wastewater is used for IUA yet its actual supply, as a resource, is only institutionalized in a few countries in the Global South and mechanisms for monitoring and enforcement are limited or absent. Thus, IUA practices are either tolerated or removed, based on the grounds of political, environmental, or public health concerns. As such, cross-cutting institutional support is imperative, through overarching policy, regulatory, and administrative frameworks that bring together responsible agencies to collaborate in IUA matters.

To navigate the challenges of co-management of IUA, there is a need to transform IUA’s linkages with urban planning and the management of urban water, sewerage, drainage, and sanitation. The emerging new opportunities for IUA in relation to greener cities, resilient food systems, and healthier lives and ecosystems highlight that IUA practices can contribute to sustainability, resilience, and liveability.

IUA can give a new impetus for retaining water instead of flushing, circularity instead of end-of-pipe solutions and waste resource recovery. This requires configurations of urban water flows that enable IUA to tap into large-scale centralized water systems, unbundling the infrastructure for hydraulic flows downstream of IUA, modernizing wastewater treatment plants to meet IUA reuse requirements, the introduction of user fees for quality IUA water, a separation of flows at the household level to utilize greywater in residential gardens and monitoring the quality of water flows for multiple purposes, including IUA.

Reconfigurations of technical systems to integrate IUA also requires new governance arrangements that reflect sociotechnical reconfigurations and reorganization of provision arrangements. Organizations operating in this realm need to come together in collaborative efforts, in which the active involvement of end users (i.e., farmers) plays a pivotal role in thinking about upstream treatment infrastructure.

The legitimization of IUA, by integrating it into city land-use plans, water allocation plans, county extension services, and the certification of farm produce can transform the nature of farming practices and the investments made into them. The recognition of IUA would legitimate it as a land-use category, consisting of temporary or permanent spaces, which would likely enable some urban farmers more secure land tenure and funding from national government, local authorities and perhaps, even, international donors. However, it should be noted that experience with the formalization of informal settlements shows that the poorest residents are often disenfranchised by such processes (Koster & Nuijten, 2012). When bringing IUA under formal urban development it is important to avoid these processes having a negative impact on the socioeconomic position of the existing urban farming community.

Conclusions

The benefits of irrigated urban agriculture are receiving more appreciation in relation to the contribution that they make in terms of providing food system resilience in times of disruption and the broader societal benefits related to urban greening. With the rapid growth of cities in the Global South, the role of urban farmers, as a key part of these urbanizing landscapes, is also growing in importance. However, IUA as a practice is still contested, due to different understandings of what agriculture in the city should look like, including notions of the economic viability of agricultural land use in the city, what a modern city should look like and health concerns.

Unpacking our four conceptual notions, we note that relational urbanity shifts our focus beyond city boundaries. The crafting of diverse sociotechnical practices is dynamic, abundant, and transformative at the same time, embracing the dynamism of city-making from below. The characteristics of urban water resources are diverse and IUA practitioners are opportunistic in accessing whatever resources they can access, with only limited consideration of the reuse of nutrients and/or potential health risks. The linkages between formality and ‘unruly development from below’ are intricate and crucial for policy practices and IUA practices alike. It was noted that to make room for ‘city making from below’, a paradigm shift is needed in the formal governance arrangements.

This special issue contains several examples of local government authorities condoning the continuance of urban land and water use for agriculture. However, this continuance is conditional and subservient/secondary to other land uses should the opportunity arise, although also reflecting how the practices, by their nature (showing persistency, adaptiveness, and providing food, income, and other benefits), are asserting their presence and shaping city-making from below.

The implications for governance are manifold. The governance of IUA would benefit from a landscape approach and a good understanding of resource flows through the city. A governance approach that embraces the continuous processes of city-making from below and shows appreciation of the value of IUA would create room for a process of meaningful co-creation with urban farmers. At the same time, there are broader societal concerns and demands to be considered, especially in relation to health risks. Central to an enabling governance framework is the reorganization of currently fragmented urban water flow arrangements towards an integrated governance approach that transcends specialized utility and services provision agencies, just as IUA does.

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.