Practitioner and Public Sector Disenfranchisement in Innovative Urban Farming in Sub-Saharan Africa: Insights from Nigeria

Innovative urban farming plays a vital role in enhancing food security, nutrition, livelihood resilience, and environmental sustainability in Sub-Saharan African cities. Despite this, agricultural policy and extension services have largely ignored urban contexts. Recently, national and international initiatives have started addressing this oversight by promoting circular innovations in urban food systems. To boost productivity, it is crucial to understand the challenges, opportunities, and prospects associated with innovative urban farming. Therefore, exploratory qualitative research, specifically focus group discussions, was conducted in Alimosho Local Government Area of Lagos, Nigeria, to gather the perspectives of various stakeholders. The analysis, using mind maps and a consensus index, compared views from private urban farming practitioners and local public sector representatives. Urban farmers see significant potential in innovative technologies such as hydroponics, aquaponics, recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS), drip irrigation, sack farming, and waste upcycling to improve productivity. However, they express frustration over the lack of public sector support for embracing these circular innovations. Conversely, public sector representatives cite urban farmers' behavioral and educational shortcomings, particularly their lack of internal coordination and commitment to adopting innovations. These discrepancies underscore the complex interactions between urban farmers and local public agricultural policymakers and extension agents. The study highlights the need for fundamental changes in both public and private sectors to address the challenges in urban farming innovations. Establishing local-level dialogues, as demonstrated in this study, can provide valuable insights for developing urban farming and policy in Sub-Saharan Africa.