A agricultura urbana e perirubana do município de São Paulo diante da pandemia de Covid-19

Urban Farm DB summary

Since early 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic has had major impacts on the world's population, and concerns about food supply — particularly for the most vulnerable populations — gained prominence among international bodies, Brazilian public institutions, researchers and civil society (2023). Difficulty responding to the crisis, especially misalignment of buffering measures across levels of Brazilian government and compounded by threats to democracy, produced a picture of absent effective public planning for food and nutrition security. In this context, urban and peri-urban agriculture (AUP), combined with food solidarity initiatives, emerged as a strategic means of food access in the most vulnerable urbanized regions, while allowing farmers to maintain their income. This article examines different food supply actions in the municipality of São Paulo, Brazil, at the peak of the pandemic, focusing especially on new dynamics among seven urban and peri-urban farmers representative of the situation in São Paulo's main production regions. Beyond social coordination among different solidarity groups in the municipality, the article highlights the role of short, proximity-based distribution circuits in sustaining local production and ensuring food consumption for food-insecure populations, amid a marked shortage of emergency food and nutrition security policies.