Cities are net consumers of food from local and global hinterlands. Urban foodshed analysis is a quantitative approach for examining links between urban consumers and rural agricultural production by mapping food flow networks or estimating the potential for local food self-sufficiency (LFS). However, at present, the lack of a coherent methodological framework and research agenda limits the potential to compare different cities and regions as well as to cumulate knowledge. We conduct a review of 42 peer-reviewed publications on foodsheds (identified from a subset of 829 publications) from 1979 to 2019 that quantify LFS, food supply, or food flows on the urban or regional scale. We define and characterize these studies into three main foodshed types: (1) agricultural capacity, which estimate LFS potential or local foodshed size required to meet food demands; (2) food flow, which trace food movements and embodied resources or emissions; and (3) hybrid, which combine both approaches and study dynamics between imports, exports, and LFS. LFS capacity studies are the most common type but the majority of cases we found in the literature were from cities or regions in the Global North with underrepresentation of rapidly urbanizing regions of the Global South. We use a synthetic framework with ten criteria to further classify foodshed studies, which illustrates the challenges of quantitatively comparing results across studies with different methodologies. Core research priorities from our review include the need to explore the interplay between LFS capacity and interregional food trade (both imports and exports) for foodsheds. Hybrid methodologies are particularly relevant to examining such dependency relationships in food systems by incorporating food flows into LFS capacity assessment. Foodshed analysis can inform policy related to multiple components of sustainable food systems, including navigating the social and environmental benefits and tradeoffs of sourcing food locally, regionally, and globally.

Shumsky, S. A., G. M. Hickey, B. Pelletier, and T. Johns. 2014. Understanding the contribution of wild edible plants to rural social-ecological resilience in semi-arid Kenya. Ecology and Society 19(4): 34. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-06924-190434

Climate vulnerability represents a highly complex public policy challenge for government due to its interaction with diverse social, political, economic, and ecological factors across scale. The policy challenge is further exacerbated when rural livelihood opportunities depend on multiple land use practices within shared social-ecological systems and adaptation actions related to one practice affects the others. In such cases, it becomes likely that national and regional-level adaptation plans will result in maladaptive trajectories if local context and properties are not carefully considered. This review highlights the importance of this issue to public policy using the case of climate change adaptation planning in Bangladesh to highlight how national and regional-level planned adaptation processes could benefit from paying closer attention to the autonomous adaptation processes occurring at local levels. Focussing on the northeastern floodplain region, an area dominated by wetland ecosystems, high climate vulnerability, and diverse and complex land use practices, we examine some of the community-level adaptation actions that are being undertaken in response to climate change and contrast these with national-level adaptation planning strategies and actions. We then analyze how the planned adaptation actions taken by government may actually end up being maladaptive, either by shifting or rebounding vulnerability. We conclude that government adaptation planning would benefit from a greater focus on learning and scrutinizing the autonomous adaptation of communities to climate stress before making significant resource allocation decisions.