The rural-urban nexus: Establishing a nutrient loop to improve city region food system resilience

 PROJECT DESCRIPTION

The Rural-Urban Nexus: Establishing a nutrient loop to improve city region food system resilience (RUNRES) is an eight-year development and research endeavour seeking to develop and scale innovations capable of supporting resilient and sustainable city region food systems. Operating in four regions of Sub-Saharan Africa, Bukavu, DRC, Arba Minch, Ethiopia, Kamonyi, Rwanda, and Msunduzi, South Africa, the project was designed with two distinct phases. In phase I, the project team conducted a comprehensive transdisciplinary process that prioritizes authentic stakeholder participation to identify, implement, and assess innovations for their capacity to achieve the desired project impacts. RUNRES Phase I is now in its final stages, with the project team having conducted rigorous economic, quality assurance, and agronomic assessments of these innovations. Compiling these data into a multi-criteria visualization assessment, the project team and steering committee, together with the donor, evaluated the innovations for scaling potential. To support this critical process, the RUNRES team developed a scaling protocol designed to demonstrate clear and concrete pathways for scaling. In addition, to maximize the potential of the selected innovations, the project team developed three distinct scaling models . The first, or A scaling strategy, is focused on working with the existing Phase I consortia to continue expanding their piloted innovations. The second, or B strategy, will support new actors, located within a current city-region or within an area with a similar context, who want to replicate an existing pilot. The third, or C strategy, will involve indirect RUNRES support for those actors outside the project s sphere of influence who want to replicate RUNRES innovations. Through this empirically based decision-making process, of the fifteen original pilot innovations five were selected for A scaling, five for B scaling, and four for C scaling. The focus of Phase II RUNRES activities will be on the B scaling. In Arba Minch, Ethiopia, one municipality that has shown a high level of commitment will be provided funding to replicate the model piloted by the Egnanew Mayet Association, which is producing compost from municipal waste. The production of animal feed derived from cassava peels and black soldier fly larvae has proven to be very successful in Kamonyi, Rwanda. Thus, the expansion of these innovations by new entrepreneurs in the region will be supported with direct funding from RUNRES. In the DRC, the three supported compost producers agreed to consolidate and relocate their efforts into one new business centre to be in a position to affordably meet the demand of Olam, a large coffee buyer interested in significantly increasing the application of compost to support its coffee production. Finally, a hybrid innovation, co-compost production coupled with agroecological living labs to facilitate knowledge development will be supported by RUNRES in the second phase of the project. For each of these scaling initiatives, high priority was and will be given to identifying and developing innovation leaders from within traditionally marginalized segments of the population to fulfil the mandate of SDC, which is to develop a project capable of inclusive development. In conjunction with this direct support to the innovation leaders, the RUNRES team will engage with potential upscaling partners such as political leaders, private investors, public sector agencies, and NGOs to facilitate further expansion of these innovations. In this manner, the project team intends to build on the demonstrated successes achieved during the first phase of the project to meet the impact objectives defined in the TOC at scale during RUNRES Phase II.