Multifunctional Landscape Transformation of Urban Idle Spaces for Climate Resilience in Sub-Saharan Africa

Abstract

Poor physical and land use planning underpin the chaotic evolution and expansion in cities and towns in sub-Saharan Africa. This situation amplifies urban vulnerability to climate change. Worse, urban landscapes are rarely considered part of the discourse on urban development in sub-Saharan Africa, let alone in climate change adaptation. Yet, landscapes are known to play crucial roles in social, economic, and cultural resilience in cities and towns. Hence, designing basic forms of appealing and functional urban landscapes that support multiple ecosystem services is essential to the drive towards resilience, which relates to the ability to maintain or improve the supply of life support services and products (such as food and water) in the face of disturbance. In this chapter, the idea of transforming idle urban spaces into multifunctional edible urban landscapes is introduced and explored as instrumental for cost-effective adaptation and resilience to climate change in cities and towns in sub-Saharan Africa. Multifunctional edible urban landscape is defined here as a managed landscape that integrates food production and ornamental design, in harmonious coexistence with other urban structures to promote or provide targeted, multiple services. These services include food security, scenic beauty, green spaces for active living and learning, jobs and livelihoods support, environmental protection, climate adaptation, and overall urban resilience. This approach constitutes a triple-win multifunctional land use system that is beneficial to landowners, city managers, and the general community. This chapter explores the benefits, challenges, and prospects for practically transforming urban idle spaces into multifunctional edible urban landscapes using an example project from Ghana. The chapter shows that multifunctional edible urban landscape transformation for resilience is practically feasible, and sheds light on the possibility of the food production component paying for landscaping and landscape management. It concludes with thoughts on actions required across sectors and multiple scales, including mobilizing stakeholders, laws, policies, and incentives, to actualize multifunctional edible urban landscapes as key transformational components of resilience in sub-Saharan Africa.