Informal Food Networks in the Global South and the Benefits of Symbiotic Food Systems

Taking that weekly trip to the supermarket to buy canned foods, packaged pasta, milk cartons, and chicken filet from the deli may seem normal to many, but in many rapidly urbanizing areas, the supermarket has yet to take off as a dominant source of food. Therefore, experiences and practices in food shopping differ. It's as if we live in different food worlds. Take Dars el Salaam, a large city in Tanzania, as an example. In Dars el Salaam, the supermarket is still viewed as a Western luxury.  Food prices are often too high and the products unfamiliar to draw in low or middle-income customers. Instead, food is obtained daily and through various other avenues. It is astounding to see how much of a difference a pre-conventional food system makes in everyday practices.

Because of the inability to refrigerate and store food, due to limited financial means, large family sizes, small spaces, and unreliable electricity, food must be bought and consumed on a day to day basis. Thus, families must visit markets which are close to them and buy food that can be eaten daily. The food has to be fresh and bought in small quantities. For meat consumption especially, this means that animals must be slaughtered on-site and then brought to the market either the next morning or the day of and sold. Everything that is not consumed locally is sold to other markets, for instance, Chinese buyers, and no waste is produced.

Without a high-technology supermarket system controlled with logistics, informal food networks rely on many people to complete a number of tasks, as delivery has to be coordinated. In Dars el Salaam, salesmen often have apprentices who learn the trade from them. In addition, partnerships are made in the form of cooperatives at the market. Food vendors will step in for each other when needed. They all stand to gain from a cooperative structure. Transportation must also be arranged. There is interdependence between the food delivery drivers, the growers, and the market. Although the supply chain is shorter when compared, coordination is required to ensure food is delivered and sold on time. 

Arranging a city to a symphony

A symphony of algorithms, that is.

Franz Ulm and Roland Pellenc, two MIT specialists in the atomic structure of cement, discovered that the texture of a city can be identical to crystalline patterns of elements in the periodic table. Such a random yet intriguing analogy reiterated something important to them: "that the laws of molecular physics can be applied to the texture of cities".

Using physics and equations to form the perfect city optimizes sustainability by building efficiently. Luis Bettencourt believes that the way to approach this method would be to seek the function of cities, not the form - what purpose does that city serve to the people? This will set the universal parameters for building that city, which works together with what Bettencourt calls "the social reactor" (a.k.a. the social dynamic in cities that produces creative and economic outcomes). Now this is the connection that we are looking for in every successful city, and this is what we need to optimize in every city along with energy efficiency and natural resource conservation. At the moment, the only way this sort of dynamic can be measured is through indicators such as city size and interactions within the population  (i.e. crime rates).

Socialisation, as it turns out, is the key to optimizing not only a city's economy, but an energy efficient city. Take this example - in a high-density city with fairly moderate public transport but high crime rate, people are more likely to avoid taking public transport and will drive individual cars. The more cars there are on the road, the higher the amount of GHG gases are emitted, which only leads to a greater carbon footprints that contributes to the upcoming apocalypse-via-global-warming. In fact, in one of his papers, "A unified theory of urban living", Bettencourt argues that the growth of both good and bad development is actually dependent on the size of the city. Mathematically, both good (e.g. opportunity)and bad (e.g. crime) development will increase by 15% should the city's size increase. Such metric data and mathematical analysis has always been used to guide an urban planner's hand, but using actual equations and universal parameters to help pursue optimal investments is a game changer in that it reduces the chances of unintended catastrophic consequences.

That being said, one wonders what the limitations of such a mathematical approach is. In my personal opinion, using mathematics to maximize municipal investment decisions and thereby spend money in the "right" way can go two ways. It will either benefit taxpayers by spending money where it is needed (assuming that municipal authorities are responsible with tax money...this might be bordering on fantasy for some urban areas), or it will ignore the necessity of what cannot be quantified in terms of dollar bills - for example, the necessity of trees and greenspace. Quantification of such amenities are also sometimes rejected because anything can dwindle in monetary value, and this can cause ramifications in appreciating the value of trees, highlighted as an issue because trees are already experiencing a game of thrones level of death as it is. Also, we need trees to survive.

Then again, this approach looks at the city as a system and goes beyond employing sustainable architecture. Using mathematics to engineer the perfect city allows us to foresee how our decisions can impact the global future with logical, rational eyes. It does not limit growth by developing the perfect city that cannot be tweaked because of its perfection; instead it focuses on keeping the city perfect throughout time - factoring in adaptations that need to constantly be made to accommodate changes in the universal parameters of city design. What interests me about this approach is whether we can use the mathematical concepts here to measure energy inputs and outputs in a natural ecosystem and whether it is therefore worth comparing a city's energy efficiency with nature's.

In the past, we have made several erroneous decisions and several great decisions when it came to urban planning. The point with this approach is to eliminate erroneous possibilities and to assist municipal authorities into making the most fiscally responsible decisions - not only in terms of money, but in terms of social, economic and political sustainability as well. No more planned shrinkages in the Bronx that only resulted in higher crime rates. No more gentrification of Jacobian streets that exclude poorer classes. Though this process may not promise us a threat-free world, it might yet compose a world sweeter to the ear.

Tabinda Shah.