Analysing the contribution of urban agriculture towards urban household food security in informal settlement areas

Figures & data

Figure 1. Conceptual framework for participation in urban agriculture (adapted from Gamhewage et al. 2015).

Table 1. Urban agriculture production levels.

Products	Percentage of farming households		Chi-squared test
	Male	Female
Maize	11.11	1.65	5.45**
Sweet potatoes	5.05	6.61	1.62
Potatoes	15.15	14.88	1.87
Beans	17.17	13.22	0.312
Cattle	1.01	0.83	0.6
Goats	1.01		/
Pigs	1.01		/
Poultry	3.03	0.83	2.28.
Peaches	1.01	0.83	0.18
Grapes		1.65	/
Bananas	1.01	0.83	0.18
Avocado pears	1.01	0.83	0.18
Carrots	24.24	22.31	0.36
Spinach	29.29	39.67	7.07***
Cabbage	21.21	28.10	1.93
Tomatoes	11.11	17.36	1.89
Onions	25.25	29.75	0.72
Other leafy vegetables	14.14	7.44	3.41*
Beetroot	4.04	1.65	/

*Significant at 10% level; **Significant at 5% level; ***Significant at 1% level.

Table 2. Household farming status by food security indicators.

Variable	Non-farming households	Farming households	T-test
Household food insecurity access scale	14.05 (6.48)	13.52 (6.83)	0.54
Household diet diversity score	10.3 (3.15)	10.42 (2.86)	−0.26
Total value consumed	R286.35 (R196.14)	R359.50 (R349.29)	0.071
Income	R3 690.00 (R4 193.48)	R3 486.47 (R4 233.18)	−0.14
Share of food expenditure	0.47 (0.21)	0.51 (0.21)	0.646

Note: Values in parentheses are standard deviation.

Table 3. Levels of per capita income per day in US$ in the different informal settlement areas of the Cape Town Metropole.

	More than US$2 per day	Less than US$2 per day	More than US$1.25 per day	Less than US$1.25 per day
Non-farmers	45.5%	54.5%	63.6%	36.4%
Urban farmers	35.7%	64.3%	66.2%	33.8%
Pearson Chi-square	1.849		0.247
Likelihood ratio	1.831		0.239

Table 4. Likelihood of participating in urban agriculture (Probit Model).

Dependent variable: Urban agriculture (Yes = 1)	Coefficient	Z
Gender of household head: Female = 1	−0.448 (0.214)	−2.10**
Access to land	1.996 (0.224)	8.91***
Distance to markets	0.466 (0.016)	2.93***
Constant	−0.542 (0.222)	−2.45***
Number of observations	220
Pseudo R^2	0.387
Wald Chi^2(5)	85.61***

**Significant at 5% level; ***Significant at 1% level. Values in parenthesis are standard deviation.

Table 5. Average treatment effect on the treated (participating in urban agriculture) using nearest neighbours, stratification and radius matching methods.

Outcome variable	Stratification	Kernel	Nearest neighbour
Income (Rand/capita/month)	R61.036 (182.83)	R52.91 (198.85)	R182.175 (210.00)
Household food insecurity access scale	−0.59 (0.983)	−0.612 (0.971)	−1.173 (1.217)
Household diet diversity score	0.154 (0.467)	0.229 (0.613)	0.154 (0.496)
Total value of food consumption (R)	R78.001 (35.740)**	R73.518 (32.274)***	R88.064 (37.388)**
SHARE	0.078 (0.029)***	0.081 (0.029)***	0 .078 (0.042)***

**Significant at 5% level; ***Significant at 1% level. Values in parentheses are bootstrap standard errors with 100 replications.

Gamhewage, MI, Sivashankar, P, Mahaliyanaarachchi, RP, Wijeratne, AW & Hettiarachchi, IC, 2015. Women participation in urban agriculture and its influence on family economy – Sri Lankan experience. Journal of Agricultural Sciences 10(3), 192–206. doi:10.4038/jas.v10i3.8072

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