African food system and biodiversity mainly affected by urbanization via dietary shifts

Koen De Vos (), Charlotte Janssens, Liesbet Jacobs, Benjamin Campforts, Esther Boere, Marta Kozicka, David Leclère, Peter Havlik, Lisa-Marie Hemerijckx, Anton Van Rompaey, Miet Maertens and Gerard Govers
Additional contact information
Koen De Vos: KU Leuven
Charlotte Janssens: KU Leuven
Liesbet Jacobs: KU Leuven
Benjamin Campforts: VU University Amsterdam
Esther Boere: International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)
Marta Kozicka: International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)
David Leclère: International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)
Lisa-Marie Hemerijckx: KU Leuven
Anton Van Rompaey: KU Leuven
Miet Maertens: KU Leuven
Gerard Govers: KU Leuven

Nature Sustainability, 2024, vol. 7, issue 7, 869-878

Abstract: Abstract The rapid urbanization in Africa profoundly affects local food and ecological systems. According to earlier research, urbanization may cause food production and biodiversity losses as agricultural or natural lands are absorbed by expanding cities. Land-use displacement effects may buffer agricultural production losses or may lead to additional biodiversity losses but are often overlooked. Moreover, impacts of dietary changes associated with urbanization are rarely considered. To address this, we combined spatially explicit projections of African urban area expansion with observed rice consumption shifts to inform a partial equilibrium model (the Global Biosphere Management Model). We demonstrate the importance of displacement effects to identify potential food production or biodiversity issues until 2050 and argue for their integration in land-use planning and policymaking across spatial scales. We identify that because of agricultural displacement, the impact of urban area expansion on food production losses is probably limited (

Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-024-01362-2 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natsus:v:7:y:2024:i:7:d:10.1038_s41893-024-01362-2

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/natsustain/

DOI: 10.1038/s41893-024-01362-2

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Sustainability is currently edited by Monica Contestabile

More articles in Nature Sustainability from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().