S09 - Session O3 - The multifunctionality of urban agriculture projects in Brussels

Authors: Francisco Davila *, Toma Rixen, Noémie Maughan, Marjolein Visser

In Brussels, as in other cities, urban agriculture projects place a more or less strong emphasis on food production but also develop other types of functions in social, health, training, education, environment or circular economy sectors. Until recently, in Brussels these functions were barely recognized and received few supports from the government, nonetheless they represent an important part of many projects and may have a significant societal impact. In order to help actual urban agriculture projects, and to support environment administration to co-create a fairer policy, we studied a diverse ranch of projects setting up urban agriculture and interviewed and carried out collective workshops bringing together field and administrations. We identified the main functions implemented by urban agriculture projects in Brussels and set up a tool aiming to determine a profile of their multifunctionality. The analysis of this profile compared to the business model of the project allows us to propose the hypothesis that the more the projects depend financially on food production, the less they seem inclined to develop a multitude of functions, and that the projects whose source of income is mixed (part from production and part from subsidies and external financial support) can afford to explore more functions. This work opens a new dialog between food producers and different government administrations highlighting the action of urban agriculture on societal functions.