The Canadian International Development Research Centre (IDRC) and the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) have selected the African Centre for Cities to host a new R12m, five-year international research programme. The joint bid with Canadian partners was one of 4 international proposals selected from a final list of 8.

The research award extends the ACC’s work on urban food security and boosts its research partnerships across cities in Africa and the Global South. The comparative multi-city inquiry will focus on youth entrepreneurship in the informal food economy; competition and inclusive growth in the urban food economy; reshaping informal food systems through inclusive growth; rapid urbanisation, food insecurity and inclusive growth.

The ACC-based network will link Canadian researchers with those from partner organizations in Cape Town, Kingston-Jamaica, Maputo, Mexico City, Nairobi and Nanjing. Their inter-disciplinary research will focus on urbanisation, food security, informality and inclusive growth. The network will develop evidence-based strategies to promote inclusive growth in the food sector of cities of the Global South. The target is to create enabling policy environments and support for entrepreneurship as well as decent formal and informal employment.

The ‘Hungry Cities’ Partnership is one of four being funded under an IDRC initiative entitled International Partnerships for Sustainable Societies (IPaSS).