By Alice Aspar, Lila Jacoud-Bonfils, and Karen Kyabega

Every day, approximately 2,000 acres of farmland – an equivalent of roughly 1,500 football fields – vanish under concrete in the US alone. Globally, urban expansion disproportionately consumes the world’s most fertile soils and the very land that once fed these cities is now perishing. As the world prepares to absorb 2 billion new urban residents by 2050, a critical question arises: can cities grow without dismantling the food systems they depend on? Achieving SDG 2 (zero hunger) and SDG 11 (sustainable cities and communities) together demands we not only answer this question, but that we begin taking action.

Fertile ground lost: How urban sprawl quietly dismantles food systems

The numbers paint a concerning picture. Between 2000 and 2020, cities across 185 countries expanded up to 3.7 times faster than they grew upward. Yet this expansion is not happening on just any land. A 2020 global assessment found that nearly 160,000 square kilometers of cropland was consumed by urban expansion between 1992 and 2016, representing more than 45% of all newly urbanized land worldwide. The consequences for food security are already visible: urban sprawl has contributed to a 3% to 4% reduction in global crop production, with Africa and Asia bearing the heaviest losses. Far from being an abstract environmental concern, it directly threatens SDG 2, weakening efforts to eliminate hunger.

The window to act is closing fast

With 70% of the world’s population projected to live in cities by 2050, land pressure on agricultural hinterlands will only intensify. Climate stress compounds the problem: prolonged droughts in rural areas trigger rural-to-urban migration, accelerating the very urban expansion that destroys more farmland: a self-reinforcing cycle. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has warned that climate change and land-use competition together threaten to reduce agricultural yields significantly in the coming decades, hitting the Global South hardest. Without proactive land-use policy, we risk locking in a trajectory where growing cities progressively hollow out the food systems sustaining them. The cost of inaction rises with every acre lost.

Planning for people and plates: The city region food system solution

A promising framework is already gaining traction among planners and policymakers: the City Region Food System (CRFS) approach, developed by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO) and Resource Centres on Urban Agriculture and Food Security (RUAF). Rather than treating urban growth and agricultural land as competing interests, CRFS integrates food production, distribution, and waste recovery into regional spatial planning. Peri-urban green corridors serve simultaneously as biodiversity buffers, foodway networks, and carbon sinks: multifunctional landscapes that cities can afford to protect because they deliver so many co-benefits. The FAO/RUAF CRFS Toolkit helps policymakers assess and strengthen sustainable urban-regional food systems.

Several cities offer instructive models. Utrecht, the Netherlands, was one of the original FAO/RUAF pilot cities, embedding food system planning into regional spatial governance. Montpellier, France, has enacted policies protecting peri-urban farmland for new farmers. In the Global South, Professor Julian May at the University of the Western Cape has shown how in Worcester, South Africa, urban expansion directly competes with productive croplands, compounded by spatial inequalities, calling for governance frameworks that treat peri-urban agricultural land as a resilience asset.

According to the FAO/RUAF handbook, cities adopting CRFS frameworks report stronger food system resilience and improved food access for lower-income residents. Cities need not choose between growing and feeding themselves, but only if farmland is treated as infrastructure, not leftover space.

From sprawl to strategy: A policy agenda for urban food security

National and local governments should treat peri‑urban farmland as essential infrastructure and embed its protection directly into zoning codes, land‑use laws, and long‑term urban development plans. Policymakers should align these reforms with SDG 2 and SDG 11, ensuring that food security and sustainable urbanization are pursued together rather than traded off. This means enforcing urban growth boundaries, prioritizing agricultural easements, and integrating CRFS principles into every metropolitan planning process. The path forward is clear, and the responsibility is shared. Protect the land that feeds the city, or the city will go hungry.

* * *

Alice Aspar is an MA student at the Grenoble School of Management.

Lila Jacoud-Bonfils is an MA student at the Grenoble School of Management.

Karen Kyabega is an MA Global Communication candidate at The George Washington University – Elliott School of International Affairs.