Partnership to restore Peru`s capital as food oasis by city’s 500th anniversary wins “Top Visionary” prize
CIP News - January 7 2021
Supported by $200,000 prize from the Rockefeller Foundation, Lima 2035 will promote food and water security in its desert slums in the lead-up to the city’s half-millennium.
Lima, Peru, Thursday, 7 January 2021 – An initiative to transform the Peruvian capital’s food system ahead of its 500th anniversary has won a $200,000 prize after being selected as a “Top Visionary” by the Rockefeller Foundation.
Already the driest megacity on Earth, Lima’s food and water supplies have been further aggravated by an influx of rural migration since the second half of the 20th century. These informal settlements now house four million residents – around 40 per cent of the population – over half of whom lack access to water.
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A typical household in these informal settlements spends up to 70 per cent of their monthly income on food and water. Not surprisingly, nutrition-related diseases are common: 35 per cent of children are anemic and 66 per cent of adults are overweight or obese.
Lima 2035, a public-private-people partnership (4P), offers a renewed and reinvigorated vision to reverse these trends, inspired by the city’s agricultural and culinary heritage. Early conquistadors, who established Lima as the new capital in 1535, described the city as an ancient marvel: a stretch of the Atacama Desert transformed into a verdant valley.
“The vision of Lima 2035 is to reconnect with the city’s unique history, geography and culture to create a 21st-century food oasis,” said Barbara Wells, Director General of the International Potato Center (CIP), a CGIAR center dedicated to transforming food systems around the world, which is leading the initiative together with Grupo Alimenta.
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