South‐South Migration and Urban Food Security: Zimbabwean Migrants in South African Cities
| Published date | 01 August 2017 |
| Author | Jonathan Crush,Godfrey Tawodzera |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12346 |
| Date | 01 August 2017 |
South-South Migration and Urban Food
Security: Zimbabwean Migrants in South
African Cities
Jonathan Crush* and Godfrey Tawodzera**
ABSTRACT
The drivers of food insecurity in rapidly-growing urban areas of the Global South are receiv-
ing more research and policy attention, but the precise connections between urbanization and
urban food security are still largely unexplored. In particular, the levels and causes of food
insecurity amongst new migrants to the city have received little consideration. This is in
marked contrast to the literature on the food security experience of new immigrants from the
South in European and North American cities. This article aims to contribute to the new litera-
ture on South-South migration and urban food security by focusing on the case of recent Zim-
babwean migrants to South African cities. The article presents the results of a household
survey of migrants in the South African cities of Cape Town and Johannesburg. The survey
showed extremely high levels of food insecurity and low dietary diversity. We attribute these
findings, in part, to the difficulties of accessing regular incomes and the other demands on
household income. However, most migrants are also members of multi-spatial households and
have obligations to support household members in Zimbabwe. We conclude, therefore, that
although migration may improve the food security of the multi-spatial household as a whole,
it is also a factor in explaining the high levels of insecurity of migrants in the city.
INTRODUCTION
International migration and food security tend to be viewed as discrete and largely unconnected realms
in global policy forums and in the large literature on both topics (Crush, 2013). One of the main rea-
sons for this is the anti-urban bias that characterizes much of the research and policy-making on food
security in the Global South (Crush and Frayne, 2011). The primary focus of food security is the rural
smallholder and agricultural livelihoods with a complementary downplaying of the importance of
urbanization, migration and the food security of urban populations. In the context of the rapid urban-
ization of the South and the associated growth in urban food insecurity, this view is increasingly
untenable. While the drivers of food insecurity in rapidly-growing urban areas are receiving some
attention (see Agarwal et al., 2009; Battersby 2011; Chatterjee et al., 2012; Crush and Battersby,
2016), the precise connections between food security and international and internal migration are still
largely unexplored. In particular, the levels and causes of food insecurity amongst new arrivals in the
city have received very little consideration –and the isolated studies that do exist focus more on inter-
nal than international migration (Pendleton et al., 2014; Rai and Selvaraj, 2015).
* Balsillie School of International Affairs, Waterloo, Canada
** University of Limpopo, Polokwane, South Africa
doi: 10.1111/imig.12346
©2017 The Authors
International Migration ©2017 IOM
International Migration Vol. 55 (4) 2017
ISS N 00 20- 7985 Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
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