"Urban agriculture" refers to the process of growing or producing food in a city. It can be done in a wide variety of places that include vacant lots, backyards, rooftops, city parks, roadsides, river banks, beside railroads, combined with amenities at the boundary between cities, or vertically, up the sides of buildings.
In a city like Mumbai that only consumes, there is a need to bring back the production of food. By removing the stigma attached with producing food in the urban context, and creating a link between agriculture and urban growth, Mumbai must take a step towards self-sufficiency in terms of basic resources.
Like most metropolitan cities, Mumbai is home to a productive tertiary sector, and the economy that it generates ensures its growth. With the growth of the city, the requirements of its people also increase, often to an extent that enormous pressure is extorted on natural resources to meet this demand. Since the primary and secondary sectors are virtually extinct in the metro-cities of India, Mumbai relies on peripheral villages and imports for meeting primary requirements of food and water majorly.
The challenge lies in identification and utilization of appropriate plots to be utilized for food production in the city. More than a top-down approach of reserving land, a bottom-up approach of macro and micro-analysis, participatory planning and local self-sufficiency must be adopted. Only then, can the essence and sustenance of the intervention be realized.