Uganda’s Emerging Urban Policy Environment: Implications for Urban Food Security and Urban Migrants

Abstract

In recognition of the challenges posed by Uganda’s rapid urbanization, the national government is in the process of developing a Uganda national urban policy (UNUP). The government is also preparing a “stringent” new national migration policy. Up to now, Uganda’s policy environment has ignored the urban dimensions of poverty and the food insecurity that accompanies it. Migration, an important driver of both urban poverty and urban food insecurity, has been poorly understood, and only international migration has been addressed. This paper explores the urban policy environment and the multilevel governance policy process in Uganda, in order to understand not only how new policies are being shaped by the government’s political priorities in the face of its weakening popular legitimacy and growing signs of urban discontent but also what potential entry points exist to influence policy making in Uganda in ways that might better support the needs of the nation’s growing numbers of urban food insecure, among them are internally displaced Ugandans.