A spatio-temporal dataset on food flows for four West African cities

Despite the importance of urban food supply, there is limited understanding of how cities in West Africa source their food, from where and in what quantities. This study contributes to filling this gap by collecting geo-coded data on food flows for four West African cities over different seasons and years. The data provide insights into the quantity of food products entering and exiting the cities, their modes of transport, and their origin. The cities varying in size, accessibility, and agroecological zone were Bamako (Mali), Bamenda (Cameroon), Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso), and Tamale (Ghana). This study focused on roads as the major transport channel for food.

The data cover, depending on the city, road, rail, boat, and air traffic. Surveys were conducted for one week on average during the peak harvest, lean, and rainy seasons, resulting in a dataset of over 100,000 entries for 46 unprocessed food commodities. The data collected includes information on the key types of transportation used, quantity, source, and destination of the food flows. The data were used to delineate urban foodsheds and to identify city-specific factors constraining rural-urban linkages. The data can also be employed to inform academic and policy discussions on urban food system sustainability, to validate other datasets, and to plan humanitarian aid and food security interventions.