Completed For increasingly large sections of the urban population, food security is becoming a luxury. In India, 80 per cent of urban households typically spend 70 per cent of their income on food (Mongeot, 1994). Several studies have shown the significance of urban agriculture as a survival strategy in the face of escalating food prices and decreasing incomes in sub-Saharan Africa, East and South East Asia and Latin America (for example, Drakakis-Smith, 1992; Mbiba, 1995; UNDP, 1996). However, little research has addressed these issues in the Indian context.