This week on Womanity, Dr Amaleya Goneos-Malka speaks with Associate Professor Jane Battersby from the Department of Environmental and Geographical Sciences at the University of Cape Town, whose pioneering work bridges geography, food security, urban development, and social justice. Drawing from decades of academic research, policy engagement, and grassroots collaboration, Associate Professor Battersby offers a cross-cutting perspective on how food systems shape and are shaped by cities, infrastructure, climate change, governance, and gender dynamics.

Why Urban Food Systems Matter

Food insecurity is an urban issue. Associate Professor Battersby explains that while global conversations often focus on food production, many people experiencing hunger today live in urban and peri-urban spaces. She highlights how access to housing, transport, infrastructure, and services directly affects people’s ability to obtain, prepare, and consume nutritious food. Even when food is physically available, urban conditions can make healthy eating inaccessible.

Community Projects Driving Real Change

Associate Professor Battersby is involved in several impactful projects that explore how infrastructure, governance, and social systems intersect with food access in low-income communities. For example, Living Off-Grid Food and Infrastructure, AFRI Food Links, Urban Food Futures, Food Systems Countdown Initiative, and Nourished Child Project. The Nourished Child Project is an initiative where community-driven research led to the creation of nutrition ambassador programmes, breastfeeding support initiatives, and partnerships with early childhood development centres.

Women, Food Security and Household Survival

Associate Professor Battersby explains that women often bear the invisible burden of household food management. In many homes, women sacrifice their own nutrition to ensure children and other family members are fed. Female-headed households are also statistically more vulnerable to food insecurity. However, she emphasises that although women may be victims of systemic inequality in some circumstances, they are also leaders, innovators, and community organisers capable of driving meaningful transformation. She highlights women’s economic participation in informal food systems; the role of mothers and grandmothers in nutrition education; the impact of gender-based violence on household food insecurity; and how women leverage social networks to help families survive

Challenging Perceptions About Informal Food Systems

Associate Professor Battersby draws attention to the informal food sector, including spaza shops, roadside traders, fresh produce vendors, and informal meat markets. She challenges assumptions that informal food systems are inherently unsafe or inferior. She explains that many informal traders source fresh produce through the same formal supply chains as supermarkets, often delivering food that is fresher, cheaper, and more accessible to communities.

Women in Academia and Leadership

Associate Professor Battersby shares positive personal experiences of working in a discipline with strong female leadership, but acknowledges that as a young academic in male-dominated meetings, there were occasions that called for confronting assumptions about women’s roles. She highlights balancing professional leadership with caregiving responsibilities, especially for the sandwich generation who attend to the well-being of ageing parents on the one hand and children on the other. She offers valuable advice to women entering leadership spaces:

Ensure your voice is heard early in meetings
Amplify the contributions of other women
Turn underestimated roles into opportunities for influence and leadership. E.g., if you are appointed as the note taker, turn that into power, and take ownership of writing the report

Success, Identity and Living Fully

As the interview draws to a close, Associate Professor Battersby reflects on the influences that shaped her journey — from attending an all-girls school that normalised women’s leadership to working with vulnerable youth during her gap year, which allowed her to see the world from very different perspectives. She speaks frankly about balancing multiple identities: academic, mother, partner, daughter, activist, and researcher. Rather than seeing these roles as conflicting, she describes them as enriching her understanding of the world and strengthening her work.

Her closing message to girls and young women is empowering and affirming: women do not need to reduce themselves to one identity in order to succeed. Their full humanity, lived experiences, and emotional intelligence are powerful assets that enhance your work, allowing you to be innovative and lead a new direction in your space.

“So if you’re going to be the note taker, make sure you turn that into power.”

Tune in for more…