ARISE at ICUH 2024 in Marrakesh, Morocco
Some of our ARISE colleagues will be attending the 20th Annual Conference on Urban Health (ICUH 2024) in Marrakesh, Morocco. Find out more below…
ARISE session: Application of community-based participatory research approach with urban marginalised people to develop community-led initiatives for promoting climate resilience and equitable health and well-being: sharing experiences, strategies, resources and tools
Tuesday, 19 November at 3.30 pm GMT
Contributors: Dr Rachel Tolhurst, Ibrahim Gandi, Dr Jiban Karki, Wafa Alam and Smruti Jukur
Community-based participatory research (CBPR) aims to co-produce knowledge with marginalised people in order to challenge and transform material, relational and epistemic inequities. People living in urban informal settlements and other marginalised urban groups face multiple spatial, social and economic vulnerabilities to the health impacts of climate change, including barriers to accessing health promoting services. They often lack opportunities to communicate their needs to and demand rights from health systems planners and providers due to social and political distance, stereotyping and discrimination. Supporting marginalised people to analyse and communicate their own realities, and to promote trusting and respectful communication with governance stakeholders is an important strategy to tackle this exclusion and promote transformative, community-led action for climate resilience and health equity. CBPR encompasses values, processes and tools to facilitate these efforts. We will create a space for sharing, discussion and practice that aims to:
- Share principles and practical lessons from applications of CBPR drawing on a 5-year programme working with urban marginalised people in four countries (Bangladesh, India, Kenya and Sierra Leone) and further emergent research on co-producing initiatives to improve health service responsiveness to extreme weather events (Urban SHADE)
- Provide a framework for discussion of experiences of CBPR in diverse contexts, including social, economic political and community characteristics
- Offer opportunities for participants to practice using tools and approaches
After a 10-minute introduction, participants will have the opportunity to join a 25 minute session at one of the three stations (see below) which will run twice simultaneously. In each station, presenters will share their experience of using a CBPR tool in a specific setting. Participants will be encouraged to share their own experiences. Presenters will then facilitate a session which practices or discusses using the approach.
ARISE session: Access to and uptake of healthy diets in the context of climate crisis: lessons from research in ten African and Asian cities on developing climate-resilient urban food systems
Wednesday, 20 November at 3.30 GMT
Contributors: Dr Rachel Tolhurst, Inviolata Njoroge, Mr Andrew Gerald Omoding, Dr Gloria Seruwagi, Dr Bossissi Nkuba, Dr Sia Tengbe, Dr Surekha Garimella.
The escalation of global political, economic and ecological crises and associated price surges has contributed to interdependent forms of malnutrition – undernutrition, overweight and obesity –- with enduring societal consequences. Poor and marginalised urban residents are already vulnerable to food insecurity as well as diet -related communicable and non-communicable diseases in the context of low and precarious incomes, inadequate market, road, water and sanitation and health service infrastructures, and the proliferation of unhealthy processed foods. Movement restrictions during the Covid pandemic exposed fragilities in urban food systems particularly for the urban poor and those living in informal urban settlements. Changing weather patterns are creating further vulnerabilities by increasing food production uncertainties as well as exacerbating existing infrastructural fragilities. Additional axes of vulnerability that intersect with low incomes are gender, age, disability and migrant/refugee status. Developing climate resilient urban food and health systems faces further challenges related to political settlements and related governance arrangements, including fragmented accountabilities for food production, food distribution, water and sanitation, roads and health services, between municipal and national governments.
This session shares findings from research conducted in 5 African cities through the African Cities Research Consortium (ACRC) and from research conducted through the ARISE consortium (Accountability for Urban Health Equity) in 5 cities in India and Bangladesh.
Urban SHADE and ARISE session: Community-led health initiatives for health equity and climate resilience in informal urban settlements: applications in the context of extreme weather events
Tuesday, 19 November at 5.30 pm GMT
Contributors: Dr Surekha Garimella, Kamilla Karu Gojobe, Milka Kori, Ibrahim Gandi, Inviolata Njoroge, Ms Smruti Jukur, Professor Blessing Mberu, Dr Caroline Kabaria, Dr Ivy Chumo
IPCC reports have identified that impacts of climate change will be concentrated among the most marginalised and poorest urban populations, particularly the one billion people living in informal settlements, where vulnerabilities to extreme weather events such as storms, flooding and heatwaves are already being experienced. This panel presents and discusses findings from several research consortia engaging with community led initiatives for health equity and climate resilience in informal settlements, through Community-Based Participatory Research in India, Kenya, and Sierra Leone. Community ‘co-researchers’, professional researchers and development professionals will share experiences from ARISE consortium research, which aimed to strengthen accountability for community health equity in informal urban settlements and will share how community-led initiatives are being adapted to promote climate resilience for health. Presenters will also share initial findings from Urban SHADE, which aims to strengthen health service responsiveness to extreme weather events in informal settlements India, Kenya, and Sierra Leone.
Presentations will include a consideration of how organised communities can use participatory data collection and analysis as the basis for developing their own processes for responding to extreme weather events as well as for advocating with governance stakeholders to improve responsiveness to their priorities and vulnerabilities. Community vulnerabilities are explored from an intersectional perspective, which considers how intersecting social identities create differential risks within informal settlements. Presenters will also share experiences of working with a range of governance actors relevant to the impact of extreme weather events on health, including but not limited to health services. They will draw from work including creating physical address systems, co-producing WASH improvements, developing community-based mental health interventions, creating disaster response approaches and co-producing climate resilient housing. In this 60-minute panel, 6 presenters will make an initial presentation lasting seven minutes each, after which the audience will be encouraged to ask questions and reflect on contributions of community and governance stakeholders to promoting inclusive urban development for climate-resilient, equitable health and well-being. Dr Surekha Garimella (The George Institute, India) will chair the panel as co-I for ARISE and Co-PI for Urban SHADE.
Colleagues will also attend the 8th Global Symposium on Health Systems Research (HSG 2024) in Nagasaki, Japan. Find out more about ARISE activity here.
