Urban Health and Wellbeing Program

Mohd Nordin Hasan

ICSU Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific

Dynamiques urbaines et enjeux sanitaires

Paris, September 2013

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Introduction

A new approach to project planning and

development

Will overcome compartmentalised science and policy

planning and implementation

Collaborative conceptual modeling (CCM)

Multistakeholder cross-disciplinary and cross-

sectoral approach supported by system dynamics

modeling

To produce realistic solutions to health and wellbeing

issues in the urban environment

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ICSU ROAP established - September 2006

Regional Committee for Asia and the Pacific

(“Governing Board”) identified priority areas for

ROAP

Initially 3 areas

Hazards and disasters

Ecosystems

Sustainable energy

Health and wellbeing in the changing urban

environment added as a priority in 2008

Background

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At ICSU

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Discussions on a programme on

health and wellbeing commenced

in 2006

Scoping Group formed in 2007

Science Planning Group started

work in 2008

Report completed in 2010

General Assembly 2011 approved

programme and proposal to

establish IPO on UHW

At ICSU ROAP

Regional Science Planning Group formed in 2010

3 meetings - Kuala Lumpur (2) and Xiamen (1)

On-line consultations at every stage

Plan launched in June 2011 (22nd Pacific Science Congress)

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• ROAP Plan developed out of the

ICSU plan

• An adaptation of the global plan

to Asia-Pacific Region

• A step in the implementation of

the ICSU Plan

• Strong focus and inter-relations

maintained – it’s one and the

same programme!

Relations with the ICSU global plan

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• Income: low, high, emerging

• Population density: low to some of the

highest

• Cultural: ancient to modern

• Governance: monarchy, democracy,

socialist etc

• Environmentally fragile

regions: e.g. pacific

islands

• Human development

indicators: lowest to

highest

• Health: life style diseases,

infectious diseases,

injuries

Asia-Pacific planning context

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Strengths

Ethnic diversity

Resilience

Many surviving local health

practices (Ayurveda, Chinese,

Vaastu, Fengshui)

Strong family values and social

safety nets

High aspirations

Skilled manpower in many fields

Young population

• Rapid urbanization

• >50% urban population

• Mostly young people

• Has triple burden of

• infectious diseases

• emerging life style diseases

• injuries from accidents

Features of the UHW programme

• Recognises that urban health issues are complex,

and require multi-disciplinary approaches

• Promotes research into urban health and wellbeing

where researchers address multi-sectoral issues

and involve a wide range of stakeholders

• Adopts a system dynamics approach

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Beyond silos….taking a systems approach

Understanding of multiple determinants of health and

wellbeing

Commitment tourban growth limits

Commitment to effectivepublic transport

Urban healthand wellbeing

Opportunities forwalking and cycling

Air quality

Quality ofhousing

Commitment tosustainable urban

development

Populationsize

Understanding ofenvironmental determinents

of health and wellbeing

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Still more variables: feed back loops

of drivers/causes

Commitment tourban growth limits

Commitment to effectivepublic transport

Viability of peri-urban agriculture

Land values

Amount of locallyproduced food

Area of peri-urbanagricultural land

Populationdensity

Urban healthand wellbeing

Opportunities forwalking and cycling

Air quality

Quality ofhousing

Commitment tosustainable urban

development

Adherence totraditional diets

Populationsize

Level of concern abouthealth and wellbeing

Impact of land-usepolicies and planning

Understanding ofenvironmental determinents

of health and wellbeing

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Recommended implementation strategy

Identify institutions keen on using systems approach in work on urban health and wellbeing;

Encourage institutions to engage in building capacity

Encourage institutions to propose and undertake pilot projects;

Bring project team into contact with potential funding agencies to support the research

Use the exemplar pilot studies as base for outreach to get city administrators and governors to support and use the systems approach for better evidence-based decision making.

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Implementation of the science plan –

began 2012

1. Capacity building

particular attention - utility of the systems approach to a

complex problem

2. Development of exemplar research projects

centered on 6 cities (Bangkok, Jakarta, Manila, Pune,

Xiamen, Taipei)

Examples of use of systems approach to deliver better

outcomes

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Implementation Step-1

Pre-scoping Workshop, Hyderabad, 28 – 29 June

2012.

Multidisciplinary, multi stakeholder workshop

Identified needs and priorities (nutrition and health,

waste management, informal settlements, urban

transport; vector-borne disease / communicable

diseases added in 2nd workshop)

Explored potential research teams with merit and

output-oriented focus

Discussed possibilities for research funding and

support

Developed call for pre-proposals

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Implementation Step-2

Scoping Workshop Bangkok, 28 – 29 August 2012

Reviewed concept proposals received (6/8 accepted

for development to full proposal)

Achieved

clarification of research aims of projects,

identification of training needs in systems approaches,

identification of complementary activities required for

successful management of pilot projects

agreement of selected projects

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,,,contd

Agreed design features (August 2012):

Used systems thinking via the CCM approach

Recognise that urban-health problems are multi-

sectoral, and solving them require multi- disciplinary

approaches, and

Projects takes into account the interests of a wide

range of stakeholders

Regional Steering Committee formed Chair Prof Javed Iqbal

Members Profs Soottiporn Chittmittrapap, Tony Capon, C.P.

Ramachandran, Katrina Proust, Nordin Hasan (ex officio)

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Implementation Step-3

Systems Workshop, Kuala Lumpur January 2013

Leaders of selected projects with advanced copies of

projects proposals

Introduction to dynamic modelling and collaborative

conceptual modelling (CCM) methodologies

Assistance to finalise proposals for submission to

funding bodies on-going

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Final remarks

All ICSU regional offices have urban health as a

priority area of work

Approach adopted by Asia-Pacific can be shared as

a template to guide implementation in other regions

(Africa; Latin America and the Caribbean)

Approach fits very well as a tool for planning

multidisciplinary integrated research, the core

concept underlying new 10-year global platform for

research on global sustainability Future Earth

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Thank you! Planning Group members et al.

Members

Tony Capon, Australia

Yong Guan Zhu, China

Phillipa Howden

Chapman, New Zealand

Reiko Kishi, Japan

Jaime Montoya ,

Phillipines

Indira Nath, India, Chair

Katrina Proust , Australia

Nordin Hasan (Ex officio)

Method Specialist

Barry Newell, Australia

ICSU ROAP

BHJ Mckellar, Chair

RCAP Australia

Nor Zaneedarwaty

Norman, Malaysia

Hizam Jaafar, Malaysia

Sharizad Dahlan

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Merci beaucoup !

Cảm ơn bạn rất nhiều

Dynamiques urbaines et enjeux sanitaires

Paris, September 2013

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