Relevant

Turning Knowledge into Service
 
The Centre for Coastal Health (CCH) team has been gaining experience in mobilizing knowledge from a wide variety of settings to help turn research into action. From informing policy decisions to creating new international One Health self-assessment manuals, the CCH is gaining a growing reputation for translating and delivering knowledge to a wide variety of stakeholders.

• Dr. Craig Stephen worked with the World Bank to develop a method for countries to assess their needs and capacities to link human, animal and environmental health; he is now working with national and international partners to build such capacity.
• Dr. Carl Ribble has been using advances in computer modelling to work with farmers to enhance their farm efficiency.
• Dr. Tyler Stitt has developed a number of pamphlets and booklets for public consumption on issues such as wildlife zoonoses and small-farm biosecurity. His talents in science communications and graphic design have produced informative, attractive and accessible documents.
• Dr. Tim Dejager has been working on the cutting edge of mobile phone applications for social learning in food security settings. Through a project with rural smallholder aquacutlurists in Sri Lanka, Tim has been applying theories of behaviour change from health promotion and extension to the issue of fostering farming practices for sustainable aquaculture for poverty reduction.
• Stefan Iwasawa has been putting network theory to practice in a way that will assist the British Columbia Ministry of Environment’s understanding, and therefore ability to track, livestock movement throughout this province.
• Jennifer Dawson-Coates has been  exploring multi-criteria decision analysis as a method to develop community consensus on methods for promoting local food security in Sri Lanka.

The diversity of skills, from computer modelling to graphic design, provides the CCH the necessary tools to translate complex technical information into knowledge that can inform decisions and actions. The educational experiences that come from having our two principle researchers (Dr Ribble and Dr Stephen) as university educators has also been a great asset in helping the CCH  distil and communicate information into usable knowledge. Increasingly, it is the ability to gather, integrate and communicate a diversity of information that serves as the gateway to improving health at the interface of people, animals and the environment. The Centre for Coastal Health is poised at this gateway.

The Centre for Coastal Health focuses on five main themes:

• Food and Food Security

• International Capacity Development

• Preparedness and Response

• Environmental Health and Impact

• Training and Education
 

Projects that were started, completed, or ongoing in the 2010/2011 academic year included:

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