London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine hosts a webinar on Biodiversity, Health & Equity in London on 20 April

The seminar will be held at the LSHTM and broadcast by webinar internationally. Professor Carolyn Stephens discusses several strategies that can be adopted to halt biodiversity loss and preserve valuable ecosystems. This seminar explores vital research and policy agenda that might emerge if we work with indigenous and local communities to understand our links to, and our place in, our biodiverse planet. Webinar participants have the opportunity to join the debate, ask questions or make comments.

Scientists, UN agencies, and indigenous and local communities, agree that we have reached a critical time for biodiversity globally, as biodiversity loss reach unprecedented levels. Western science is now divided into two camps. Some scientists believe that the only way to halt biodiversity loss is to produce evidence that links biodiversity to ecosystem service and human health. Others suggest that the situation is too urgent, and that we need now to introduce a process adapted from emergency medicine – Triage — to select the planet’s most “important” species and/or ecosystems for emergency conservation. Meanwhile, some of the world’s most isolated indigenous and local communities view their place in their local and global ecosystem with more holistic eyes. They are fighting to protect their ecosystems for their own health and well-being, but also for that of fellow humans and the planet. This seminar discusses these debates, and explores the vital research and policy agenda that might emerge if we work with indigenous and local communities to understand our links to, and our place in, our biodiverse planet.

The seminar will be held at the LSHTM and broadcast by webinar for international participants to log-in, starting an hour before the presentation (at 11:45 UK summer time).

For additional information on the webinar click here.

Last updated on 5 April 2012