Stakeholder approach for identification of research needs of policy and practice in environment, climate and health

Abstract

S08: Setting the European Environment and Health Research Agenda, 2020-2030: the HERA project, Room 217, Floor 2, August 26, 2019, 1:30 PM - 3:00 PM The HERA-project will develop a European Environment and Health Research Agenda in close collaboration with different stakeholder communities to achieve wide societal participation in deciding on research priorities. It will develop strategies and tools to ensure the engagement of stakeholders, increasing coordination and cross-fertilisation of ideas, and contributing to the European environment and health process and policy activities. Stakeholders at EU, national and regional level will be identified to ensure a large and inclusive consultation process. Important stakeholder groups are relevant research-communities in the field of environment, health and climate change, policy makers (EU, national), civil society organisations, industries and businesses, workers’ and patients’ representatives, practitioners and international organisations. Stakeholders will be engaged via an interdisciplinary Consultation Group, national and regional focal points of larger networks (e.g. EEA-EIONET; WHO-Environmental Health Task Force) and seven regional consultative workshops. HERA will apply a multi-actor approach that will include stakeholders from different sectors and disciplines, thus allowing cross-fertilisation of ideas and research needs. It will encourage participation of representatives of countries with less developed environment and health policies by organising stakeholder workshops in all regions of Europe, by local partners. These groups will identify the actual needs across major topics as well as for cross-cutting issues and thus will provide input for the European environment, climate and health research agenda. Guidance for the stakeholder consultation will be developed to harmonize information gathering and to get synergies. A mix of consultation approaches and methods will be applied, including websurveys, workshops and webinars. As the stakeholder groups are very diverse, it is important to consider their specific perspectives and aims while selecting appropriate methods of engagement for each of them. The usefulness of various qualitative methods will be assessed regarding their potential to produce knowledge that is usable on a European scale.