The Second Annual FORHEAD Conference will be held at the Institute for Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, November 11-13 2010.

The Forum on Health, Environment and Development (FORHEAD) supports cross-disciplinary exchange and collaboration on issues relating to health, environment and development in China. For more information about FORHEAD, see www.forhead.org.

As in the past, the conference will include papers by researchers in the natural, medical and social sciences on a range of environment and health issues related to development.  This year’s meeting will also feature a special focus on urbanization, environment and health, and on environmental health risks faced by migrant workers.

Papers and Panels

Many of the panels will present ongoing work of FORHEAD network members, but we also welcome applications to give papers or organize additional panels related to the theme of urbanization, environment and health.

All proposed papers or panels should include a social science perspective or have clear and specified implications for policy or other responses. In keeping with the spirit of FORHEAD, papers which involve collaboration between natural and social science disciplines are particularly welcome.

Topics of interest

Papers on all topics related to the broad conference theme of urbanization, environment and health will be considered, but we are particularly interested in papers that focus on the following topics and approaches:

-         Papers that consider the ways in which institutional arrangements and interactions shape the handling of environmental health risks and how institutional weakenesses are related to risk vulnerability of various sorts, for example, patterns of cross-agency coordination, the impact of changing central-local relations on the ability to coordinate the management of environment-related health risks at the local level, the ways in which budgetary arrangements affect incentives and the capacity to respond, etc..

-         Papers that examine the way in which the health sector assesses and responds to environment-related health risks, including its incorporation into ongoing healthcare system reforms.

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-         Papers that examine the ways in which environmental policy and the work of environmental NGOs currently addresses the health impacts of environmental change.

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-         Papers that examine the engagement of sectors beyond the health and environment agencies in assessing and responding to environmental health risks, including the ways in which a consideration of environment-related impacts is (or is not) integrated into development planning at the national, regional, and local levels.

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-         Papers that focus on how information about environmental health risks is generated, circulated, and used: the channels through which it is available, the barriers to greater transparency; the ways in which information shapes perceptions of and responses to risk by various actors, the way in which information moves through decision making processes and shapes policy innovation; the role of media and other actors in shaping processes of issue generation and framing, etc..

-         Analysis of environmental health emergencies, and responses to them, including their role in shaping policy and institutional change.   

-         In-depth case studies of responses to environmental health risks in localities that reflect representative types of resource use; local governance structure; cultural practices etc.

-         Papers that analysze chains of production, supply and consumption and seek to identify potential levers and agents of change at various points in the process.

Registration and submission of paper/panel applications

Participants who wish to present a paper and/or organise a panel should submit a paper and/or panel abstract (maximum 300 words) by June 30 2010. Participants will be notified of acceptance and should confirm their participation by September 30 2010.

People who wish to attend the conference, but do not wish to present a paper are asked to register by September 30 2010 on the website or at forhead@forhead.org.

Full papers must be submitted to the conference organiser by October 15. Those who cannot meet this deadline must bring copies of their papers to distribute to the other participants at the conference. Individual presentations will be allocated 30 minutes (20 minutes presentation+10 minutes discussion and debate).

Publication

FORHEAD expects to publish a selection of high quality papers as an edited volume or a special issue of a refereed journal.

About FORHEAD

The Forum on Health, Environment and Development (FORHEAD) was formed in 2008 to provide a platform for sustained communication among researchers, policymakers, NGOs and others working in the field of environment, health and development. The Forum promotes exchange and collaboration among scholars and professionals from different disciplines and seeks to make research on environment and health issues available to a broad range of publics. The Forum is a network of organizations and individuals within China and overseas. The current Steering Committee is composed of representatives from the China Agricultural University (College of Humanities and Development), the China Academy of Sciences (Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources), Peking University (Institute of Environmental Economics) Kunming Medical School, and the Social Science Research Council (China Environment and Health Initiative). For more information about the Forum see www.forhead.org..

You can become a member of the FORHEAD network by sending your name, title, institutional affiliation, country and contact details to forhead@forhead.org. Your name will then be included in the mailing list, and you will receive periodic information about FORHEAD activities.