About Us
IBEROAMERICAN NETWORK OF SUSTAINABLE TERRITORIES, DEVELOPMENT AND HEALTH - RIA–TSDS
The Rede Ibero-Americana de Territórios Sustentáveis, Desenvolvimento e Saúde (RIA-TSDS) (Iberoamerican Network of Sustainable Territories, Development and Health) has been articulated since 2012 by a range of institutions and researchers from Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Spain and Portugal.
RIA-TSDS aims to implement a network for the exchange, analysis and proposal of studies using territorial and participatory planning approaches, methodologies integrating sustainable development and the promotion of equity and health, as well as local epistemologies in the analysis of social and environmental sustainability. Thus the network provides a common research agenda integrating researchers, managers and social movements from diverse disciplinary fields, which could result in proposing strategies of action in concrete territories.
It is intended to promote debate, allowing territorial deconstruction of environmental development, with particular relevance to the structural aspects that condition it, in its social, cultural and environmental relations and demonstrations, highlighting the plural knowledge conveyed by the subjects and spaces of empowerment and participatory democracy required, so as to rebuild the territory from this perspective.
The network's main objective is to set synergies between the constituent groups in the exchange of methodological experiences, results and transfer of knowledge about the processes of understanding and promoting social and environmental sustainability in the territories.
FOCI OF ACTION
• Develop technologies for monitoring and analysis of the health and sustainability of the territory, allowing the reflection on models of development and its ability to promote improvements in health status of populations of such territories
• Comparatively map the public policy of sustainable development and health of countries
• Perform a comparative survey of practices that rule the planning and decision making, including participatory processes mobilized
• Conduct a comparative characterization of the assessment instruments and an intervention on environmental risk, vulnerability and social inequality
• Identify how different communities in different geographical and social contexts integrate and disseminate knowledge on sustainability, development and health
• Study the mechanisms of adaptation and mitigation of risk in different socio-geographic contexts, and in particular the components of relationship they have with the environment (biodiversity and conservation) and setting standards for the use of resources (ecosystem services) and their appreciation
• Deepen the concepts and mechanisms for the deployment of confrontation of the social determinants of health and promotion of sustainable development, equity and health
• Identify and promote the exchange of experiences between local projects that adopt the principles and categories of Sustainable Development and Health Promotion
• Identify the critical elements for the effectiveness of strategies for Sustainable Development and Health Promotion
• Identify and compare strategies for the integration of social and government Agendas in the different territories
OBJECTIVES OF THE 1ST INTERNATIONAL SEMINAR - SUSTAINABLE AND HEALTHY TERRITORIES
This is the first personal meeting of RIA-TSDS, with the prospect of consolidating its articulation and set an action plan. Thereunto, you want to start the development of foci of action, and especially to promote the exchange of experiences using territorial and participatory planning approaches, methodologies integrating sustainable development and the promotion of equity and health together with local epistemologies in the analysis of social and environmental sustainability.
JUSTIFICATION
Sustainable development (SD) seeks to harmonize environmental conservation and rational use of natural resources with economic growth, justice, well -being and social equity. Simultaneously based on political, scientific, environmental and cultural dynamic and multidimensional processes, sustainable development requires an interdisciplinary epistemological positioning, democratizing knowledge (scientific and local). Withal this interdisciplinary positioning focuses on lay rationalities and communities not only regarding the knowledge conceptions and explanations , but also regarding policy-making, management and implementation of adaptive and mitigation strategies of the impacts of population growth, urbanization , economic growth, social and environmental inequalities, climate change, loss of biodiversity and environmental and human health .
This implies producing socially and environmentally sustainable strategies, protecting the social biodiversity and maintaining of ecosystem services. Its complexity requires a holistic socio-ecological approach, not only (but also), economic or conservationist, which is attentive to social and environmental justice, to universal access to education and health, to improving the quality of life of the entire population and to the equity between genders in different intercultural contexts (ethnic , social and religious ), committed to the lives of future generations .
The degree of integration or social exclusion can be understood both as a determinant of health-disease process and environmental sustainability and has significant impact on social equity. The principle of equity, in turn, is one of the pillars of public policy, including health promotion and sustainable development. This indicates that the formulation of healthy public policies implies connections between environment and health, consequently between sustainable development and health promotion.
When the territory in which these policies are implemented is characterized by its economic, environmental, cultural or social vulnerability, such as environmental conservation areas, traditional populations, economically depressed regions and social and epidemiological profile revealing frailty and/or risk, their characteristics add complexity to local management and increase relevance of the link between sustainable development and health promotion.