Month: July 2024

Voices from the Ground: Learning from the implementation of the KAP Wildlife project in Latin America

Posted on by Nora Leonie Rust

During the latest ‘Voices from the Ground’ event on June 26th, 2024, the Center for International Health (CIH) of the Ludwig-Maximilian-University Munich (LMU), in collaboration with its university partners from Bolivia, Chile, Brazil, and Guatemala, presented the outcomes of the Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practices (KAP) project. The project focused on understanding and addressing the risks of zoonotic diseases, wildlife trade, and wildlife consumption in Latin America.

With about 60 event participants, Maria Teresa Solis Soto from Universidad Mayor Real y Pontificia de San Francisco Xavier de Chuquisaca in Bolivia, provided an introductory overview of the project’s objectives and methods. The aim was to identify the knowledge, attitudes, and practices related to the risk of zoonotic diseases, wildlife trade, and consumption, in urban, rural, and indigenous communities in Latin America. To achieve this, the project implemented mixed methods in the lowland areas of Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, and Guatemala. These methods included collecting quantitative baseline data, conducting in-depth interviews with key stakeholders, and organizing focus group discussions and round tables.

Based on the results, innovative, context-specific approaches were developed to educate communities and co-construct behavioral change strategies to raise awareness and influence behavior. Additionally, the project facilitated spaces for the exchange of experiences, challenges, and solutions identified during the implementation of the KAP Wildlife project across the diverse cultural contexts of the countries mentioned above.

Representatives from each country shared their insights from two years of working on the ground. During the presentations, video footage from impressive landscapes and with in-depth testimonies were shared.

Here you can find the key takeaways:

Marcia Adler, Bolivia:

  • Joint Planning with Local Authorities: Crucial for project involvement and sustainability.
  • Flexibility and Patience: Essential when working with local Authorities.
  • Local Collaboration: Working with local people fosters trust and leverages their knowledge.
  • Enhanced Institutional Communication: To better address zoonotic disease knowledge gaps, especially among younger populations.

Denise Siqueira de Carvalho, Brazil:

  • Close Work with Local Communities: Conducted interviews to assess their knowledge.
  • High Awareness: Some communities demonstrated a strong awareness of zoonotic disease risks and transmission.

Pilar Mansilla, Chile:

  • Community Collaboration: Despite challenges in conducting interviews, working closely with communities was emphasized.

Carlos Roberto Vásquez Almazán, Guatemala:

  • Building Trust: Overcoming challenges such as language barriers and rural accessibility.
  • Culturally Sensitive Interviewing: Using interviewers fluent in indigenous languages and trusted by the community.

The Q&A session

The Q&A session revealed unexpected challenges, such as:

  • Trust Issues: Difficulty in gaining the trust of local communities.
  • Access Problems: Obstacles like floods preventing access to certain areas.
  • Community Priorities: Balancing the project with the limited time and differing priorities of community members.

Maria emphasized the need for a collaborative culture between scientists and local communities, to work together on solutions, recognizing the complexity and varying priorities within communities.

Watch the recording in the members area and If you have any further questions or if you would like to get in touch with the project leads, please contact the Secretariat via alliance-health-wildlife@giz.de

Watch the recording here

Expert Talk with Dr. Katie Woolaston : What on Earth is a Policy Impact Statement? A Guide to Appropriate Policy Communication in Wildlife and Conservation Research

Posted on by Nora Leonie Rust

Dr. Katie Woolaston joined the Alliance community on May 29th, 2024, for an Expert Talk and shared her expertise on how to, as a scientist, approach policy makers through writing policy impact statements. Science communication, especially towards policy making, is often not considered throughout science education and academic trainings. However, the importance of communicating scientific evidence to the policy realm remains crucial.  

Dr. Woolaston is an interdisciplinary scholar and lawyer at the Queensland University of Technology and has been part of IBES Panel on Biodiversity and Pandemics as well as part of the TAG of the Nature4Health Initiative curated by UNEP. Her research focus ranges from  domestic and international wildlife and conservation law to One Health and primary pandemic prevention.  

Given that many policy makers have limited time available to engage with multiple scientific and academic articles, policy impact statements should be a more integrated and rewarded part of scientists’ work. ‘Good’ and effective communication at the science-policy interface begins with the understanding of the policy cycle and the term policy itself, as policy is everything and nothing: the term covers a range of documents, starting from Action Plans to legislations or guidelines. As a scientist, knowing, first of all, to what policy your research and work is corresponding to, who to contact, which department is responsible, where and how your work proves relevant for the identified policy, and how it can be integrated into the policy (where does this policy stand now in the policy cycle), might be obvious aspects to be considered, but are often overlooked. Once these processes are understood and established, formulating a policy impact statement thrives from different perspectives. Partnering with colleagues from different backgrounds enriches the policy statement as it ensures to situate your research in a broader context. Other essential basics to be aware of and not underestimate is the use of language, preciseness and conciseness, the difference between scientific communication and advocacy, or departing from a scientists’ perspective of what type of information is needed versus what information the policy making arena needs. Especially looking at the wildlife-health nexus, the policy process can be challenging as a diverse set of stakeholders need to be involved, silos need to be broken, and it is more difficult to identify who to communicate with and what department is responsible for what exact research area. As Dr. Woolaston’s experience has shown, especially multidisciplinary policy briefs and workshops can be a great opportunity to deepen the engagement and foster bridging the gap between science and policy.   

The discussion that followed up touched further upon issues such as how to approach policy makers if your work theme is not considered a priority, the integration of policymakers from the start of scientific research, the missing credits and rewards of scientists engaging with policy making efforts and informing policy, even numerically, and the potential conflict and obstacles of different interests that are present when entering the political sphere.  

Watch the recording of Dr. Woolaston’s talk in the members area and have a look at her slides to get some practical guidance for your next policy impact statement. If you have any questions, please reach out to the Secretariat. The team would be happy to connect you to Dr. Woolaston.  

Watch the recording here

Voices from the Ground: Informing Policy and Technical Recommendations to Ensure Biosecurity at Facilities Farming Wild Animals in Viet Nam

Posted on by Nora Leonie Rust

GIZ/Nguyen Van Tien

The GIZ country office and WCS Indonesia joined the Alliance’s Voices from the Ground format on May 8th, 2024. The Alliance Secretariat warmly welcomed Anja Barth and Nhung Nguyen as well as Ahmad Faisal from WCS Indonesia as speakers for the Event. Miss Barth and Miss Nguyen presented on behalf of the GIZ country package on ‘Informing Policy and Technical Recommendations to Ensure Biosecurity at Facilities Farming Wild Animals in Viet Nam’. Mister Faisal continued to present on the ‘Socioeconomic Impact of Commercial Wildlife Trade and its Relation to Zoonotic Risk of Emerging Infectious Diseases in North Sulawesi and Gorontalo’.

As part of the GIZ country office in Viet Nam, Anja Barth is responsible for various projects on forestry and biodiversity conservation and Nhung Nguyen who joined the department in 2023 has extensive experience working with policy makers and wildlife practitioners. Ahmad Faisal is part of WCS Indonesia and the One Health Senior Program Coordinator.

Miss Barth and Miss Nguyen started off with an outline of the GIZ project approach: Integrating three crucial steps from policy review (national and international) to applied research on a national level, to multi-stakeholder policy advocacy. Yet, these three steps are not necessarily restricted to linear relationships. During this process, biosecurity has been identified as a valuable entry point towards addressing zoonotic risk emergence at wildlife farms. Having a closer look at wildlife farm management, Miss Barth and Miss Nguyen elaborated on the issues that arise with integrating biosecurity measures in wildlife farm management. These issues include aspects such as a unclear responsibilities among relevant management agencies, lack of defined penalties for offences and non-compliance, limited information sharing, or lack of clear guidance, especially regarding hygiene standards and pandemic prevention. From identifying what needs to be improved to lessons learned, on the base of those lessons learned are communication and education. More concrete suggestions for integrating biosecurity measures include a recommended set of biosecurity measures for wildlife farming for further elaborating into technical guidlines. However, for the continuation of improved biosecurity measures, legal, institutional, and technical factors and aspects need to be included in future discussions.

GIZ/Giang Van Hung

Moving from Viet Nam to Indonesia, Mister Faisal outlined the health risk in wildlife meat demand issue faced in North Sulawesi and Gorontalo. The large amount of wildlife trade occurs, commonly transported by ground, across the region could lead to a potentially increasing risk of zoonotic spillovers. Each spillover risk value differs at each actor of the wildlife trade supply chain. These values have been identified through a heat map that shows these risks per actor in the study that has been conducted. Better understanding of the risk profile and value at each actor will be crucial to prevent and control the pathogen spillover risk in the region. The results and recommendations deriving from this study refer to increasing efforts for data collection, further genetic sampling, and exit/entry hub assessment to gather information on trade routes.

GIZ/Pham Phuong Thao

If you would like to learn more about the projects, you can log into the Members Area and watch the recording, which also includes the follow-up discussion which outlined some similarities found in both cases as well as differences and other regional examples. Please feel free to contact the Secretariat in case you have any further questions.

See below for more information on the results of the GIZ country package project in Viet Nam.

Presentation-for-the-Voices-from-the-Ground-event-on-8-May-2024Download
Wildlife-farming-zoonotic-presentions-Policy-brief-ENDownload