Complex risks to human health and wellbeing have been neglected by governments and NGOs because of a failure appreciate the complex nature of environmental risks, a new report warns.<\/p>\n The report, led by environmental experts at the University of Reading, funded by the UKRI Natural Environment Research Council and involving collaborators from Universities of Surrey and York and Defra, suggests that a more comprehensive system of risk management should be introduced to deal with environmental risks \u2013 considered by the UN and World Economic Forum to be among the greatest threats to human life and livelihoods.<\/p>\n Problems like air pollution, food insecurity and zoonotic (animal-borne) disease are complex risks, also known as \u2018systemic\u2019 risks. They are environmental in nature, but are influenced by multiple political, economic, social, technological and legal factors.<\/p>\n These systemic risks are becoming more severe in an increasingly interconnected world, especially as the global environment becomes more degraded. However, they tend to be neglected due to their complexity and the very broad expertise needed to understand them.<\/p>\n \u201cThe air we breathe, the food we eat, and our ability to withstand disease are fundamental human needs, but we are failing to protect these from multiple known and unforeseen threats.\u201d says Professor Tom Oliver, the project lead from the University of Reading.<\/p>\n \u201cStandard risk management techniques don\u2019t work well to show where the weak points are in our resilience to such complex risks\u201d<\/p>\n The project gathered experts from a wide range of academic disciplines and sectors, 50 experts in total from over 35 different organisations across sectors, in order to maximise \u2018cognitive diversity\u2019 to analyse complex risks. They used an approach known as participatory systems mapping to understand the various pathways by which risks can impact human health, and identified key sources of data to track risks (\u2018watchpoints\u2019), as well as interventions to reduce risks.<\/p>\n The project involved three case studies: air quality, biosecurity and food security. The air quality case study considered aspects like the emergence of novel chemical pollutants, unexpected issues arising from wide uptake of electric vehicles and altered work patterns due to the pandemic.<\/p>\n The biosecurity case study considered the emergence of zoonotic (animal-borne) diseases, exploring aspects ranging from bioterrorism to how the melting of permafrosts under climate change can release anthrax spores. Prof Ian Jones and Dr Matt Greenwell, co-investigators from the University of Reading say \u201cWhile a pandemic index would be valuable to get ahead of emerging disease, it has been very difficult to generate with any certainty. What our studies suggest is we need to refocus and consider a network of factors whose contribution as a whole tip the balance towards crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n The food security case study looked at some of the root causes that hamper access to sustainable nutritious food. Issues such as labour shortages featured, but also deeper causes such as climate change and land use conversion. Prof Bob Doherty, a co-investigator from the University of York, says \u201cThe participatory approach using people working across the food system allowed us to identify a series of interconnected risks from trade, food banking to soil health impacting on food security. For example, COVID-19 has shown the vulnerability of our increasing reliance on food banks largely staffed by elderly volunteers. This allowed the team to identify Interventions to tackle systemic poverty and associated dietary ill health\u201d<\/p>\n All these risks also interact with each other. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown how impacts of an airborne disease can be exacerbated by long term air pollution, driving lower respiratory health, as well as how global food supply chains can been disrupted.<\/p>\n \u201cThe pandemic has shown how one threat can spread across many areas of life and how policies to mitigate the risks need to consider their side effects and unintended consequences \u201c said Prof Nigel Gilbert, a co-investigator from the University of Surrey and Director of the ESRC Centre for the Evaluation of Complexity Across the Nexus (CECAN).<\/p>\n Professor Tom Oliver explains \u201ca positive result of this project involving over 50 diverse experts across academia, business, third sector and government, is the identification of interventions that can reduce multiple types of risk, killing several birds with the same stone, as the saying goes.\u201d<\/p>\n An example from the report is how improving ventilation in buildings can reduce exposure to indoor toxic chemicals as well as to airborne pathogens like COVID-19. Another example is how reducing unsustainable consumption, such as behavioural choices to eat less red meat, can help reduce ecosystem degradation, improving food security and reducing risk of emergence of new animal-borne diseases like COVID-19.<\/p>\n \u201cThese types of intervention to reduce multiple risks are often neglected due to the siloed nature of our government and university departments\u201d says Oliver. \u201cEfforts for more joined up thinking across government and academia are essential\u201d<\/p>\n An example is The Defra systems research programme<\/a>, which involved investigators Oliver, Doherty and Moller. It was a 2.5 year investment to understand how environmental policies interact and can deliver multiple outcomes. The programme was instrumental for helping to set targets in the recent Environment Bill and Defra\u2019s agricultural strategy towards Net Zero. Now, it has expanded into a broader programme- the Systems Innovation and Futures Team in Defra, and similar approaches are being developed in other departments such as BEIS for net zero planning.<\/p>\n \u201cThis type of systems thinking in government would now benefit from being to applied to reduce our exposure and vulnerability to complex environmental risks\u201d says Oliver.<\/p>\n The project titled \u201cSystemic environmental risk\u2013 processes to appraise interventions for complex risks\u201d report is available to download from https:\/\/www.sysrisk.org.uk\/resources\/<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"![\"\"](\"https:\/\/research.reading.ac.uk\/social-and-applied-ecology\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/148\/2022\/12\/Sysrisk-Pictures-300x107.png\")
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