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Environment Can Help Prevent or End Conflict, Says ECSP Director at JHU

DECEMBER 2008—"Connecting Sustainability and Health" Lecture Series Features Dabelko

"Natural resources and environmental issues are key to livelihoods…[and] to the health and well-being of populations, communities, and, ultimately, countries," said Environmental Change and Security Program (ECSP) Director Geoff Dabelko at an October 30, 2008, talk he delivered as part of the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health's "Connecting Sustainability and Health" lecture series. He urged the audience to view a healthy environment not as a luxury for the rich, but as a necessary component of any prosperous and stable society.

The extraction of natural resources like diamonds and timber has fuelled deadly conflicts, said Dabelko, but transparent and equitable governance of natural resources is key to achieving peace in impoverished post-conflict countries where most people depend on natural resources for their livelihoods. Dabelko was the eighth and final speaker in the series, which was co-sponsored by the Department of Health, Behavior and Society; the program on Global Sustainability and Health; and the Center for a Livable Future.

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Environmental Change and Security Program

The Environmental Change and Security Program (ECSP) explores the connections between environmental change, health, and population dynamics and their links to conflict, human insecurity, and foreign policy.  Read more