Colombia Archives | NeuroLandscape

On Monday 13th September at 11:00 CEST Dr Diana Benjumea Meija presented her research on "The Spatial and Social Components of Community-led Green Spaces and its Contribution to the Health and Wellbeing of Low-income Communities" at the 9th World Sustainability Forum

In the last decade, there has been a surge in projects initiated by urban low-income residents in Medellin to revitalise urban green spaces through pro-environmental initiatives. Urban green spaces in these neighbourhoods are believed to be the repositories of diverse socially constructed and perceived meanings defined by the prosocial and self-reflective approaches of the communities to achieve alternative methods of governance over the territory.

This study was designed to investigate the underlying spatial and social components that emerge after the community-led green spaces are built. Two neighbourhoods in Medellin were investigated: Villatina (commune 8) and Eduardo Santos (commune 13). A quasi-longitudinal mix-methods study was conducted from 2016 until June 2021.
Ethnographic field work, interviews, focus groups and surveys were collected with residents of the two neighbourhoods. The results of this study suggest that there are underlying social and spatial components that emerge after the community-led green spaces are built and these are crucial to forge prosocial behaviours, activism, stewardship, and protection from crime.

Additionally, the active engagement of the communities in self-governed placemaking process creates an immediate sense of place defined by social factors such as ownership, learning, community coexistence, cooperation, sustainability, and ecology. These components contribute to the mental and physical health and wellbeing of low-income residents and creates unique social and environmental values.

Book of abstracts available here

In our most recent contribution to the Volume Two of the book series Urban Health and Wellbeing Systems Approaches, published by Springer and Zhejian University, we discuss the preliminary findings of our research project currently conducted in low-income communities in Medellin Colombia for our program Planting Seeds of Empowerment: Mental Health and Wellbeing of the Communities.

The book is intended for citizens and political decision-makers interested in systems perspectives of urban health and well-being seeking for inspiration to find solutions for the increasing complexity of cities and the environmental, social, and health impacts of urbanization.

In our paper entitled: Coping with Extreme Circumstances Through Community-Led Local Nature Interventions: A Science-based Policy Analysis, we discuss
the importance of the Local Nature Interventions Projects (LNIP) that are created by low-income communities as coping strategies to extreme events to help them sustain
health and well-being.

We present examples of the LNIP taking place during the Covid-19 pandemic and we argue that the LNIP are part of a secondary green network that could be acknowledged as part of the main city’s urban green infrastructure. Therefore, the internal capacities of the communities to create sustainable projects in the natural and built environment across time should be acknowledged and supported in future urban green projects. With these preliminary findings, we seek to draw attention towards LNIP initiatives as they could become alternatives to sustain community empowerment, environmental awareness, and health and well-being across settlements located in extreme urban environments.

COVID-19, Cities and Health: A View from New York (Jo Ivey Boufford and Anthony Shih)
Current and Future Human Exposure to High Atmospheric Temperatures in the Algarve, Portugal: Impacts and Policy Recommendations (André Oliveira, Filipe Duarte Santos, and Luís Dias)
Neuroscience-Based Urban Design for Mentally Healthy Cities (Agnieszka Olszewska-Guizzo)
The Role of Money for a Healthy Economy (Felix Fuders)
Developing Health-Promoting Schools: An Initiative in Government Schools of Indore City, India (Alsa Bakhtawar)
Mobility and COVID-19: Time for a Mobility Paradigm Shift (Carolyn Daher, Sarah Koch, Manel Ferri, Guillem Vich, Maria Foraster, Glòria Carrasco, Sasha Khomenko, Sergio Baraibar, Laura Hidalgo, and Mark Nieuwenhuijsen)
COVID-19 Shows Us the Need to Plan Urban Green Spaces More Systemically for Urban Health and Wellbeing (Jieling Liu)
How Lack or Insufficient Provision of Water and Sanitation Impacts Women’s Health Working in the Informal Sector: Experiences
from West and Central Africa (H. Blaise Nguendo Yongsi)
Planning Models for Small Towns in Tanzania (Dawah Lulu Magembe-Mushi and Ally Namangaya)
Coping with Extreme Circumstances Through Community-Led Local Nature Interventions: A Science-Based Policy Analysis (Diana Benjumea and Agnieszka Olszewska-Guizzo)