Planetary Health education in the Bolivian Amazon: Course development and implementation for university professors, researchers and NGO Professionals

The following abstract is part of the collection for the Planetary Health Annual Meeting 2025.

ABSTRACT

Project: From April to June 2024, we developed and implemented an educational course in Planetary Health (PH) at the Autonomous University of El Beni – José Ballivián (UAB-JB) in partnership with the Barcelona Institute for Global Health and Medicus Mundi Mediterrània (MMMed) in Riberalta, Bolivia.

Target Audience: Our primary audience were UAB-JB faculty from Nursing, Education and Forestry Sciences. Additionally, professionals from Medicus Mundi Riberalta, investigators from the Amazon Forest Research Institute (IIFA) and other professionals associated with the UAB-JB were invited to participate.

Goals: The overarching aim of the project was to enhance the teaching and research capacity of the UAB-JB faculty in PH, enabling its integration into existing courses. To achieve this, we designed a PH course tailored to the local Amazonian context.

Results: The program included 10 jointly-designed modules given in 20 hybrid sessions, plus one field day visiting a local community to learn how they sustainably manage and derive economic benefit from their forest. Twenty-three participants attended six or more sessions (fourteen women, nine men). Among them, nine developed plans to integrate PH into their existing courses or classes, while eleven designed research protocols to conduct PH-focused studies in their respective fields. To ensure the course’s longterm sustainability, all sessions were recorded and made available through a MOOC and a website promoting PH in the Bolivian Amazon was created to serve as an ongoing resource.

Financing: This project was financed by the Catalan Agency for Development Cooperation and the Generality of Catalunya (R/N:21482/AE0087 N-PR2022/L1).