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An Ecological Risk Management and Capacity Building Model
Abstract Worldwide, natural and human ecosystems are increasingly subjected to natural hazards due to global environmental change. Because these threats reflect interaction between social and ecological systems, effective Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) can best be accomplished by increasing community capacity to mitigate, cope with, adapt to, and recover from hazard consequences by developing DRR strategies…
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Working Together with Remote Indigenous Communities to Facilitate Adapting to Using Energy Wisely: Barriers and Enablers
Abstract: A $12 million Commonwealth funded consortium project trialled energy efficiency initiatives in six remote Indigenous communities over three years. This project, which won several awards, employed and educated over 80 local Yolŋu to educate their fellow community members to use power wisely. The research and evaluation component was designed together by Indigenous and non-Indigenous…
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Housing and overcrowding in remote Indigenous communities: Impacts and solutions from a holistic perspective
Over three years, a $12 million Commonwealth funded consortium project implemented energy efficiency initiatives in six remote Indigenous communities. An ecological community-based participatory action research design that utilized qualitative and quantitative research approaches in a multiple methods design was employed to clarify how Yolŋu use power, to identify the barriers and enablers of Yolŋu using…
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Synergy of systems theory and symbolic interactionism: A passageway for non-Indigenous researchers that facilitates better understanding Indigenous worldviews and knowledges
Historically, non-Indigenous researchers have contributed to colonisation by research based on Western positivistic philosophical frameworks. This approach led to disembodying knowledge from Indigenous people’s histories, worldviews, and cultural and social practices, thus perpetuating a deficit-based discourse which situates the responsibility of problems within Indigenous peoples and ignores the larger socio-economic and historical contexts in which…
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HEAL Network Investigators Webinar Science Communication for Health
Categories: Webinars
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AusEnHealth – Methods Report
This report details the process of building a digital environmental health decision support platform from the ground up. First, the report details the identification of high value use cases, relevant data, and metadata in the Data Audit Section. The report then outlines the selected data custodians, data formatting and processing methods, as well as indicator…
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CANBREATHE/HEAL-HAZE Newsletters
Newsletters send quarterly Following along with the CANBREATHE/HEAL-HAZE newsletter to hear regular updates across all partner countries as we work together on climate change, wildfire smoke, air quality, and health.
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CANBREATHE/HEAL-HAZE Newsletter – Vol.3 2026
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“Waka Ŋurrkanhayŋu—Regenerating the Existence of Life”: Indigenous and Western Researchers Engaging in Two-Way Exchange to Resolve Our Existential Crises
Categories: Journal PapersHumanity is experiencing increasingly existential crises. While the crises are potentially apocalyptic, they also create transformative opportunities toward ways of being–knowing–doing that not only ensure our survival but thriving. Realizing these transformative opportunities requires the prevailing Western worldview remembering and embracing ancient Indigenous worldviews. One potent pathway for accomplishing this paradigm shift is authentically exchanging two-way with Indigenous peoples. To illuminate this…
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The Value of Sophisticated Indigenous Ways of Being-Knowing-Doing Towards Transforming Human Resource Development in Ways that Contribute to Organizations Thriving and Addressing Our Existential Crises
Categories: Journal PapersAcross the world we are experiencing existential crises that emerged from the compounding effects of the interactions of COVID, disasters, climate change, environmental destruction, poverty, food and water shortages, war, crime, domestic violence and substance abuse. Parallel, our individual and collective human resources have been steadily declining – we are getting physically and mentally sicker,…
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Restoring the transformative bridge: Remembering and regenerating our Western transformative ancient traditions to solve the riddle of our existential crisis
Categories: Journal PapersThe apocalyptic cultural transition threatening our existence represents a transformative opportunity. To facilitate realizing this opportunity, we synergized the knowledges of three transdisciplinary transformative scholar-practitioners. The ensuing composite story suggests the source of the crisis is spiritual and the consequence of millennia long domestication and colonization in the Western culture that started with Plato advancing…
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Facilitating Effective DRR Education and Human Survival: Intentionally Engaging the Transformative Education-Paradigm Shift Spiral
Categories: Journal PapersOver the last few decades, research has repeatedly shown that the education strategies used to develop the disaster risk reduction (DRR) capabilities and relationships required to reduce the risk of extreme natural events and facilitate the development of adaptive capacities have been ineffective. We propose that the ineffectiveness of current DRR education efforts derives from…
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Living in harmony with our environment: A paradigm shift
Categories: Journal PapersAbstract The Sendai Framework of Action 2015–2030 calls for holistic Indigenous disaster risk reduction (DRR) research. Responding to this call, we synergized a holistic philosophical framework (comprising ecological systems theory, symbolic interactionism, and intersectionality) and social constructionist grounded theory and ethnography within a critical Indigenous research paradigm as a methodology for exploring how diverse individual…
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Synergy of systems theory and symbolic interactionism: a passageway for non-Indigenous researchers that facilitates better understanding Indigenous worldviews and knowledges
Categories: Journal Papers
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Facilitating Sustainable Disaster Risk Reduction in Indigenous Communities: Reviving Indigenous Worldviews, Knowledge and Practices through Two-Way Partnering
Categories: Journal PapersAbstract The Sendai Framework of Action 2015–2030 calls for holistic Indigenous disaster risk reduction (DRR) research. Responding to this call, we synergized a holistic philosophical framework (comprising ecological systems theory, symbolic interactionism, and intersectionality) and social constructionist grounded theory and ethnography within a critical Indigenous research paradigm as a methodology for exploring how diverse individual…
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HEAL Investigators Webinar: Community-based climate adaptation interventions for extreme events
Date: Wednesday August 19 12.00–1.00pm online This webinar brings together researchers from the HEAL Bushfires, Air Pollution & Extreme Weather Events (BAPEE) Theme to explore how communities experience and respond to climate-related hazards across both regional and urban Australia. Highlighting research on the role of grassroots groups in supporting wellbeing in flood-affected communities, alongside emerging…
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Environmental Monitoring Sensors
These devices measure tiny particles (e.g. dust and smoke) in the air that results in poor air quality and temperature, humidity and carbon dioxide (CO₂) inside and outside homes. GATEWAY #AA Requires Power Requires a LAN Ethernet cable connection to Modem Indoor Carbon Dioxide Sensor No power required Required GATEWAY #AA to be placed 1-1.5m…
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Exploring adaptive capacity to arid heat in remote First Nations communities in Central Australia
Format: websiteCategories: Journal PapersThis study used yarning sessions with 30 participants from four remote First Nations communities in Central Australia to examine the impacts of extreme heat, highlighting how poor housing, energy insecurity, and limited cooling options increase health risks and the need for community-led climate adaptation strategies.
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Emergency Department Presentations During Dry and Humid Heatwaves: A Case-Crossover Study in the Northern Territory, Australia
Format: websiteCategories: Journal PapersThis research found that both dry-heat and humid heatwaves increase emergency department presentations in Australia’s Northern Territory, with visitors particularly affected during dry-heat events and Aboriginal people during humid heatwaves, highlighting the need for humidity-inclusive warning systems and targeted protections for high-risk groups.
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Associating geospatially assessed walkability with population health physical activity indicators from urban and regional settings: A case study from Tasmania, Australia
Format: websiteCategories: Journal PapersThis study found that higher neighborhood walkability is associated with increased physical activity, particularly in regional Tasmania, highlighting the potential of built environment design as a practical strategy to support healthier, more active communities.
