Health Impact Assessment

Introduction

Many companies now have minimum health standards that include safeguarding community health. They require an HIA of new projects, major modifications, and abandonments. The HIA may be stand-alone or integrated with environmental and social impact assessment. The internal requirement is supported by lender requirements – embodied in the Equator Principles.

This course uses problem-based, small group learning techniques to enable participants to explore methodological and procedural issues in order to be effective when participating in, or working with, Health Impact Assessments.

Objectives

By the end of this course participants will be able to:

• Participate effectively in Health Impact Assessments
• Outline the reasons for and explain the method for embedding HIA in business management systems and the importance of engaging external stakeholders
• Describe how to participate in HIAs as a team member
• Outline the required specialized knowledge in HIA
• Describe how the HIA integrates with the environmental and social impact assessments
• Demonstrate the skills required in HIA

Target Audience

Persons whose work is likely to require an understanding of the theory and practice of Health Impact Assessments (HIA) including; HSE Professionals, Engineers, Supervisors, Project managers, Company medical staff, contractors, Social and Environmental impact assessment staff and consultants, as well as external stakeholders such as Ministry of Environment and Ministry of Health. No previous knowledge of health or HIA is required.

Occupational Health and Safety Outline

The course covers the following topics:

• Context – Put HIA in the context of what it is and how it works
• Methodology – Explore methodological questions by undertaking a rapid HIA of a development project
• Procedures – Explore procedural questions including; when an HIA is needed, actions pre post assessment,
• Priorities – explore different approached to prioritization taking account of risk, resource constraints, and interests of project proponents
• Critical appraisal – Consider ‘what constitutes a good HIA’ and critically appraise aspects of procedures and methodology