Page - 338 - in Biodiversity and Health in the Face of Climate Change

338 15.2.3.3 What Works Well It was noted by participants that the wide array of cross-sectoral issues was not common in expert meetings. For example: biodiversity-related issues featured less in discussions of the OH community; and experts that tackle health benefits from nature contact or experience do not often engage with communities focusing on nature-related health risks such as infectious diseases. The more generic sessions on evaluation, social science and education were also appreciated and considered important. Lastly, the largely interactive character of the workshop was welcomed by participants. This facilitated networking, bridge building and joint reflection, as well as creative ‘out of the box’ thinking. 15.2.3.4 Main Challenges During discussions at the European OH/EH workshop, the need for focused European networks was recognized. This will support implementation of OH/EH concepts, which can benefit from transdisciplinary and iterative processes between policy, science and practice. One should, however, be careful of creating big OH/EH institutions as this could result in building fences rather than creating openness to (new) collaborations. This may be avoided by focusing on open, collaborative networks like Communities of Practice, which are less (institutionally) bound and more flexible, and can be open to newcomers and new ideas and approaches. Such networks should not be limited to scientific experts, but also need to be open to policy experts, local knowledge, practitioners, grass-root organizations and all relevant stakeholders. Specific focused networks could concentrate on, for example, transdisciplinary One Health education, integration of social sciences in OH/EH actions and networks, and on translating research findings on the Environment- Microbiome- Health axis into policy-making. It was also suggested that a European Community of Practice could be initiated in order to support these several concrete networking initiatives, and to help to promote the building of other emerging initiatives. Currently, with NEOH (see Sect. 15.2.2 above), the establishment of such a European OH/EH network is under discussion. A follow-up European OH/ EH meeting was organized in September 2018  in Bologna. Contact information: http://www.biodiversity.be/health/58 15.2.4 Conference Biodiversity and  Health in  the  Face of  Climate Change 15.2.4.1 Introduction Climate change poses significant challenges to biodiversity and human well-being in Europe. Biodiversity in urban as well as in adjacent rural areas can provide benefits for human health and well-being when nature-based climate change H. Keune et al.