Can psychological well being profit from nature-based well being therapies? A brand new scientific challenge led by the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (ICTA-UAB) will discover how most of these therapies, consisting of frequent publicity to pure inexperienced areas, may very well be built-in into public well being and nature promotion insurance policies to enhance the psychological well being of the inhabitants and scale back inequalities in addressing these pathologies.

Over the following 4 years, the GreenME challenge will revolutionize the understanding of psychological well being equality throughout Europe. To obtain this, it is going to contain 19 companions from international locations reminiscent of Spain, Italy, the United Kingdom, the United States, Poland, Sweden, Germany, and Belgium, with funding of almost 6 million euros from the European Union’s Horizon Europe analysis and innovation program.

Over 60 members of the consortium lately gathered in Barcelona to kick off the challenge. Researchers, remedy suppliers, and municipal representatives labored collectively to deal with the challenge’s challenges.

We must deepen the proof that therapies based mostly on contact with nature profit psychological well being and wellbeing, and one in every of our primary ideas is to empower completely different stakeholders on how contact with nature advantages folks’s well being (inexperienced care), and to contain them in shaping sustainable well being options.” 

Dr. Helen Cole, researcher at ICTA-UAB and one of many scientific coordinators of the GreenME challenge

“This project will analyze in depth the close relationship between the different levels of green care and mental health equity, enabling this knowledge to be translated into real and effective policies”, mentioned Dr. Margarita Triguero-Mas, researcher on the UOC and ISGlobal and scientific coordinator of the challenge along with Dr. Cole.

The researchers will look at the shut interplay between psychological well being, inexperienced care, and environmental justice (together with socio-environmental inequities) might be examined. As a part of this, they are going to analyze the effectiveness of nature-based well being care interventions. Nature-based therapies vary from horticulture, forest bathing (Japanese shinrin-yoku), to any exercise that takes place involved with nature and is particularly designed as a remedy, to advertise the remedy of an sickness or the advance of private wellbeing. The challenge can even assessment insurance policies that at the moment promote equality in psychological well being and environmental sustainability.

In addition to nature-based therapies, the researchers acknowledge two different forms of inexperienced care reminiscent of contact with nature in day by day life (e.g. the existence of inexperienced and blue infrastructures for contemplation and strolling) or nature-based well being promotion (lively interplay with greenery, reminiscent of gardening and conservation).

“We want this project to play a fundamental role in shaping healthy, just, climate-resilient, and sustainable communities”, provides, Dr. Helen Cole. Therefore, the GreenME challenge goals to replace our understanding of how contact with nature advantages our well being, guarantee equitable entry to nature-based therapies, and advocate for a more healthy planet for all.

Led by ICTA-UAB, the GreenME consortium “Advancing Greencare in Europe: An Integrated Multi-Scalar Approach for the Expansion of Nature-Based Therapies to Improve Mental Health Equity” consists of the University of Bologna (Bologna, Italy), Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet – Uppsala, Sweden), ILS Research (Research Institute for Regional and Urban Development – Dortmund, Germany), Warsaw University of Life Sciences (SGGW – Warsaw, Poland), Open University of Barcelona (UOC – Barcelona, Spain), Old- Continent (Brussels, Belgium), NeuroLandscape Foundation (Warsaw, Poland), Gesellschaft für Gartenbau und Therapie (GGuT – Hückeswagen, Germany), Institute of Psychiatry and Neurology (IPIN – Warsaw, Poland), Scandinavian Nature and Forest Therapy Institute & SHINRIN-YOKU (Stockholm, Sweden), Eta Beta Cooperativa Sociale (Bologna, Italy), City of Herne (Herne, Germany), Spanish Association of Horticulture and Social and Therapeutic Gardening (AEHJST – Madrid, Spain), University of Kent (Kent, UK), University of Salford (Salford, UK), Social Farms and Gardens (Bristol, UK), Mind in Bexley and East Kent LTD (London, UK), and Oregon Health & Science University Portland State University School of Public Health (OHSU-PSU) – Oregon, USA.