On 9th and 10th of July, academics from the Faculties of Medicine at Hokkaido University (HU) and the University of Melbourne (UoM) gathered in Sapporo for the HU-UoM Workshop: Challenges & Opportunities of Climate Change Impact on Migrant Health in Australia and Japan. The workshop was one of the five selected workshops for the 2025 Hokkaido-Melbourne Joint Research Workshops Fund.
HU's Professor Kayo Ueda and Associate Professor Xerxes Seposo virtually met UoM's Professor Kathryn Bowen, Deputy Director of the Melbourne Climate Futures and Lead Author on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Health Chapter last December, and developed a plan to realise their first in-person meeting in Hokkaido. This workshop gathered multi-disciplinary experts to discuss global warming-related issues and the challenges of migrant health through case studies in Australia and Japan. Professor Bowen brought her colleagues in the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences: Associate Professor Karen Block in Migration and Mobility and Community Engaged and Co-productive Research; Dr Eliza Crosbie in Migration, Refugee Settlement and Gender; and Ms Gemma Tarpey-Brown, a PhD candidate in Child & Community Wellbeing.
The workshop was started by Professor Ueda and Dean Shinya Tanaka from the Faculty of Medicine, HU, and welcomed talks by UoM speakers on 'Climate Change and Displacement: Implications and Opportunities of Crisis Narratives', 'Women's Experiences of Temporary Labour Migration in the Asia-Pacific', 'African Farmers in Australia, That's a Good Dream: Adapting to New Climates through Cultivation in Regional Australia.' From the HU side, Professor Chi Hyunjoo Naomi from the Graduate School of Public Policy explained the summer heat and deep snow in recent Hokkaido and its impact on migrant health and social justice, and Specially-appointed Associate Professor Kazutaka Yoshida from the Graduate School of Medicine, Hirosaki University introduced international workers' health in Aomori prefecture while Associate Professor Yasufumi Moritani from Hokkaido University of Education, Hakodate, introduced the situations of international workers in Hokkaido.
Based on a scoping review by Associate Professor Seposo, the following discussion invited external participants and covered a wide range of topics such as climate change, migrants in agriculture, regional food security, including that of residents, a gap between the expectation and actuality of medical systems, etc., which gradually led to brainstorming for future joint research collaboration. An innovative approach in Social Medicine by academics of the two universities is much anticipated.
Text and photos are provided by the Office for International Collaborations
