About this speaker
Dr. Rosemary (Ro) McFarlane is a teaching-research academic. She is member of Healthy Environments and Lives (HEAL) Global Research Centre and Discipline lead of Public Health. She oversees the UC Health Research Institute's Master of Public Health and undergraduate and postgraduate public health teaching across the university. Her expertise is in the intersection of human, animal and environmental health. She has significant professional experience and expertise at the interface between health, biodiversity, environmental sustainability and food production. Her unique perspectives derive in part from her initial training as a Veterinarian, and direct hands-on experience in primary production and natural resource management in marginal climatic and agronomic regions. Her PhD training was with the late Professor Tony McMichael and his team of experts in the area of the health impacts of climate and broader ecological change.
Ro works extensively with community groups and government to develop landscape-level health solutions. She facilitated the declaration of the 9.8 million ha Ngaanyatjarra Indigenous Protected Area, W.A., and was an instigator of Australian Antarctic Division’s biosecurity measures to protect Antarctic wildlife from human and livestock diseases. She has a long association with Landcare in NSW, ACT and NT, Catchment Management Associations and local food producers.
Ro also works on collaborative projects with WHO, IUFRO, IUCN, and other international organisations. She is currently co-ordinating lead author on the Health chapter of the Nexus Assessment (Biodiversity Water, Food Health and Climate ) for the Intergovernmental Panel of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES).
Her current research explores health linkages in ecosystem service frameworks and translating global environmental sustainability policy to local solutions. This includes local food system resilience, quality of parks and greenspace on health and wellbeing and zoonotic disease ecology.
