2012 Rockefeller Meeting in Bellagio, Italy
November 27 – December 1, 2012
The McGill Centre for the Convergence of Health and Economics (MCCHE) hosted a meeting entitled ‘Nurturing and Bridging Agricultural, Health, Industrial, Organizational, Social and Institutional Innovation: Whole-of-Society Solution For and With the Poor and Vulnerable’, which was held at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center in Bellagio, Italy - in the beautiful Lake Como region. This high-level private workshop convened 23 cross-sectoral representatives.
The meeting was a next step in a long-term convergence-building multi-roadmap development process led by MCCHE, with the INCLEN Trust International and the research program on agriculture for improved nutrition and health (CPR4) of the Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centers (CGIAR).
A cornerstone of the event was the creation of the Convergent Innovation Coalition, a consortium of actors from different backgrounds convening around a set of actionable, time-based roadmap projects.
Back row: Gordon Bacon, John Kirton
Second row: Richard Gold, Chris Lannon, Jaykumar Menon, Alain Poirier, Gavin Gibson, Abu Masud, Narendra Arora, Nazmul Huda, Animesh Shrivastava, John McDermott, David Freedman, Nick Drager
Front row: Steven Bingler, Rajiv Tandon, Laurette Dubé, Leah Schwisow, Nirmala Murthy, Patrick Webb, Steven Thompson
2011 Rockefeller Meeting in Bellagio, Italy
On March 7-10, 2011, the McGill Centre for the Convergence of Health and Economics (MCCHE) convened an Experts’ Meeting at the Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center to discuss issues of business engagement in Global Health Diplomacy (GHD) in the arena of food and nutrition including:
- Food safety.
- Food security.
- Under-nutrition.
- Chronic disease.
- Maternal and child nutrition.
At this meeting, 16 high-level representatives presented a range of perspectives and identified mechanisms and opportunities for better harnessing the power of business to address global health challenges in food and nutrition.
The central meeting outcomes included the following:
- The need to measure and monitor progress on addressing global health challenges for policy making and accountability.
- The need for business competencies to be utilized in time-bound, specific projects.
- The need to recognize and build on current progress in terms of initiatives tackling food and nutrition global health issues.
- The need to create/scale-up enabling environments for the inclusion of business at the policy table.
The range of perspectives addressing the issue of ‘harnessing the power of business for better GHD’ in the realm of food and nutrition, which were explored during the Bellagio Meeting, provided critical input into targeting current gaps and identifying next steps.
Two strategic briefs on the role of business in food and nutrition in GHD involving primary research were produced as background material for the meeting and a Meeting Outcomes Report was also produced. These reports will be used to structure next steps in promoting and consolidating business engagement in GHD.
