Professor Jouni Jaakkola and ARAHAT research group received a continuation grant from the Finnish Cultural Foundation

The aim of the project is to produce new scientific and popular information about the climate change, the effects of climate change and adaptation for the Saami people, industry and commerce, governmental actors, researchers, the practicers of traditional Saami livelihood in addition to educational and private sector.

The research project combines the methods of epidemiological and cultural studies. The Finnish Cultural Foundation awarded a grant for the first year of the ARAHAT project in 2017, the current continuation grant enables the activities of the next two years of the planned three year project. The goal of the entire project is to create indicators to monitor climate change. Indicators enable creation of reliable time series and the indicators can be used to monitor the rate of the changes, speed and development of Saami culture in a reliable manner. Existing knowledge and research finding will be elaborated to identify the key indicators that can best be used to study and monitor the effects of climate change. These indicators and supporting information will be published as an open data. The future vision is to develop a long-term monitoring system for climate change influences that would enable sustainable adaptation of a sensitive culture to climate change in a rapidly changing environment.

The grant was awarded in the annual gala of the Finnish Cultural Foundation on 27 February 2019.  

More information:

Jouni J. K. Jaakkola, Professor of public health, director, Center for Environmental and Respiratory Health Research (CERH),
Faculty of Medicine, University of Oulu
email: jouni.jaakkola (a) oulu.fi
tel. +358 40 6720 927

(Picture: Inga-Briitta Magga)