ICCP 2026: Rural Health Equity Through Community Psychology
Phebean Ganiyu and Christiana Ekefre represented What About Rural Health?™ as speakers at the 11th International Conference of Community Psychology (ICCP 2026), held in Lagos, Nigeria.
As part of the conference, we presented a roundtable discussion titled “From Source to Shore: How Community Psychology Can Advance Rural Health Equity.”
The discussion focused on a simple but important question: What happens when we start with the community when thinking about rural health?
We explored how rural health goes beyond the presence of hospitals and health centres. Access to healthcare can also be affected by transportation, poor roads, electricity, internet connectivity, availability of healthcare workers, affordability, the environment, trust and other realities that shape people’s everyday lives.
The conversation highlighted the importance of listening to communities and recognising them as partners and sources of knowledge, rather than simply recipients of healthcare interventions or sources of information.
We also discussed the move from consultation to meaningful participation and shared power. Communities should have opportunities to influence how problems are understood, how solutions are designed and how decisions affecting them are made.
A key part of the discussion was what happens to community knowledge after it has been gathered. We explored the need for knowledge to move beyond community meetings, research reports and conference rooms to policymakers, decision-makers, funders, organisations, practitioners and others who can translate knowledge into action.
Through the work of What About Rural Health?™, we also highlighted the role of communication in creating pathways for rural health experiences and knowledge to reach wider audiences and influence conversations around policy, funding, programmes and practice.
Most importantly, the journey should not end with action. There should also be a pathway back to the community, so people can understand what happened with the knowledge they shared and how it contributed to change.
The central message of the roundtable was simple:
Start with the community. Listen. Involve. Act. Return.
The discussion provided an opportunity to connect community psychology with rural health equity and to reinforce the importance of creating solutions with communities, not simply for them.
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