FORMER Bermuda resident Kathleen Frith crossed paths with leading actor and environmental educator Harrison Ford this week.

Mrs. Frith is now based in Boston where she works as communications co-ordinator for Harvard Medical School's Centre for Health and the Global Environment.

The school presented the film star with its 2002 Global Environmental Citizen Award for all he has done to help bring awareness to the issue of biodiversity.

"Every year, the Centre gives (the) award to recognise an individual who has made a contribution to furthering the knowledge of, or increasing awareness about, the global environment," said Mrs. Frith, who is married to a Bermudian, Jonathan, and is a former spokesperson for the Bermuda Biological Station for Research.

"Last year, we gave it to Edward O. Wilson, who is a professor of Harvard and pretty much the world's most profound thinker in terms of biodiversity and conservation.

"Harrison Ford is on the board of Conservation International, an organisation dedicated to protecting plant and animal diversity in major tropical wilderness areas and key marine ecosystems. Aside from increasing the visibility of this issue with his star status, he is also involved, through Conservation International, in buying hot spots around the world.

"We're very excited (about the presentation) which stemmed from our collaboration with the New England Aquarium.

"We're delighted that he accepted. (Biodiversity is) an emerging issue and a hot topic and it's great that he's giving a lot of attention to the cause."

Mr. Ford has served on the board of Conservation International for more than ten years. A field-based organisation with more than 1,000 professionals in 30 countries, Conservation International concentrates on protecting biodiversity hotspots - 25 places comprising 1.4 per cent of the earth's surface but home to 60 per cent of the variety of species.

Most recently he lent his talents to the IMAX film Lost Worlds: Life in the Balance, which he narrated. The film examines the planet's biological diversity from the polar regions to the tropics.

"Our health relies entirely on the vitality of our fellow species on earth," he said at the awards ceremony. "When we protect the places where the processes of life can flourish, we strengthen not only the future of medicine, agriculture and industry, but also the essential conditions for peace and prosperity.

"It is an honour to receive this award. The Centre's leadership renews my belief that we can improve the course of our relationship with the natural world."

Harvard's Centre for Health and the Global Environment is the first medical school-based centre in the United States that operates to investigate and promote awareness of the consequences that global environmental change can have on human health.

"We believe that changes in the environment directly affect human health," explained Mrs. Frith, "and so we're interested in how biodiversity is important to human health. We're highlighting the importance of conservation to protect health.

"The loss of biodiversity could deplete sources of important medicines, the loss of species could greatly hinder our ability to enhance our understanding of human biology, especially in primates, disrupting ecosystems can foster emerging diseases and ecosystem disruption threatens our food supply. We stress that biodiversity is important because it is important to our health."

Mr. Ford was presented with the award on Monday at a ceremony co-hosted by the Centre for Health and the Global Environment and the New England Aquarium. The two groups have worked in collaboration on many projects.

"Harrison Ford is a tremendous actor, but what is perhaps not well known about him is his commitment to protect biodiversity - the variety of plant and animal species that are threatened each day," said Eric Chivian, the Centre's director.

"Ecosystems provide the network on which all other life depends. Harrison's efforts to protect earth's most critical places are helping advance human health and well-being."