A professional, qualified and multidisciplinary workforce, in sufficient numbers, is vital to the organisation and management of effective Public Health systems around the world. Such a workforce is essential to evaluate and respond to growing threats to population health, to address health inequalities between and within countries, and to develop and implement scientifically-based interventions in a timely and appropriate manner within the limits of available resources. Ensuring that such a workforce exists and functions effectively requires the development and/or expansion of Public Health training programmes and educational systems in each country, based on the country’s own needs but incorporating international best practices and norms. Yet many countries still do not have Schools of Public Health, or have Public Health training programmes that do not incorporate many of the more modern tools of Public Health education and practice. For example, in 2003 an Afrihealth survey of schools in Africa found that 54.7% of countries offered no post-graduate training in public health and where there was training many post-graduate public health programmes remained ‘traditional’ with a ‘narrow view’ of public health and which provided access only to health workers and medical practitioners The introduction of new programmes and Schools of Public Health historically takes place within settings which are highly medicalised and where the status and ensuing salaries of Public Health are low in comparison to traditional medicine . The objective therefore of introducing Schools and programmes is to develop a critical mass of personnel trained in modern techniques that can change their systems from within. This session will introduce participants to the strategies and techniques of introducing and developing programmes and Schools of Public Health from differing international settings, including Africa, the Middle East and Central and Eastern Europe.