The 24^th ISS committee has chosen the theme ‘Seaweeds in a changing world’, to focus on ongoing changes in seaweed aquaculture practices, industrial processing, future products and markets, local and global environmental change, and scientific advances that will change our understanding of how seaweeds function at all levels of organisation.

Planning for the Symposium is proceeding for February 2022 as scheduled. In light of the COVID-19 pandemic we anticipate the conference will be of a hybrid nature. We will plan to have some face-to-face sessions where possible, but we will be incorporating online attendance as well.

We have also changed the symposium format to embrace new technologies that allow actual and virtual delegates to attend and interact, and we expect a vibrant and exciting new stye of conference.  The organising committee feels the opportunity to have part of the Symposium hosted online presents an opportunity for us to reach a broader audience than the traditional Symposium and will also give us the opportunity to include different presentation formats. As such, we see 2022 as being a new and positive direction for the Symposium.