SCBO Board meeting & public forum in Brisbane

Once each year, the SCBO board try to get together face-to-face to discuss Section business. Last Thursday and Friday, most of us met up in Brisbane. Our discussions were primarily focussed on reviewing and updating our workplans – outlining and planning what we will do (Capacity, Conferences, Science and Education and Policy and Management) over the next year in line with our Strategic Plan. We streamlined our committee structure to focus on these four key themes. James Watson, president of the global Society for Conservation Biology, dropped by to give us a quick update from the SCB Executive.

On Thursday afternoon, we were treated to a tour of the Brisbane Convention & Exhibition Centre, which will be the venue for SCBO 2016 in July next year (don’t forget to get your abstracts in by the 13th January!). It really is a lovely venue filled with natural light and views across the city, with a fantastic plenary auditorium and lots of space for networking and socialising. We’re all excited for the conference next year!

After testing the menu at the BCEC bar, we headed over to Queensland University of Technology to host our public event The Great Barrier Reef – are we doing enough?. Richard moderated an excellent expert panel, with guest speakers Carole Sweatman (Chief Executive Officer of Terrain Natural Resource Management, Wet Tropics), Sean Hoobin (Freshwater Policy Manager, WWF-Australia) and Terry Hughes (Distinguished Professor at James Cook University). For those who missed it, you can listen to the audio here, or watch the recording on our brand new YouTube channel! You can also catch the highlights on Twitter #GBRforum.


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Questions from the audience

The panel, L-R: