On August 30th, 2022, the International Scientific Committee (ISC) of the XVIII World Water Congress held its 5th meeting online. ISC Co-Chairs Renée Martin-Nagle and Shi Qiuchi chaired the meeting. ISC Vice Chairs and the nominated members, and representatives from the IWRA’s Executive Office and the Congress Secretariat attended the meeting.

The Vice Chairs of each working group reported recent working progress and outcomes of academic activities. The technical documents, review procedures and arrangement, website construction for the call for abstracts and special sessions were reviewed and discussed deeply in the meeting. The preliminary consideration of plenary sessions as well as the initial thinking of the framework of Beijing Declaration were also discussed. Comments and suggestions were widely exchanged on key issues.

The meeting reached consensus on launching the call for abstracts and special sessions from 16 September, until 31 December this year for the first round. In the next step meeting, the ISC will focus on the review of abstracts and proposals of special sessions, schedule the programme of academic activities, and further promote and mobilise the Congress academic activities.