NZES & SCBO 2026 Conference

Confirmed Symposia

About the Symposia
The names below indicate the lead organisers (symposia convenors) for each confirmed symposium. Presentations within these sessions may include invited speakers as well as contributions submitted through the general abstract process.

All those invited or interested in contributing are asked to submit an abstract via the open call before 12 August 2026. For requirements and submission instructions, visit the Call for Abstract page.

Please note that all participants, including invited speakers and abstract submitters, will be expected to register for the conference.

A National Ecosystem Typology: creating a common language

Fiona Hodge
Ministry for Cities, Environment, Regions and Transport

The Ministry of Cities, Environment, Regions and Transport (previously Ministry for the Environment) is leading the development of a national ecosystem typology for New Zealand. This will be standardised, cut across all domains and nest under the IUCN Global Ecosystem Typology.

Ecosystem typologies identify, define and describe different types of ecosystems – they are fundamental infrastructure for biodiversity protection, monitoring, research and management

Developing a national ecosystem typology collaboratively offers an opportunity to establish a common language, support data and knowledge integration, allow a better understanding of ecosystems, and inform targeted management. Sharing and collaborating on this work ensures that the typology works for different users.

Work began with engaging end-users to collectively identify what makes a good typology, with these principles guiding the programme. To date, most progress has been in the terrestrial and wetland domains with the first version of the national catalogue scheduled for June 2027.

The objective of this symposium is to share the work underway on National Ecosystem Typology with the science and research community. This includes progress in the terrestrial and wetland domains.

Adapting our adaptive management: Evidence-driven conservation planning & adaptive management tools for real-world decisions

Jamie Mcaulay, Simon Moore, Lucy Bridgman
Department of Conservation

In ecology, nothing stays still for long.

Modern conservation management demands evidence‑based, strategy‑led decision‑making. Advances in prioritisation tools, management techniques, and evidence frameworks come thick and fast. But how does it all fit together? In an ever‑changing landscape, what does adaptive management look like where the rubber meets the roots?

Two themed sessions draw together best‑practice adaptive management theory with on‑the‑ground realities from across Oceania. In addition to invited speakers, submissions are welcomed for speakers to share how they design and deliver science‑led frameworks and conservation systems that help respond to an uncertain future.

Session 1: The Department of Conservation New Zealand frames the challenge of making wise conservation investments. Invited speakers describe why new approaches are needed and DOC's approach to meet the challenge. Invited and contributed speakers share their own approaches and the practical challenges of designing management systems that can genuinely adapt.

Session 2: From climate adaptation to indigenous‑led conservation planning, this session invites real‑world case studies showing how organisations deliver different components of adaptive management systems in practice.
This is followed by a panel discussion with all speakers from both sessions.

Adopting IUCN Ecosystem Risk and Recovery Frameworks in Aotearoa New Zealand

Simon Moore, Dr Ellery Mayence
Department of Conservation

Aotearoa-New Zealand faces persistent and well-documented challenges associated with ecosystem degradation and loss. In response, New Zealand has begun engaging with international assessment frameworks developed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), specifically the Red List of Ecosystems (RLE) and the Green Status of Ecosystems (GSE). Both frameworks require national pilot studies prior to formal adoption to evaluate methodological feasibility, data sufficiency, and policy relevance in local ecological and institutional contexts.

This symposium will present and critically examine progress from pilot applications of the RLE and GSE in New Zealand. Contributions will address technical and conceptual issues arising during RLE pilots, including ecosystem typologies, spatial and temporal reference models, treatment of uncertainty in underlying data, and interpretation of threat categories. The symposium will also consider the additional analytical demands of a GSE pilot study of saltmarsh ecosystems, particularly the specification of reference states, recovery baselines and trajectories, and indicators of ecosystem integrity in highly modified landscapes.

The symposium further considers the application of these pilot efforts within a political and governance environment, where biodiversity assessment tools increasingly inform national and international reporting, prioritisation, and monitoring obligations. Consideration will be given to how GSE interacts with Māori knowledge systems. This symposium aims to advance discussion on the role of global ecosystem assessment frameworks in shaping evidence-based conservation policy and practice in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Beyond restoration: towards regenerative ecology in science, policy, and practice

Bradley Case
Auckland University of Technology

Ecological restoration has become a central strategy for addressing biodiversity loss and climate change. However, restoration efforts are often fragmented, site-based, and insufficiently connected to the broader social, economic, and political systems that ultimately determine ecological outcomes. In parallel, there is growing interest in “regenerative” approaches that emphasise system transformation, relational values, and long-term resilience, yet these concepts remain inconsistently defined and weakly integrated into ecological science and policy.

In this symposium, we ask: how can ecological science move beyond restoration towards regenerative approaches that are measurable, scalable, and policy-relevant?

We aim to bring together researchers, practitioners, and policy actors to explore key themes related to, for example:

emerging conceptual frameworks for regenerative environments (e.g., Nature-based Solutions), including relational and systems-based perspectives that link ecosystems, communities, and governance.
advances in measurement and indicators, addressing the challenge of evidencing regenerative change across ecological and social dimensions.
implementation pathways, including policy instruments, funding mechanisms, and institutional arrangements required to scale regenerative approaches in Aotearoa New Zealand and beyond.

By integrating insights across these domains, the symposium will highlight where current restoration paradigms are insufficient, identify opportunities for transformative change, and outline a research and policy agenda for regenerative ecology. In doing so, it directly responds to the conference theme of “changing the conversation” by positioning ecology as a discipline that not only diagnoses environmental problems but actively shapes the systems that produce them.

Building sustainable and adaptive participatory strategies in conservation by, for, and from local communities in New Guinea

Shannon Kachel, Linzon Zamang, Lisa Dabek
Woodland Park Zoo and Tree Kangaroo Conservation Program - Papua New Guinea

The island of New Guinea hosts some of the world's highest levels of cultural and biological diversity and endemism; conservation efforts there have long been shaped by this diversity, but also by rapid development and its attendant social disruptions, contrasting approaches to land tenure across the Indonesia-Papua New Guinea border, and dramatic political changes. Evolving in this context of shifting social, technological, political, and environmental pressures (pressures now reshaping conservation globally), New Guinea’s community-based conservation programs offer insights as models for building robust, enduring strategies that are nonetheless adaptive enough to handle to new challenges and inputs, and agile enough to make good on emerging opportunities. This symposium brings together invited speakers (6-10 speakers) representing a range of institutional approaches, cultural contexts, and conservation challenges, working across the island of New Guinea, from the YUS and Managalas Conservation Areas, Crater Mountain Wildlife Management Area, and the Cyclops Mountains in West Papua. Their work spans (and expands) the breadth of conservation practice: conducting exploratory baseline assessments, negotiating and maintaining community support for land-use planning and protected areas, designing participatory research and monitoring programs, integrating one health and livelihood programs, bringing conservation strategies into alignment with government priorities, and developing committed financing and governance structures that empower communities to lead and sustain conservation over the long term. This symposium, consisting of presentations and interactive discussion, will provide speakers and participants the opportunity to share and integrate experiences and perspectives that advance discussion toward community-grounded conservation that is sustainable, responsive, and resilient.

Carbon and Biodiversity Credits: a challenge for ecology and conservation

John Craig, Green Inc & Tahi Estate
Neil Mitchell, Tahi Estate & Ecobureau
James Russell, University of Auckland & ZIP

Ecology and conservation have the potential for a significant boost when focused on the twin global crises of climate change and biodiversity decline. International markets for trading carbon credits are already established, but some large multinational companies are now favouring biodiverse credits over monoculture carbon sources like pine. “Nature-based credits” (consisting of both nature-based carbon credits and biodiversity credits) are a rapidly evolving and significant potential voluntary market for New Zealand. Influencing current negotiations on how carbon and biodiversity are measured, as well as how these measures are verified, would benefit from input from ecological and conservation experts. This symposium aims to raise awareness of current issues and encourage greater engagement from conference attendees.

Changing the Conversation: Coastal Ecology in the Age of Green Infrastructure

Dr Cate Ryan
Auckland University of Technology

In Aotearoa New Zealand and globally, coastal ecology is being reshaped by climate change and political recalibration. Regulatory reform, including streamlined planning frameworks, reflects priorities of efficiency, development and economic growth. In this context, coastal ecosystems are increasingly judged by their utility. Framing them as green infrastructure aligns ecology with policy drivers, but risks narrowing relationships between people and place.

Coasts are not only sites of risk management and ecosystem service provision; they are a core part of our identity. In Aotearoa, this is expressed through whakapapa linking people, land, and sea; globally, coastlines remain places of origin, livelihood, and belonging. Beaches, dunes, estuaries and wetlands, therefore, provide key functions and are part of our natural heritage.

Changing the conversation requires a deliberate integration of these perspectives. First, focus is needed on ecosystem thresholds that determine continued support for people and biodiversity, including under climate change. Second, practitioners must engage with coastal squeeze, where rising seas and coastal development compress ecological space. Third, the baseline narrative must recognise current systems as functionally important, recoverable, and meaningful.

A symposium provides a forum to collectively test and refine this re-framing across disciplines and knowledge systems. Aligning biodiversity goals with the priorities of iwi, hapū, Pacific peoples, communities, scientists, policy-makers, engineers and insurers builds a broad base of shared influence and ownership. The goal is not to choose between biodiversity and infrastructure, but to reposition coastal ecology as a means of managing risk while maintaining connection to landscapes that shape who people are.

Connecting People and Wildlife: Advancing Transport Ecology in Oceania

Jamie Steer, Carol Bannock
NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi

This symposium will bring together researchers, practitioners, agencies, and Indigenous knowledge holders from across Oceania to explore how transport systems influence biodiversity and ecological processes, and how ecological knowledge can better inform transport planning, design, and operations.

Building on and extending collaboration following the recent Australasian Network for Ecology and Transportation conference (an EIANZ community of practice), the session will highlight emerging research and applied practice that improve biodiversity outcomes across diverse landscapes. Contributions are invited on themes including evaluating the effectiveness of biodiversity mitigation and restoration, improving risk assessment and decision-making processes, understanding sensory and disturbance impacts such as noise and artificial light on fauna, enhancing habitat connectivity and reducing fragmentation through infrastructure design, integrating biodiversity considerations into transport planning and project delivery, and addressing ecological risks and management approaches in emergency works and rapid response situations. Presentations may include case studies from transport or other linear infrastructure where ecological effects and management responses are comparable. The symposium encourages contributions that demonstrate applied outcomes, transferable lessons, and cross-jurisdictional insights, particularly where these help address key evidence gaps in transport-related biodiversity management.

Conversations about species conservation: Highlighting Pacific Island priorities and voices to accelerate Pacific Island species recovery actions

Mereia Tabua, Megan Joyce, Andrew Roge

Photo Credit: Stuart Chape

The Pacific Islands Round Table Species Working Group (SWG), a network of Pacific Island Species Specialists established in 1998, has heightened the call for species conservation in Pacific Island nations and territories spanning Melanesia, Polynesia, and Micronesia. Building on the momentum from the 2024 IUCN Oceania Regional Conference the SWG has been meeting monthly (virtually) since September 2025 to strengthen the network and develop regional and national strategies for species recovery in the Pacific.

In an effort to catalyze coordinated action for accelerated species recovery and to achieve Target 4 of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KM-GBF) this proposed full-day species congress will allow Pacific Island species specialists, researchers, and practitioners to engage in:

1) Storytelling: through presentations and poster display of species-related research and recovery action in their Pacific Island nation.

2) Reconnecting: through a mini workshop to exchange ideas, map existing species assessments, recovery plans, and secure commitments to action that support the revised Pacific Islands Framework for Nature Conservation (2026-2030), post September 2026 Pacific Nature Conference in Noumea.

3) Changing the conversation: through panel discussion and presentations addressing species priorities that are often non-existent or focused on species that are charismatic or opportunistic. Many species that could have genuine conservation status improvement are overlooked so a method was developed in response to many discussions with governments regarding the challenges and complications related to Target 4 of the KM-GBF and the appropriate species recovery actions.

Disturbance as Catalyst: Leveraging Extreme Events to Transform Ecological Knowledge and Public Discourse

Julie Deslippe,Victoria University of Wellington
Cate MacInnis-Ng,University of Auckland

Extreme disturbances such as volcanism, wildfire, floods, drought and cyclones act as powerful filters on biodiversity, rapidly reorganising communities, disrupting plant-soil interactions, and altering ecosystem functions like carbon storage and nutrient cycling. These pulse disturbances increasingly occur against the backdrop of on-going press disturbances such as elevated CO2, warming and altered water cycles. The interactions of these press and pulse disturbances often drive nonlinear responses, breaching thresholds and triggering ecological regime shifts that challenge traditional conservation and restoration paradigms based on historical baselines. At the same time, these events generate rare opportunities to observe ecological processes in action, enabling tests of theory under conditions that are otherwise difficult to replicate experimentally.

Beyond their ecological impacts, extreme events create moments of heightened public and political attention, opening critical windows for engagement. These periods provide an opportunity to communicate complex ideas such as uncertainty, resilience, and shifting baselines, and to reframe conservation goals toward forward-looking, adaptive management. This symposium brings together empirical, conceptual, and applied perspectives from across disturbance types to examine how communities and ecosystems respond to extreme events and how these insights can be leveraged to transform both ecological understanding and public discourse. By drawing insights across systems and disturbance contexts, we will also explore how to more effectively communicate ecological complexity to support evidence-based decision-making and improve management outcomes in an increasingly disturbance-driven world.

Genomics for informing threatened species management: how and why you should use it too

Eilish McMaster
University of Sydney

Population genomics is increasingly applied in conservation management, yet its use remains far from universal. Some practitioners perceive genomics as expensive or unnecessary when traditional ecological approaches are available. However, a growing body of work across Oceania demonstrates that genomic data can provide unique insights into population structure, genetic diversity, connectivity, and risk; information that can substantially improve conservation decision-making for threatened species.

This symposium will showcase a series of case studies where population genomics has directly informed conservation management for threatened plants and animals. Presentations will highlight how genomic approaches have revealed insights not achievable through ecological data alone, what was the cost, and how these analyses are being translated into practical management actions.

The session will include short presentations from researchers and practitioners working across different taxa and genomic technologies, followed by a facilitated discussion with audience participation. This discussion will focus on improving accessibility of genomic approaches for non-specialists and identifying opportunities to better integrate genomics with traditional ecological research.

Hellaby Indigenous Grasslands Research Trust: Current knowledge and future directions in the ecology of Aotearoa’s indigenous grasslands

Nicola Day, Dave Kelly, Kath Dickinson, Richard Duncan, Warren King
Victoria University of Wellington

Indigenous grasslands are an iconic and fundamental component of Aotearoa’s landscapes, supporting unique biodiversity and providing essential ecosystem services. Like grasslands globally, they face increasing pressures from invasive plants and animals, land use change, drought, woody incursion and wildfires. This symposium aims to present current knowledge on the ecology and management of indigenous grasslands in Aotearoa. A central aim of the symposium is to showcase the research of some of the current and recent postgraduate fellows supported by the Miss E. L. Hellaby Indigenous Grasslands Research Trust, thus providing a forum for early career ecologists to profile their research on key components of the biodiversity and functioning of indigenous grasslands. If time is available in the schedule, we will also consider complementary talks from non-Hellaby-funded researchers. The symposium will open with an overview of the history of the Trust, its purpose, and achievements by the current Chair of the Trust, Emeritus Prof. Dave Kelly.

How open access to herbarium data and images is contributing to species conservation in the Pacific

Yumiko Baba, Auckland Museum
Mereia Tabua, NatureFiji-MareqetiViti

The Auckland Museum and NatureFiji-MareqetiViti propose a symposium that focuses on the role and practices of open-access to physical collection data, from museums and herbaria, and digitised specimens in Oceania. The symposium will be hybrid, both in-person and online, comprising presentations, panel discussions, and an open forum. We invite speakers to showcase their case studies on the use of open-access data in conservation in Oceania. Selected panels will be invited from New Zealand, New Caledonia, Samoa, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, and USA to share their experiences and we intend to invite the audience for open discussions on how these collection institutions' practices and collaborative work with the indigenous community in their conservation work. We also discuss which types of information should be included in bicultural/traditional knowledge labels for biodiversity collections from Oceania to make our practices safer and more effective.

Safeguarding biodiversity during infrastructure development

Jamie MacKay, Liz Curry
Tonkin & Taylor Ltd

Infrastructure is expanding across Aotearoa New Zealand, through roads, quarries, renewable energy developments, and housing, at the same time as ecosystems face accelerating pressure from habitat loss, fragmentation, invasive species, and climate change. This symposium, Safeguarding biodiversity during infrastructure development, aims to bring together ecologists, practitioners, planners, iwi/hapū partners, regulators, and industry to explore how infrastructure can be planned, designed, delivered, and maintained in ways that actively safeguard biodiversity and support resilient landscapes. We will explore how early ecological input and nature-based solutions can shape project siting and design, how to apply the mitigation hierarchy with clarity and accountability, and how monitoring can move beyond compliance to measurable ecological outcomes.

The Ecology and Evolution of Biological Invasions

Ang Mcgaughran
University of Waikato

Biological invasions are among the most pervasive drivers of ecological change worldwide – reshaping communities and altering ecosystem processes. As well as outcompeting other species, invasive species' success can be determined by the ability of invaders to respond rapidly to abiotic factors in the invaded habitat.

This symposium will focus on research that seeks to highlight how ecological and/or evolutionary processes can determine invasion success, spread, and impact. It will explore invasive species as powerful models for understanding fundamental ecological questions, including potential species' responses to novel and future environments.

By integrating ecological and evolutionary perspectives, this symposium aims to advance holistic understanding of biological invasions and their consequences, fostering dialogue across subdisciplines and identifying key directions for future research in invasion ecology.

Unlocking the value of New Zealand's biodiversity data through GBIF

Georgia Sharp,Ministry for the Environment
Meredith Mckay, Environment Canterbury

New Zealand’s biodiversity data is extensive but highly fragmented — held across central and local government, research institutions, and other organisations. This fragmentation limits our ability to build a coherent national picture of ecosystems, track change over time, and support effective environmental decision-making.

Recent cross-agency work has highlighted both the scale of this challenge and the opportunity to take a more coordinated national approach to biodiversity data mobilisation and use.

New Zealand has a solution for open access to primary biodiversity data through the proven infrastructure provided by the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). GBIF is a global data infrastructure that provides free and open access to biodiversity information. It holds over 3.5 billion biodiversity records globally, including more than 19 million from New Zealand.

The Ministry for the Environment (soon to be the Ministry of Cities, Environment, Regions and Transport) has been working closely with GBIF New Zealand to improve the sharing and accessibility of biodiversity data, including supporting increased mobilisation of data to GBIF.

This symposium will explore how GBIF is helping to connect New Zealand’s biodiversity data, improve accessibility, and enable new insights. It will include a short introduction to GBIF and its role in New Zealand, followed by a series of curated presentations from researchers and practitioners demonstrating practical applications of GBIF-mediated data.

Voices across Moananuiākea (expansive ocean) Hui - Changing the Conversation: Including and amplifying Indigenous voices in conservation

Courtney Melton, Aimee Sato, Kiri Reihana
Society For Conservation Biology Oceania, Brisbane, Australia

This symposium hosted by Society for Conservation Biology Oceania Voices across Moananuiākea Group aims to amplify Indigenous peoples Voices in conservation conversations. There is an increasing need for co-designed conservation solutions based on Indigenous cultural practices. Such practices are slowly becoming appropriately recognised in conventional science and practice, however, equitable forums, resources and safeguards to incorporate emerging solutions are scarce. Here we will gather in a hybrid variation of a Hui to celebrate Indigenous communities’ contributions to conservation of place, land and/or oceans, and discuss our key challenges. As an extension of the “Voices across Moananuiākea Oceania Forum” held at the 2024 HCC, and the “Moananuiākea – Recognising the value of Indigenous sciences in driving effective and equitable conservation efforts” symposia held at the 2025 ICCB, this symposium is an opportunity for our group to continue to support elevation of Indigenous knowledge systems alongside Western science, ensuring equity, respect and cultural integrity in conservation spaces. While recognising the pressures of globalisation and environmental change at both regional and local scales, this symposia in 2026 foregrounds the co-design of knowledge – grounded in Mātauranga Māori and in dialogue with other Indigenous, formal, and community knowledge systems—to drive meaningful change and ensure the continuity of Indigenous knowledge of flora and fauna for future generations.

What is rewilding and (how) does it apply in Oceania?

Sally Hawkins, CQUniversity, Melbourne
Tristan Derham, Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre, Hobart

Rewilding is rapidly emerging across Europe, Africa, and the Americas, yet its uptake in Oceania has been comparatively limited. Several factors contribute: concepts of “wild” can conflict with First Nations worldviews; environmental policies and funding settings often favour traditional, species centric conservation; invasive species and extractive land use remain pervasive ecological and management barriers.

At the same time, rewilding principles reflect a broader shift in conservation, considering rights of nature, landscape scale, functional ecological restoration and place based, participatory, adaptive management. These shifts can align with Oceanian priorities when grounded in Indigenous rights and knowledge, community aspirations, and long-term stewardship.

The session will open with co-editors of the new IUCN Guidelines for Rewilding, introducing the definition, vision, principles, and practical theory of change framework.

This foundational talk will anchor contributions exploring whether—and how—rewilding principles can be interpreted and applied across Oceania’s diverse ecological and cultural settings.

We invite contributions from researchers, practitioners or policymakers exploring the opportunities, constraints, and practicalities of rewilding in Oceania. Empirical case studies, theoretical and critical perspectives, and applied conservation experiences are all welcome, including contributions addressing relevant themes like coexistence, trophic restoration, species reintroductions, invasive species management, governance and policy innovation, Indigenous-led stewardship, monitoring and adaptive management, and pathways for scaling up restoration and ecological recovery across the region.