Each Symposium will focus on specific contemporary issues, but the primary and secondary focal areas are listed below. Special Sessions for 2022 have been included in the list, and are highlighted in blue with a live link to their detailed descriptions. Spotlight Sessions are also included in the list and are highlighted in green with a live link to their webpage.

Protected and Conserved Areas

• Protected Area Management Effectiveness
• SPECIAL SESSION: Protected Area Management Effectiveness: Assessment, Standards and Making the Shift towards Socio-Economic and Ecological Outcomes
• Biodiversity Stewardship
• Delineation and Management of Buffer Zones/Zone of Influence
• Transboundary Conservation
• Land Restitution and Co-Management of Protected Areas
• Integration of Cultural Heritage and Biodiversity Management
• Eco-Tourism
• Community-Based Conservation

Species Conservation

• Threatened Species Conservation
• SPECIAL SESSION: Exploring Small Mammal Conservation in Africa
• SPECIAL SESSION: Out of Sight, Out of Mind: The Fish Below the Surface in Freshwater Ecosystems
• Spotlight Session: Plant Conservation
• Spotlight Session: Conservation Genetics
• Sustainable Resource Use
• Advances in Monitoring and Surveillance

Landscape and Ecosystem Conservation

• Systematic Conservation Planning
• Land-Use Planning
• Securing Critical Biodiversity Areas
• Spotlight Session: Ecosystem Restoration
• Biodiversity Economy
• Ecosystem Goods and Services and Ecological Infrastructure
• SPECIAL SESSION: Freshwater Ecosystem Management
• Ecological and Evolutionary Processes

Conservation Tools

• Spotlight Session: Innovative Technology and Data Management
• Legal, Policy and Ethical Issues
• SPECIAL SESSION: Pollution Remediation and Protecting Biodiversity and Ecological Assets - Opportunities and Challenges within the Legal Framework, Compliance and Enforcement
• Biodiversity-Related Multilateral Environmental Agreements
• Sustainable Conservation Financing
• SPECIAL SESSION: The Science of Funding: How Conservation Success is Measured by Funding Agencies
• Resource Economics

Environmental Education and Awareness

• Effective Communication
• Interpretation
• Role of Social Media in Conserving Biodiversity
• Citizen Science

Global Change Conservation

• Conserving in the Face of Global Change
• SPECIAL SESSION: Rights for Nature: Progress in the Protection of Natural Systems
• Impacts of the COVID and other Pandemics on Conservation

Threats to Biodiversity

• Spotlight Session: Biological Invasions
• Climate Change
• Land- and Marine-Use Changes (including but not limited to mining activities)
• Pollution (including but not limited to plastics, herbicides, pesticides, effluents from urban areas, mining, and industry)
• SPECIAL SESSION: Pollution Mediation and Protecting Biodiversity and Ecological Assets - Opportunities and Challenges within the Legal Framework, Compliance and Enforcement
• Exploitation and Unsustainable Resource Use
• Wildlife Crime
• SPECIAL SESSION: The World-Wide-Web: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly