The 1,449 proposals received represents roughly 20% more proposals than what IUCN received for the 2016 Congress and almost five times more proposals than the total number of slots available during the Forum. For Thematic Stream Sessions, the ratio was even stronger at almost eight proposals for each available slot.
The promise of quality extends beyond the number of proposals, with not only deep dives into conservation topics but also a strong showing of nature’s relevance to sustainable development more broadly and other sectors not usually associated with nature conservation. There are multiple proposals covering each of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, and 16 of the 17 goals each received at least 70 proposals related to the specific goal. Half of the proposals are global in scope, while the other 49% divide fairly evenly across eight geographic regions. Only Africa received more than 10%.
Just over 45% of the sessions target professional audiences, 42% target youth and young professionals and 12% seek to engage a broader public audience. Young professionals (aged 35 years or younger) submitted 503 proposals, many focused on business, indigenous peoples, youth and gender-related topics.
All proposals are currently under review through IUCN’s extensive process to ensure compliance with the submission criteria, technical quality and overall balance and diversity of programming across the Forum. More than 600 volunteer technical reviewers have reviewed the proposals, and 90% of the proposals received technical reviews from at least three independent reviewers. An advisory panel made up of representatives from IUCN Commissions, the IUCN Secretariat and the Host Country are currently reviewing the recommendations from the technical reviewers. The Forum team will alert session proposers of the status of their proposal in the week of 18 November.
