The board of the European Aquaculture Society (EAS) decided that the Aquaculture Europe 2020 event, to be held in Cork in April 2021, will become an online event to be held on the same dates, from April 12-15, 2021.
The basic format of the event will remain the same, with morning plenary sessions and breakout parallel sessions for oral and E-poster presentations. The parallel sessions will be made up of shorter slots for pre-recorded video presentations of the oral presentations and with time allocated to review E-posters and for Q&A. The board has also agreed to extend the deadline for the submission of abstracts to January 31. There will also be an e-market where vendors and media partners will have a dedicated place online to present their products, link to their website and have a chat-box to interact with attendees and set up meetings.
Gavin Burnell, outgoing EAS president and AE2020 Steering Committee chair said that “making this decision now, six months ahead of the date, will allow us to prepare and configure the event so that it can be successful and interactive for attendees. This early announcement and the extension to the abstract deadline will also assure authors that they will have a chance to present their work and will position AE2020 against the many other online events taking place this year and early next.”
The organization said that the parallel sessions with pre-recorded presentations will reduce the risk of technical problems and will allow attendees to watch all presentations (oral videos and E-posters) after the event. This ensures that attendees will not miss any presentation that they would have missed with a busy program in a physical event. Contact with the presenter will also be facilitated, complementing the live Q&A during the conference days.
EAS will also organize the planned RAS@EAS event as a one-day online workshop on April 12 before the conference starts. The workshop theme “Creating an optimum environment” will be a panel-based discussion organized in three sessions addressing three key questions: “How do we best approach disinfection?”, “Where are we going with monitoring and autonomy?” and “What are the most problematic interactions between fish and their environment?” Each session will have an introductory presentation, followed by a moderated panel discussion. Registration for this event can be made separately, but all those registered for the full AE2020 event will be able to attend.
During the opening plenary session, and as done for the first time at AE2019 in Berlin, the EAS Student Spotlight Award will be held with short pitches from the finalists where participants will decide the winner.
For more information on AE2020, visit www.aquaeas.org. EAS is moving forward with the plan of AE2021 in Funchal, Madeira from October 4-7, 2021 and abstracts can also be submitted online for that event.
