Virtual 2021 Sustainable Island Futures Symposium III

On December 14 2021 the Sustainable Island Futures (SIF) symposium III took place, hosted by The Metabolism of Islands & The Sustainable Island Solutions through STEM at the University of Aruba. This innovative virtual online event hosted ten speakers affiliated to reputed institutions such as KU Leuven, the University of Aruba, Northeastern University, Rotterdam School of Management, Delft University of Technology, the Erasmus School of Law, the Institute for Global Public Policy, Canterbury Christ Church University, VU Amsterdam and the UN-FAO, and was attended by over 50 scholars from four continents. The keynote on sustainable management of freshwater resources for food security and nutrition in Small Island Developing States, delivered by Ben Sonneveld and Amani Alfarra was followed by discussions on water stress as a symptom of the insularity-islandness tension; a human-centric approach to economic forecasting and disaster planning; ascendency analysis as a diagnostic tool for the robustness of resource flow networks, assessing waste management systems of small islands; and finally an investigation into the effects of UV-filter (suntan-lotion) pollution on the environment. The symposium brought together researchers that are concerned about sustainable futures for small islands throughout the world. The exchange of ideas in the discussions that followed the presentations demonstrated a growing community of island scholars concerned about the sustainability transformations that are taking place in small island states. Stay tuned for the fourth Sustainable Island Futures Symposium in June 2022 to further foster interdisciplinary and interinstitutional collaboration on sustainable development in small island states.