The 15th Cross-Strait Symposium on Constructed Wetland took place from October 16 to 23, 2025, with events hosted in Jinan, Shandong. (Credit: IHB)

The 15th Cross-Strait Symposium on Constructed Wetland took place from October 16 to 23, 2025, with events hosted in Jinan, Shandong, and at multiple field sites across Shandong and Jiangxi. The symposium was jointly organized by the Institute of Hydrobiology (IHB) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, China University of Geosciences (Wuhan), the Water Resources Research Center of Sun Yat-sen University (Taiwan), the Taiwan Wetland Society, and Wuhan Textile University. It was hosted by Shandong Normal University and the Lushan Botanical Garden of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Jiangxi Province, with support from Shandong Provincial Academy of Environmental Sciences Co., Ltd., the Environmental Biology Branch of the Chinese Society for Environmental Sciences, Shenzhen Biyuan Environmental Technology Co., Ltd., the School of Ecology and Environment at Zhengzhou University, and Nanyang Normal University. More than 200 experts, scholars, engineers, and technical managers from over 40 universities, research institutes, and enterprises across the Strait attended the event. 

The opening ceremony was chaired by LIANG Qiong, deputy director of IHB. Welcoming remarks were delivered by senior representatives from the organizing and hosting institutions, as well as officials from relevant scientific and environmental departments. The ceremony emphasized the symposium’s role in fostering academic exchange and technological collaboration across the Strait in the field of constructed wetlands. 

Under the theme “Smart, Resilient, and Integrated Development Empowering Green Growth of Constructed Wetlands,” the symposium featured a series of keynote speeches addressing topics such as ecological protection strategies, climate adaptation, technological innovation in water quality management, and breakthroughs in blue carbon methodologies. In addition, a special report reviewed the origins, development, and future outlook of the Cross-Strait Constructed Wetland Symposium series. The academic program included 42 conference presentations, 32 papers, and 15 posters, facilitating in-depth discussions on carbon sink potential assessment, emerging contaminant treatment, smart operation and maintenance, resilience design, and nature-based restoration approaches. 

During the symposium, experts from Taiwan engaged in a dedicated exchange session with Shandong Normal University on disaster prevention and mitigation, exploring potential collaboration in areas such as wetland engineering and ecological resilience. Participants also conducted field visits to several ecological projects, including the constructed wetland for tailwater treatment at Jinan West District Wastewater Treatment Plant, the Xinxue River Constructed Wetland in Jining, and the Poyang Lake Wetland in Jiangxi. 

Initiated in 2008, the Cross-Strait Symposium on Constructed Wetland was founded by researchers from both sides and has since been successfully held in 15 editions across cities including Wuhan, Kaohsiung, Taipei, Yichang, Hangzhou, Yinchuan, Shenzhen-Hong Kong-Macao, Guilin, Taichung, and Jinan. Over the years, it has attracted more than 4,800 participants, including over 50 senior experts such as academicians, with more than 750 papers and 600 presentations contributed. The symposium has established itself as a key platform for knowledge exchange and technical cooperation among wetland experts, engineers, and managers from across the Strait, promoting the sharing of theoretical insights, technological innovations, and engineering applications, and effectively advancing the popularization of wetland conservation concepts, the progress of ecological engineering technologies, and the development of the ecological restoration industry.