Abstracts Collection of the 5th Sustainability Conference at the University of Akureyri, Iceland

The sustainability conference at the University of Akureyri (Iceland) at 11. April 2025 is celebrating its 5th anniversary. For the 5th time, we explore and address environmental and sustainability issues of local, national, and global relevance. This year, the conference comes with two exciting novelties. Firstly, the conference is for the first time co-hosted by the Stefansson Arctic Institute. The institute sponsors the first Stefansson Arctic Student award among self-nominated students who graduated at the BA, MA or PhD level at the University of Akureyri. The award is highlighting excellent student research in order to attract more talents to devote their time to research on sustainability and/or to conduct their research in a sustainable manner. Secondly, while in the past year the abstracts were published on the conference website and the recordings of talks were uploaded to social media (YouTube), this year, the abstracts of the conference are published in the peer-reviewed journal Nordicum-Mediterraneum. We see these developments together with an increased registration rate as evidence for the conference gaining momentum, not only because environmental issues and especially climate change are reaching the public awareness, but also because the continued efforts of the organisation committee since the first conference in 2020 to increase the quality and reach of the conference have been successful. The conference traditionally has a student session, which every year highlights the interest and/or involvement of students in making academic affairs more sustainable. This student session is also reflecting the tradition of the University of Akureyri within the Green Flag certification, where student involvement in sustainable practices leads to more environmentally friendly research, teaching, and more generally sustainable operations.