Welcome & addresses will be given by the following organisations & representatives:

• Bert Holtslag, EMS President
• Paulína Valová, Slovak Meteorological Society, President 
• Milan Chrenko, Minister of Environment of Slovak Republic
• Martin Benko, Slovak Hydrometeorological Institute, Director
• Daniel Ševčovič, Dean of the Faculty of Mathematics, Physics  and Informatics of Comenius University
• Dennis Schulze, Professional Trade Association for meteorological service providers (PRIMET), Chairman
• Stella Kafka, AMS Executive Director
• Scott Sheridan, International Society of Biometeorology President

Solicited speakers of Strategic Lectures:

Sabina Bokal & Anna Smetanová will give the presentation together.
Sabina Bokal  is the interim Regional Coordinator of Global Water Partnership Central and Eastern Europe and the lead of Integrated Drought Management Programme Central and Eastern Europe (IDMP CEE). She has supported participatory development and implementation of IDMP pillars across CEE countries and has contributed to development of strong cooperation with IDMP Global (coordinated by WMO and GWP). She co-developed the Danube Drought Strategy and led development of the Drought communication guidelines. She is passionate about mountains, water, and drought-resilient landscapes. 
Anna Smetanová is strategic project manager in Global Water Partnership Central and Eastern Europe and she co-leads the Integrated Drought Management Programme Central and Eastern Europe (IDMP CEE) programme. She is specialist in multiscale management impacts on water related hazards and landscape processes, and expert in knowledge transfer, change management, and capacity building. She has led knowledge transfer on IDMP from CEE to Caucasus and Balkan countries via empowerment of local expert communities for drought related action. She supports the resilience building by gender and social inclusion, and science-art co-operation for enhancing the societal transformation.    

Spyros Afentoulidis is the team leader of the Emergency Response Coordination Centre’s (ERCC) Analytical Team in DG ECHO, European Commission. During the last 10 years he has been working in the civil protection and emergency management field from different positions within DG ECHO as well as in the EU delegation to Serbia. He has an educational background on Civil engineering and European studies and, as a Greek, he likes storytelling.

Presentation of EMS and Tromp Foundation Awards

• EMS Outstanding Poster Award 2022
• EMS Young Scientist Conference Awards
• EMS Young Scientist Award 2023
• Tromp Foundation Travel Awards for young scientists
• EMS Technology Achievement Award
• EMS Outstanding Contribution Award

EMS Silver Medal Ceremony 

• Introduction, Laudation by Beth Ebert, presentation of the medal & certificate
• EMS Silver Medal Lecture by Sarah Jones: “Early Career Scientists and how they shape our world"

 Harry Otten Prize 2023

• Pam Emch will introduce the Harry Otten Prize
• Harry Otten will reveal the winner of the 2023 prize

The Keynote presentation will be given by Lívia Labudová.

Lívia Labudová is a climatologist at the Slovak Hydrometeorological Institute. In the past, she worked as an assistant at the Department of Physical Geography and Geoecology, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Comenius University in Bratislava. Her research focuses on meteorological and soil drought.
Lívia Labudová is involved in operational meteorological and soil drought monitoring, co-operates on international projects focused on drought (e. g. DriDanube, Clim4Cast), prepares expertise on drought occurrence and co-operates on the studies scoped on the drought impacts on agriculture, forestry and hydrology.

The Keynote presentation will be given by Estíbaliz Gascón.

Estíbaliz Gascón has been working as a scientist in ECMWF since 2016. She has participated in different European projects including ANYWHERE, IMPREX, MISTRAL, and HIGHLANDER focused on producing new products for high-impact weather and applying new post-processing methods to calibrate ensemble forecasts. She also works as an analyst in the 'Forecast Daily Report' group whose main task is the analysis and diagnostic of model performance issues in ECMWF forecast.

Currently, she is actively involved in the new Destination Earth initiative evaluating the performance of extreme events at km-scale global forecasts in the Extremes Digital Twin framework.

The Keynote presentation will be given by Manuela Brunner. 

Manuela Brunner is an assistant professor at the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science at ETH Zurich and the WSL Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research SLF in Davos. Her research focuses on extreme climatic and hydrological events such as floods and droughts.  
Manuela Brunner studies the hydro-meteorological drivers of extreme events, develops methods for their prediction, and assesses changes in the water cycle and extremes.