The International Conference on Water and Flood Management (ICWFM) has been held biennially since 2007 by the Institute of Water and Flood Management (IWFM) of Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), and ICWFM 2023 is the ninth event. Water management in general, and flood management in particular, is an interdisciplinary field that requires integrated knowledge from diverse fields such as hydrology, hydraulics, morphology, atmospheric science, climate, environmental pollution, ecosystem, agriculture, disaster, vulnerability, risk, gender, livelihood, and poverty. As physical and socioeconomic risks change as a result of climate change and anthropogenic interventions, integrated approaches to analyzing these processes and their interactions, as well as incorporating nature-based solutions, are gaining traction. This conference aims to serve as a common platform for bringing together the most recent developments in the aforementioned fields. The central theme of ICWFM-2023 is ‘Climate Extremes and Resilient Development’. In recent years, the world has witnessed unprecedented extreme events. Cherapunji (India) received its third highest rainfall in 122 years in 24 hours in 2022, with floods submerging nearly 80-90% of north-eastern districts of Bangladesh. The 2022 drought in Europe appeared to be the worst drought in the last 500 years. Extreme events are occurring more frequently, and therefore, it is high time the world took a closer look at extreme events and incorporate appropriate management measures into planning efforts. We truly think that our hard and soft development strategies should be robust enough to withstand these climatic extremes.

The 8th ICWFM will be held in a situation when the whole world is struggling to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. The world has seen a new dimension of water and flood management during this condition. Although the natural system remained indifferent to this pandemic, the human system responded differently during disasters compared to its normal response. People were reluctant to move, and evacuation became difficult. In this context, the 8th ICWFM expects to generate some new insight into water and flood management.

There will be many ‘new’ in this event of ICWFM. The platform of this 8th event of ICWFM will be new. For the first time since its inception, the entire conference will be held in an online platform. It is expected that this new platform will bring a wider community of its kind together to express and exchange their findings and thoughts. For the first time, the conference will be completely free for the students. It is expected that this will attract many new emerging scientists to share their findings on a global platform.

Unlike the previous events, the 8th ICWFM does not have a central theme. Rather papers are invited from multidisciplinary fields with the expectation that at the end of the day, new insight will emerge that will shed light on the interdisciplinary nature of water and flood management.