By WARP30 Co-Organizer, Dr. Benjamin Jennings

As 2016 marks the 30^th anniversary of the Wetland Archaeology Research Project it seemed a great opportunity to hold the latest iteration of the WARP conference series. Having organised the conference at the University of Bradford with Francesco Menotti and great assistance from Dale Croes, I think we can all agree that we are extremely happy and impressed with the conference, which was a great way to celebrate the Wetland Archaeology Research Project, catch up with old colleagues, and meet up and coming early career researchers.

The conference started well with wonderful introductions from Professors Bryony Coles, Barbara Purdy, and Dale Croes. These three papers set the scene and tone for the following two days of, admittedly quite intensive, but highly interesting and informative presentations covering a wide variety of epochs, subjects from archaeozoology to experimental sailing performance of dugout canoes, and from the northern extremities of Scotland and Canada, to Japan, Australia and New Zealand (see full program published below, under Conferences-Exchanges menu category).

More than being a scientific programme, the anniversary meeting was intended to offer an opportunity for introductions, networking, and collaboration. The discussions held throughout the conference certainly indicate that this was achieved, and the NewsWARP site will act as platform to continue contact, interaction, collaboration and presentation.

Conferences and meetings are only successful because of the speakers and delegates who attend; on behalf of the conference organising committee and myself, I extend my sincerest thanks and congratulations to all those who attended WARP30. It was truly a pleasure to see you in Bradford, and without your attendance the anniversary meeting would not have been successful! Not only in terms of celebrating the 30^th anniversary of the Wetland Archaeology Research Project, or in celebrating the numerous achievements of Professors Bryony and John Coles, but also in terms of encouraging early career researchers to carry the torch of wetland archaeology in the future.

Finally, as we discussed during the closing session of the conference, it is crucial that we remain in contact and make sure that our research gets out there – one way to do this would be to use a keyword in our chosen method of article archiving, e.g. Academia, etc., using a common theme – how about #WARP ?

Once again, thank you for attending WARP30 and making the conference the success that it was, and looking forward to meeting many of you again at WARP30 +1, wherever it may be.

Benjamin Jennings

University of Bradford