Berlin’s Community Garden Program goes live

On the 12th of September, Berlin’s first network evening “Berlin gärtnert [ Berlin is gardening]” took place at Prinzessinnengarten Hermannstraße. Many long-standing community gardening activists and new urban gardeners followed the invitation by the Senatsverwaltung für Umwelt, Verkehr und Klimaschutz [Senate Department for the Environment, Transport and Climate Protection] via its Plattform Produktives Stadtgrün, coordinated by Toni Karge. The aim of the evening was to discuss greener cities in general and the implementation of the Community Garden Program in particular with Environment Senator Bettina Jarasch and the Borough of Mitte’s District Councillor for Green Spaces, Dr. Almut Neumann. Senator Bettina Jarasch also directly held out the prospect of increased human and financial resources for community gardening with budget negotiations for the next double budget (2024/2025) to follow. A monitoring committee consisting of the garden scene, administration(s) and academia is to be actively involved in the implementation of the program’s individual tools.

Over the last two years, the Berlin Community Garden Program has been developed with many stakeholders to support existing community gardens and enable new ones. It builds on more than 10 years of joint efforts, challenges and communication between community gardeners, the city administration, local residents, expert advisers, including Katrin Bohn, and politicians.

At the first network evening, the community gardeners scene was represented on the podium by Hanna Burckhardt from the Prinzessinnengarten Kollektiv, coordinating one of Berlin’s most visible community gardens, and Kerstin Stelmacher from the Netzwerk Urbane Gärten, the network of Berlin’s self-organised community gardens. The event was moderated by Prof. Undine Giseke of bgmr Landschaftsarchitekten who led the partipatory process around the program.

News about the Community Garden Program can be found here.

The Plattform Produktives Stadtgrün is here.

For more information on our contribution to this process see here.

Image:  Title page of the Community Garden Program (source: Senate Department for the Environment, Transport and Climate Protection Berlin, 2022)