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On your marks, get set, go! or how biodiversity is becoming a national sport in Germany

In order to educate the German sports world in biodiversity, the Grüne Liga is organizing a national contest to encourage children and adolescents to discover nature around their stadiums. Its aim is to link nature conservation with sports activities in order to create nature zones for biodiversity.
Projects listing

Environment and Biodiversity

Place
Berlin, Germany

Sponsor
Carl Mauger

Grant(s)
€10,000 to the Selection Committee at 2012/03/06

Project leader

Grüne Liga

"I spend my leisure time with my family in the wild. The Grüne Liga initiative gives me a chance to understand the challenges and solutions for more biodiversity, and I consider its approach via the sports associations ingenious and highly promising."

Carl Mauger

The Grüne Liga (Green League), a national network of ecological movements and environmental associations, originated in the environmental and peace movement in the former German Democratic Republic (East Germany).

Its role is to support and coordinate large-scale ecological projects, such as ecological urban development, the Grüne Liga competition (green courses), youth ecological trips, the national The Jungle at School Contest, the Netzwerk21Kongress national congress with the awarding of a local development prize, the annual environment festival in Berlin with its 150 000 visitors, and many others.

Growing jungles around playing fields

Today, considering their potential of nature zones, the Grüne Liga is focusing its attention on sports via the adjacent open spaces, which can serve as habitats for endemic species and allow nature experiments. Thanks to a national contest, The Jungle On Sports Facilities, a dedicated website, seminars and educational materials, the Grüne Liga therefore plans to reach out to children, adolescents, members, coaches and managers of sports associations to give them the knowhow they need to identify their sportsground as a biotope and to develop its biodiversity capacity. The 91 000 sports associations and their 27.4 million members In Germany are accordingly invited to pitch in for biodiversity by creating jungles, biotopes, hedges for birds, flower berry bushes for bees, etc. A prize awarded at the close of the contest offers the opportunity to present the best ideas and to communicate on good practices. it is also planned to track the implementation of the initiatives for five years, to network the players, and to publish the results on the website and also in the form of a practical guide.

The Veolia Foundation is supporting this original initiative associated with biodiversity protection.