Global biodiversity is in crisis, with 150 species of animals and plants going extinct every day. A number of interdisciplinary approaches are being taken at Freie Universität Berlin to tackle this urgent problem. The work being carried out by and between our various departments is raising awareness of how important it is to maintain biodiversity on our planet and is inspiring the creation of innovative solutions.

Initiatives such as the “Blühender Campus” (Campus in Bloom) project, SUSTAIN IT!, or Grüne Bibliotheken (Green Libraries) have not only contributed toward changing how Freie Universität Berlin is seen by the public, they have also help promote biodiversity and sustainability on campus.

President of Freie Universität Berlin Professor Günter M. Ziegler has declared 2024 the “Year of Biodiversity” at the university. This means that the university will be putting an even stronger focus on biodiversity in teaching and research as part of its aim to raise awareness of the subject and support biodiversity preservation measures.

Freie Universität Berlin is the first German university to publish a biodiversity strategy. In particular, this strategy aims to promote and protect native urban flora and fauna on campus. To this end, it is combining biodiversity as an object of scientific study with nature conservation research and how it plans and manages its own green spaces and buildings. At the same time, the strategy is intended to facilitate networking and enhance the visibility of activities in research, teaching, and volunteer work that protect biodiversity.

The Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin, which belong to Freie Universität Berlin, play an important role in the strategy through their support of national and international biodiversity programs. With a comprehensive collection of living plants, a herbarium containing millions of specimens, and a library dedicated to specialist botanic literature, the Botanic Garden is an invaluable resource for biodiversity, evolution, and ecology research and teaching at the university.