Lecture: "Sisal, tea, vanilla: the role of botanical gardens once and now".

For centuries, botanical gardens have been researching, documenting and presenting the plant world and preserving it in their extensive collections. In this way, they make a significant contribution to the preservation of plant diversity. There are almost 100 gardens in Germany, and they cultivate about 50,000 plant species in their scientific collections, which corresponds to about one fifth of all described flowering plants. As particularly beautiful and exciting places of learning, they bring joy and beauty to many millions of visitors each year, and impart knowledge about the diversity of the plant world. We take a look at the history of gardens, their foundations in the north and south of the world, and their tasks once and today.

But where does this abundance of forms come from and who does this diversity actually belong to? Did you know that some botanical gardens were instrumental in supporting colonial interests? That the cultivation of vanilla, tea and sisal could only spread through illegal transfers via botanic gardens? The inculturing of crops involved a great deal of horticultural knowledge. Some plants flowered in cultivation but did not fruit. The most famous example is the expensive vanilla. It belongs to the orchids is pollinated by hand - in cultivation, but also in Witzenhausen. Sisal reached Tanzania from Mexico via the Royal Botanic Gardens of Kew, via Florida and Hamburg. One botanic garden was directly involved in breaking the sisal monopoly.

Marina Hethke, as curator of one of the smallest botanic gardens in Germany, chats "out of the closet." She has done scholarly work on the educational work of German botanic gardens, visited major institutions worldwide from Candy to Kew, New York, Santo Domingo to Warsaw, and has been involved with the Association of Botanic Gardens for 25 years.

Free admission.