In Germany, the consumer sector “food” is responsible for around 15% of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG). Due to the high demand for food outside the home, changes in this area has the potential to significantly boost climate efficient nutrition.

The Beezdorf Kitchen initiative, which was launched in 2023 by Greenman OPEN, strives to engage and educate local school children about the benefits of sustainable farming, growing your own food, healthy eating, and cooking. The programme implements events, activities and competitions in the retail centres of OPEN and with the local schools within the catchment areas. In February the very first event was hosted at Berlin’s Fuchsberg Elementary school together with our agricultural daughter company Potager Farm, who provided the school with a mini-replica of a vertical farm in which the children planted their own seedlings.

Last week the educational initiative went into the third round, with a live cooking session for the children. Different homegrown herbs of the vertical farm could now be harvested by the children and incorporated into a healthy, homemade meal. During the workshop, one group of children replanted seedlings into the farm for the next growing cycle, while the rest harvested chives and basil, made a pasta dough, cut vegetables and prepared a tomato sauce.

It is rewarding to see that the initiative is a powerful solution to educating young people and addressing climate change in a sustainable way!

Read more about the last events and the initiative on the Facebook page.