Leibniz Institute of Vegetable and Ornamental Crops (IGZ)

Task of the institute

Horticultural products should be of high quality, come from an environmentally friendly cultivation and must be affordable to the consumer. Vegetable plants are the basis of much valuable food. Vegetable based food can both taste well and be healthy. Ornamental plants affect the daily well-being of many people. The Leibniz Institute of Vegetable and Ornamental Crops (IGZ) works on the scientific base of ecologically meaningful and also effective production of garden produce. Thereby we hope to help the environment, the competitiveness of the growers and the needs of the consumers. We work together with universities, other research institutes and producers, also beyond the borders of Germany and Europe. The currently most successful research areas of the Institute are vegetable production systems in the field and in glasshouses, as well as plant propagation and seed research of ornamentals.

History

As a result of the German reunion process and after being positively evaluated by a national panel of scientists the "Institute of Vegetable and Ornamental Crops" was founded in January 1992 on basis of two existing institutes. Grossbeeren, located approximately 20 km south of Berlin, was a research center for vegetable crops since 1925. In 1952 the institute was incorporated into the "Akademie der Landwirtschaftswissenschaften" and was the central research institute for vegetables of the German Democratic Republic. Horticultural enterprises in the area of Erfurt have a long tradition in breeding and seed production. This promoted the development of research institutions that focused on the needs of these companies. Our department of ornamentals has it's roots in the "Cooperative for Seedproduction for Ornamentals" in Erfurt. The new institute is a member of The Leibniz Association (Wissenschaftsgemeinschaft Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, WGL) and is funded by the Ministries of Agriculture of the Federal Republic of Germany, the Brandenburg State and the Thüringen State .