New published 15 November 2024

We are excited to announce that the BGCI Accreditation Scheme has reached (and passed) the milestone of 100 accredited gardens!

BGCI’s Accreditation Scheme is designed to place high value in the activities that botanic garden do uniquely well – such as documenting, understanding, growing and conserving plant diversity, and communicating its value to the general public visiting these gardens.

“One of the best value the accreditation gives is the inner proud for employees.” Jardín Botánico Carlos Thays, Argentina

The 100th garden to be Accredited via BGCI’s Scheme was the Jardim Botânico Municipal de Bauru in Brazil, in this video you can learn what it takes to be an accredited botanic garden! Thank you to the staff of Jardim Botânico Municipal de Bauru who helped us prepare this video to celebrate this occasion.

About the Accreditation Scheme

Gardens that met the credentials to become internationally accredited, were assessed on various criteria for activities across the whole garden, including;

• Leadership and Strategic Direction
• Collections Management
• Horticulture
• Public Engagement
• Conservation Actions
• research capacity
• Specialist Expertise
• Sustainability and Ethics
• Networking

“The Accreditation demonstrates that the garden has global best practices in place, so is a great endorsement for the garden” – Inala Jurassic Garden, Australia

The process not only helped gardens to showcase their work, but also allow many gardens to identify gaps in their programmes. Through the support provided by BGCI staff, regional and national networks and using resources that BGCI provides through our online training courses and documents from other gardens, many gardens used the scheme as a mentorship tool.

“Through accreditation we reviewed what we do, what activities we might need to deal with, and where we can improve” – Ljubljana University Botanic Garden, Slovenia

In the next month we will be celebrating each of the accredited gardens in 2024 through our social media channels. We would like to thank all gardens for their support to the scheme and for keep on raising standards to safeguard plant diversity worldwide. To learn more about each garden zoom in the map below and learn more about them here.

“The scheme is useful for teaching policymakers about what it takes to call ourselves Botanic Garden.” – Gothenburg Botanical Garden, Sweden

Congratulations to all gardens!

For more information on the scheme please follow the link and below you can also listen to a short presentation on the scheme and what major areas of a botanic garden are assessed.