The United Nations Office at Geneva (UNOG) has been awarded the prestigious "Nature Reserve Certificate" by the Swiss non-profit organization "Fondation Nature & Economie". This well-known environmental quality label is awarded to entities that protect nature and contribute to biological diversity by managing at least 30 per cent of the green areas around buildings in a natural manner.

The award of the Certificate constitutes an acknowledgement of UNOG’s firm commitment to climate neutrality and enables the Office to show an important example in line with the Secretary-General’s priorities.

UNOG’s many initiatives to qualify for the Certificate include, among others, avoiding pesticides, utilizing compost and making use of sheep instead of lawnmowers.

As a result of these concerted efforts over several years, visitors can enjoy the rich biodiversity of the 46-hectare park, with trees over 100 years old, more than 68,000 m2 of lush grassland and a large variety of flowers.

The maintenance of Ariana Park in a natural manner will hopefully inspire and encourage staff members and all who come to visit the Park to apply the same principles in their activities and thereby provide further impetus for a greener United Nations in our collective efforts to combat climate change.

UNOG is proud of this recognition of its efforts to maintain the biodiversity of the beautiful Ariana Park and looks forward to building on this achievement with more greening initiatives.

View of the Ariana Park (1)
View of the Ariana Park (2)

For use of the information media; not an official record


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