The Nation­al Park Asso­ci­a­tion turns 25

What’s so spe­cial about it? A club is cel­e­brat­ing its 25th birth­day. It hap­pens every day. Is cor­rect! But the Asso­ci­a­tion of Friends of the Ger­­man-Pol­ish Euro­pean Nation­al Park Unteres Oder­tal eV is some­thing spe­cial. Found­ed soon after the reuni­fi­ca­tion of Ger­many by con­ser­va­tion­ists, local politi­cians, pas­tors, sci­en­tists and indus­tri­al­ists, it brought a lot of mon­ey to the region, above all inter­est­ing peo­ple, min­is­ters, heads of gov­ern­ment, includ­ing WWF Pres­i­dent Prince Philip. The asso­ci­a­tion has acquired a lot of land and leased it in accor­dance with nature con­ser­va­tion require­ments, it active­ly sup­port­ed the devel­op­ment of the Unteres Oder­tal Inter­na­tion­al Park and pro­mot­ed eco­log­i­cal agri­cul­ture. All of this hap­pened as part of his civic com­mit­ment as a vol­un­tary, char­i­ta­ble work. At the same time, many per­ma­nent jobs were cre­at­ed in this area.

Admit­ted­ly, the Nation­al Park Asso­ci­a­tion was not always the favorite of the rulers in Pots­dam, but nei­ther did it want to be. Resis­tant to soil, yes, as he is, it was always about get­ting the best for the peo­ple of the region, but also for nature, for ani­mals and plants that oth­er­wise have no sup­port­ive rep­re­sen­ta­tives and lawyers, straight­for­ward, indomitable, incor­rupt­ible and consistently.

Not every­thing was suc­cess­ful and per­fect, but a lot has been set in motion. We look back and for­ward with grat­i­tude to the next 25 years.

All of this wants and should be cel­e­brat­ed on Tues­day, Novem­ber 14th, 2017. First with a con­gress “Eagle over Europe” in the Bran­den­burg Acad­e­my of Criewen Cas­tle from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Then with a musi­cal­ly diverse, ecu­meni­cal cre­ation ser­vice in the medieval vil­lage church in Criewen, fol­lowed by a vernissage open­ing on the sub­ject of “Cra­dle of the Wilder­ness” by the Berlin painter Maria Bahrdt and final­ly, of course, with a hearty cer­e­mo­ny with short, crisp and beau­ti­ful speech­es Music. The keynote address will be held by Dr. Paul A. Engst­feld, from 1990–1994 the 1st State Sec­re­tary in the new­ly found­ed Min­istry for the Envi­ron­ment, Nature Con­ser­va­tion and Region­al Plan­ning of the State of Bran­den­burg (MUNR), who was large­ly respon­si­ble for the devel­op­ment of the nation­al park region. At the time he came to Pots­dam from the Euro­pean Par­lia­ment and brought the Euro­pean spir­it, Euro­pean par­lia­men­tar­i­ans and, ulti­mate­ly, Euro­pean mon­ey with him to the East. That is why the theme of the evening is both cur­rent and his­tor­i­cal, “Europe and nature con­ser­va­tion”, which will also be addressed by oth­er guests from Bran­den­burg state pol­i­tics. In addi­tion to Dr. Paul Engst­feld, Vice Pres­i­dent of the Bran­den­burg State Par­lia­ment, Dieter Dom­brows­ki (CDU) and Axel Vogel, Chair­man of the Bünd­nis 90 / Die Grü­nen par­lia­men­tary group in the Bran­den­burg State Par­lia­ment. The jour­nal­ist Eck­hard Fuhr (FAZ / Die Welt) will mod­er­ate the event.

The board of directors