About us
ETH is one of six founding institutions of the Waldlabor Zurich Association. It supports the commitment of ETH members to the Waldlabor in organizational and financial terms.
Covering an area of over 150 hectares of urban forest and designed for a period over the next 100 years, the Waldlabor Zurich is a Europe-wide unique living lab on forest, forest management and society.
The Waldlabor Zurich is an experience-oriented education and research site, open to the general public as well as to education and research. The long-term project is intended to illustrate and bring to life past, present and future issues relating to the forest. Complex aspects of the forest and its management, such as the long periods of the development cycle of forests, are also addressed. The focus of interest is the forest influenced and managed by humans.
- Waldlabor Zurich: external page Vision (pencast, in german)
- Waldlabor Zurich: The living laboratory for applied research and comprehensive knowledge transfer on forest issues takes shape. Article in GAIA 3/2021 (in german)
- external page Waldlabor website: The Waldlabor and its supporting institutions (in german)
- external page Waldlabor app (via AppStore, Google Play sowie Webbrowser): Forest topics, research results and thematic events at a glance (in german)
- external page Events in the Waldlabor (in german)
Before the Waldlabor could be launched on the Hönggerberg in Zurich, extensive preliminary work by the six sponsoring institutions was necessary. The Lottery Fund provided start-up financing and the city and canton of Zurich were willing to make a large forest area, the Hönggerberg Forest, available for this project.
The association Waldlabor Zürich was founded in 2019 on the occasion of the anniversary of Wald Zürich, the association of forest owners in the canton of Zurich. The six sponsoring institutions are: Wald Zürich, the City of Zurich, the Canton of Zurich, ETH Zurich, the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL and the Forstpersonalverband of the Canton of Zurich. The cooperation of the supporting institutions is regulated in the association's statutes and in bilateral framework agreements.
In autumn 2019, the then newly elected managing director Martin Brüllhardt ceremoniously opened the Waldlabor. The Management Office supports the bodies and processes of the Waldlabor Zurich Association and ensures ongoing project support and administration. It is responsible for fundraising and central communication via the Waldlabor website and Waldlabor app. It also organises individual events and guided tours.
ETH Zurich has been involved in the Waldlbor project as a supporting institution since 2018. The contact person responsible for the project is Professor Harald Bugmann. The commitment of ETH to Waldlabor is financially supported by the Schulleitung.
The ETH Zurich Waldlabor group of (WaLabETH) is formed by all ETH members who have an interest in launching a research, educational, public outreach or combined project or event in the Waldlabor. WaLabETH enables transparent processes and broadly supported decisions. In addition. A WaLabETH Coordination Office was founded to represent ETH interests on the Board of the Waldlabor Association. It is the contact point for interested ETH members and provides relevant information.
- Download Regulations of WaLabETH (PDF, 461 KB) (in german)
- WaLabETH info event on Monday 19 September 2022, 12-13h, online (external page Zoom-Link)
- WaLabETH Coordination Office: Andreas Rudow
