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Fascination of Plants Day is a global initiative promoted by the European Plant Science Organisation (EPSO), aimed at celebrating the wonders of the plant kingdom. Occurring every second year, 2026 marks the eighth international “Fascination of Plants Day”. Officially taking place on 18th May, however any event running from March to November qualifies.
The goal of this activity is to get as many people as possible around the world fascinated by plants and enthused about the importance of plant science for agriculture and sustainable production of nutritious food, as well as for horticulture, forestry and the production of plant-based non-food products such as paper, timber, chemicals, energy and pharmaceuticals. The role of plants in environmental conservation is also a key message.
Once again, New Zealand has joined Fascination of Plants Day, with Sanjeev Raikar and Simona Nardozza from the Bioeconomy Science Institute as National Coordinators. We currently have 33 events listed here, with hopefully more to come.
As National Coordinator, we are reaching out to the NZ Science Teachers community to let them know about this global initiative and encourage to participate. Individual event organisers can submit their event through the official website by clicking on the ‘Submit new event’ button and entering the code FoPDglobal1805.
Browse the New Zealand page to see the range and size of the events. No event is too small to qualify. It can be open to the community or restricted to your own students. Ready for a planting day, for a walk in the bush, a photo competition or for an exciting plant experiment? If so, we would love to hear from you.
Sanjeev (email) and Simona (email)
Image credit: Antonio Friedemann