The Green & Light conference took place in February 2017 in the Royal Łazienki Park in Warsaw. It was organized by The Dutch Embassy in Warsaw and has attracted many people interested in the positive influence of green plants and light on human health and well-being. The subject is important especially nowadays, when Poland is almost fully covered with smog. Green plants clean and moisturize the air indoors, where we spend about 90% of our time. Additionally, proper light helps us work and relax most effectively. Light can protect against autumn or winter depression, often caused by the insufficient quantity of sun.
source: Paweł Czarnecki
Combination of these two elements – healthy plants and proper light – creates a new living quality. It is not only about satisfaction and esthetic impression, but about visible, substantial and beneficial health effects that indoor and outdoor plants and light have. Well combined, those two elements create most friendly surrounding and atmosphere.
Speakers with considerable scientific achievements took part in the conference to prove the main thesis. Professor Ph.D. Łukasz Święcicki talked about winter depression and how it can be treated with light, Professor Ph.D. Stanisław Gawroński from Warsaw University of Life Sciences brought up the phenomenon of phytoremediation, Ph.D. Agnieszka Krzymińska from Department of Ornamental Plants of University of Life Sciences in Poznan spoke about horticultural therapy, treatment of different diseases with help of garden and pot plants. Sander Kroll, green and creative design expert, showed how plants could be used in offices and public spaces for “production” of clean air. Latest fashionable solutions, the vertical gardens, were described by landscape architect, Beata Dziedzic from wertykalni.pl. Architect and lecturer from the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, Dariusz Śmiechowski, showed how architectural education evolves and increases the use of nature. Plants in connection with healthy lighting were described by Ph.D. Paweł Morawski from Philips Lighting. However, as mentioned by Marco van Leeuwen from „Air so Pure”, to let plants do their job, we need to take care of them – we should remember to water and fertilize them.
The “Green and Light” conference is a good example of a communication platform between different areas of science and life. Opening up to new ideas and exchanging knowledge bring interesting views and solutions that can be beneficial to everyone – summarized the participants. Agricultural counsellor of the Embassy of Kingdom of the Netherlands Martijn Homan ended the conference with following sentence: „It is not nature that needs us, but people who need nature”.
