About

The ministry has been working over 40 years to protect the public from environmental toxins and radiation, to promote the wise and efficient use of raw materials, to advance climate action and to ensure that natural resources are used in a way that protects the diversity of animal and plant species and preserves their habitats.

In addition to its focus on environmental protection and nature conservation, the BMUKN has once again housed the Climate Protection Department since the start of 2025. The BMUKN therefore shapes core issues for the future that focus on people and their living environments. It drives economic, environmental and social modernisation.

In the context of the German Ecodesign Award, the BMUKN acts as patron, sponsor and jury member. The highlight of the competition, the award ceremony, takes place in the atriums of the Federal Ministry for the Environment. There, Federal Environment Minister Carsten Schneider honours the award-winning projects with a trophy and personalised certificate. Ingo Strube, who is responsible for the competition at the BMUKN, provides further insights into the competition and the BMUKN's role in a short interview.

The spectrum of issues is broad, including waste avoidance, climate protection, and the promotion of environmentally compatible product design.

The aim is to reduce the environmental impact of products throughout their entire life cycle by improving their design. For this purpose, the UBA uses a whole range of instruments and methods, such as the Blue Angel, the Ecodesign Guideline and the Ecodesign Kit learning and information portal.

With this expertise, the UBA is an indispensable partner not only as a patron and jury member for the German Ecodesign Award. In addition, around 50 employees of the German Environment Agency review the submitted projects in the pre-evaluation phase, and assess the environmental impact of the entries. In a short interview, Lisa Cerny, who has been in charge of the German Ecodesign Award from the beginning as an employee of the UBA, explains the standards of good design from an environmental point of view.

With its multidisciplinary member network, the IDZ provides knowledge and expertise from diverse fields and industries. It connects the design field with businesses, fosters knowledge exchange and implements projects and events around design topics. The IDZ works in active exchange with representatives from politics, culture and science on national and international levels.

The International Design Centre Berlin is also responsible for the implementation of the competition concerning the German Ecodesign Award. Whether it is the call for entries, the organisation of the jury session or the SPOTLIGHT ON series , all this and much more is realised by the IDZ. The team informs you about the latest news via newsletter and is the right contact when it comes to any question about the German Ecodesign Award.