Hack for Food, Hack for Good | Berlin

If you are a gardener or a citizen of Berlin, but also a professional, designer, maker, service or UX designer, developer, communication expert, creative or student, and you want to contribute to support urban gardening communities in Berlin and promote the adoption of a healthier lifestyle, this is the event for you: sign up here!

All info on the official FEAST page!

OpenDot - innovation hub for social impact based in Milan - in collaboration with the Berlin Community Garden Programme of the Berlin Department for Urban Mobility, Transport, Climate Action and the Environment - is organizing a new hackathon with the aim of supporting the urban garden system in the city.

The event is an activity of the European project FEAST - Food systems that support transitions to healthy and sustainable diets (https://feast2030.eu/), which aims to facilitate the transition to a food system that is better for people and for our planet.

The hackathon will bring together international and local partners to develop co-designed tools, innovative tech solutions or approaches that can generate positive change to improve health and promote the adoption of a healthier lifestyle.

The event will take place on 5th and 6th of November, 2024, at Kiezkapelle Neukölln, near Prinzessinnengarten Jacobi.

The hackathon is open to gardeners, citizens, but also students and researchers from the fields of design, communication, graphics and arts, social sciences, and technological development.

👉 Sign up here!

The event consists of a creative marathon that takes place in a limited period of time, during which heterogeneous and multidisciplinary teams will compete to find innovative solutions to one of the proposed challenges, supported by OpenDot designers and makers, FEAST mentors, and local experts.

For the participants, the hackathon will serve as an educational opportunity because it will allow them to learn new methods of collaboration and innovation as well as a professional opportuity that will allow them to meet other students and professionals and establish new collaborations.

The team with the best idea will win a 2 month mentorship and acceleration program with OpenDot for prototyping their idea.

Audience: participation is open to:

• groups up to a maximum of 5 persons

• individuals*

*Candidates who propose themselves as singles will be grouped into teams.

Groups of less than 5 people may be associated with other participants.

• Participation is free after registration and selection. The criteria for selecting participants will be experience, in order to create teams with balanced skills, and motivation.

• Candidates who propose themselves as singles will be grouped into teams.

• Groups of less than 5 people may be associated with other participants.

• At the time of registration you can express your preference over the challenges that you would like to participate in. At the start of the event you and your team will be assigned to one challenge. 

• You’ll receive a communication of acceptance via email.

• All participants will need to organise travel/accommodation themselves - it might be easiest if you are already based in Berlin 

• Lunch and coffee breaks during the event will be provided.

Limited availability (max 25 people)!

👉 Register your interest here!

Deadline to apply: 31st October 2024 (do not wait until the last moment - seats will fill fast!)

After the two sessions of need finding with representatives of the advisory board of the community gardening programme and gardeners, a series of challenges were defined.

• How can we develop a structured, systematic, engaging, and collaborative onboarding plan for new urban gardeners?
• How can we effectively help the community to share skills and create an internal common knowledge?
• How can we help urban gardens to best communicate their values and activities?
• How can we transform urban gardens into public spaces inclusive for everyone?

Day 1 - 5th November
09:00 - 09:30 Registration + Welcome coffee (provided)
09:30 - 10:15 Challenges presentation and team building
10:15 - 10:30 Co-design methodology: framework, goals, tools
10:30 - 12:30 Group work: brainstorming ideas
13:00 - 14:00 Lunch break (community lunch, provided)
14:00 - 15:00 Checkpoints with mentors & experts
15:00 - 17:00 Group work with (free) breaks; closing with a main idea for each group
17:00 End of Day 1
Evening: Community pub (optional)

Day 2 - 6th November
09:00 - 09:15 Registration + Welcome coffee (provided)
09:15 - 10:30 Group work with checkpoints on concept definition
10:30 - 11:00 How to: prototyping the ideas and preparing the final presentation
11:00 - 12:30 Group work
12:30 - 13:30 Lunch break (community lunch, provided)
13:30 - 16:00 Group work: finishing the prototype and preparing the final presentation
16:00 - 17:00 Final presentations

Mentoring and Prototyping

The winning team will have access to 2 months of mentoring by OpenDot to prototype and implement their idea, to be completed by April 2025. The mentoring will consist of weekly online meetings to receive feedback, suggestions, methods, tools, and strategies to bring the idea to life. It will also include networking opportunities, materials, and services to implement the idea, with a total value of €5,000.

A project by FEAST
Realized by OpenDot

OpenDot - Project Team
Laura Dellamotta - Co-Founder, Supervisor, General Project Coordinator
Giovanna Gardi - Co-Founder, Administrative Coordination and Reporting
Alessandro Masserdotti - Co-Founder, General Project Supervision
Fabrizio Pignoloni - Co-Founder, Creative Project Supervision
Cristina Biella - Project Management, Project Writing and Operational Coordination
Marta Savoldelli - EU Grants Expert and Project Support
Camilla Guerci - Social Media Manager

Berlin Senate Department for Urban Mobility, Transport, Climate Action and Environment - Mentor
Toni Karge - Community Garden Program

FEAST - Mentor
Anant Jani - University of Heidelberg and FEAST Project Coordinator

Reiner Braun - Researcher, Founder of os4os - open science for open societies