The Botanical Garden at Lund University, “Botan“, is estimated to suffer a financial loss of one million SEK. If the greenhouses are closed to save money, it threatens to destroy plants worth hundreds of millions SEK.
Lack of staff and no profit. Lund’s Botanical Garden has 500 000 annual visitors. Despite a great flow of visitors, the economy is dropping. The question is whether the garden will be able to continue the business after 2014.
“The financing from the University is neglected and has not followed the development of salaries and rent increases. According to calculations we will lose one million SEK. This is impossible to keep up in the long run,” Annika Bergengren, chairperson of the Botanical Garden’s Board, says.
Too few employees
It was recently revealed that employees at the garden have been forced to work too much and that the garden’s staff was too small to live up to the restrictions on working hours set by the Work Environment Act.
“Due to saving needs, we have sometimes stopped employing new staff. This has caused an increased workload of the staff and some tasks have not been performed,” Annika Bergengren says.
Alarming situation
Even though two part-time employments have been negotiated, the financial situation is still alarming. “Botan” only has half as many employees as other botanical gardens in Sweden, in proportion to the area they take care of. If the greenhouses are to be shut down as a means of saving, it threatens to destroy plants worth 150 million SEK. Two weeks ago, the University Board was informed about the financial situation.
“We have still not received information about our future funding. It causes an uncertainty in the business and it is difficult to make plans,” Annika Bergengren says.
“There is a limit”
Sven Strömqvist, Pro Vice Chancellor with special responsibility for the USV, the special centres of the University to which the Botanical Garden belongs, means that the difficulty to supply more money is caused by the fact that the garden isn’t connected to the governmental financing of the University. It is instead something the University itself chooses to pay for.
“There is a limit to how much we can give to certain centres before the basic education starts to suffer. It is too early for me to say something about this now, but we will discuss the question at a Board meeting in May,” Sven Strömqvist says. Until then, the financial future of the Botanical Garden remains uncertain.
Text: Linus Gisborn
Translation: Charlotte Fransson
