Eleven years have passed since the war in Bosnia ended, That war, which gave birth to the term “Ethnic Cleansing,” began In 1992 when the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia started to collapse, and the country’s three major ethnic groups fought against each other trying to claim as much as territory and power as possible. Those three groups: the Bosniaks (formerly called Muslims), the Serbs and the Croats had coexisted as a part of Yugoslavia for 50 years. By the time the war had ended three and a half years later, as many as 250,000 lives had possibly been lost, and 2 million people had been displaced.

The Dayton Agreement in 1995 ended the war, but created two entities within Bosnia and Herzegovina: the Muslim-Croat Federation, and the Serbian Republic (Republika Srpska). As a result, Bosnia's former multi-ethnic community disappeared, and ethnic tensions still remain to this day. In 2000, in an effort to provide a safe area where people from Bosnia's different ethnic groups could meet and work together, the American Friends Service Committee established its first community garden in Sarajevo. The project initially started with one garden. Today it has expanded to 15 gardens spread throughout the country.

Main purposes of the community gardens are:
*To create a safe environment for the positive interaction between Bosnia’s different ethnic groups.
*To help support low-income families by giving them a place to grow their own vegetables.
*To provide work therapy for people who were physically and mentally traumatized by the war.
*To educate the participants about environmentally friendly ways of food production.
*To give assistance to the participating refugees and displaced people.

Each participating family member is assigned a plot of about 50 square meters in which to grow his or her own vegetables. Families who wish to participate must submit a form containing information such as their family income, ethnicity, and number of children. They are also asked if the members of their family are displaced, or if any family member is employed. The first criterion for the selection of the participants is their financial situation, though also high on the list is their ethnicity. Since the gardens are intended to be communal spaces for the interaction of Bosnia’s different ethnic groups, the ethnic structure of the gardens is carefully balanced. As well as the participants, staff members are also multi-ethnic. Davorin, the garden director, is Croat. Belma, an agronomist, is Bosniak; and Vanja, another agronomist, is Serb.

Currently, about 2,000 people participate in the project. However many more remain on the waiting list. More gardens throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina are needed, and would greatly contribute to the peacemaking process between the region’s different ethnic groups. The community garden project connects people who might otherwise never get the opportunity to meet. It gives them hope for the healing and rebuilding of their communities, and it affords them the opportunity to become friends as individuals, without the fear of being labeled by their ethnicity.