Botanical garden and plant diversity conservation in China

Abstract

© 2020 International Society for Horticultural Science. All rights reserved. The worldwide contribution of Chinese plants can be simply explained by its rich plant diversity and domestication of cultivated plants in global agriculture development and botanical garden plants. China has recorded 32,096 native species of higher plants belonging to 3,156 genera and 323 families, of which 50% are endemic to China. China with its ancient civilization has developed a wide variety of cultivated plants in agriculture, horticulture, and forestry, at least 136 cultivated plants originated from China, making up 20% of the world total cultivated plants (666 species) around the world for their economic importance. The history of botanical gardens in China can be traced back to 2,000 years ago during the Han Dynasty. Modern botanical gardens in China have been developed over 138 years, up to 2015, there are 191 botanical gardens established all over China. So far 197,517 plant taxa maintained in 142 botanical gardens' 99,771 ha for ex situ conservation. Botanical gardens play an important role of botanical research in introduction and acclimatization of plants, development of new crops and domestication of plants for landscape construction in supporting for sustainable development of China. The third important function of botanical gardens is to serve as a popular public education institutions for plant conservation and botanical knowledge dissemination through garden plants in different living plant collections and training programs, so as to contribute to a national strategy of eco-civilization construction in China.