Medicinal botanical garden in southwest China was entered in the Guinness World Records as the largest of its kind in the world, a garden official said Friday. Located in Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region and spread over an area of 202 hectares (over 2 square kilometres), the garden has been confirmed to be containing the most varieties of medicinal plants and the largest cultivated area of medicinal plants in the world, Xinhua reported. The garden, till date, has saved over 6,000 kinds of living medicinal plants (including more than 100 endangered varieties and over 30 new varieties), more than 3,200 kinds of medicinal plant seeds and 100,000 medicinal plant images. Built in 1959 by Guangxi’s health department, its objective is to cultivate, collect and save medicinal plants besides conducting research. The garden is expected to be built into an advanced international medicinal plants conservation base and a centre for traditional Chinese medicine culture and science. Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region is one of China’s most undeveloped provinces. But it is known for its large variety of herbal medicines and the ethnic minority cultures of Zhuang and Yao. A botanical garden is a well-tended area displaying a wide range of plants labelled with their botanical names. It may contain special plant collections.
Source : Economic Times
