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Botswana Opens its First Botanic Garden
BOTSWANA
5th November 2007

Botswana has opened its first botanic garden. The nine acre garden in Gaborone, Botwsana features collections of living plants for education and research in a beautiful natural setting with historic buildings.

The Head of Natural History at that The National Museum, Nonofo Mosesane, announced the opening at a press briefing, where he said that the garden was built under the museum’s mandate of preserving Botswana’s cultural and natural heritage.

“We have to meet the international conventions to promote indigenous knowledge, in this case botanical knowledge,” Mosesane said.

The National Museum has tried to collect all plants, including common weeds, because some negligible plants have been discovered to have unique properties. Though the Botanical Garden is among the smallest in the region, it will serve, among other purposes, as a back up for all floras in Botswana. If the need arises, vanishing plants may be propagated back into the wild.

The launch on 2nd November was preceded on the 1st of the month by a seminar on challenges to plant conservation in Botswana.

Read more on the Republic of Botswana news site 

Read more on the local paper website 

 



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