On June 5, Workshop on the Establishment of Digital Botanical Gardens opened at XTBG, with attendance of representatives from Kew Gardens, 12 botanical gardens in China and universities. The opening ceremony was hosted by Prof. Hu Huabin.

  Dr. Chen Jin, director of XTBG, gave opening remarks. “Botanical gardens are rich in living plants and play an important role in ex situ conservation and biodiversity preservation. By employing information technology, a digital botanical garden is a virtual representation of the reality that enables people to explore and interact with various information collected about a botanical garden. The establishment of digital botanical gardens provides an important platform for the management, scientific research and information sharing among botanical gardens nationwide and worldwide”. He hopes the workshop to be a fruitful one .

 Stephen J. Ruddy from the Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew was invited as the first lecturer at the meeting. He made a report on the Mapping & Data Management at Kew, showing the information technology systems, intelligent management of special plant sections etc. at Kew to the participants. His report aroused much interest among the listeners.

  As scheduled, a series of reports are to be given at the workshop by experts and technicians who are engaged in the establishment or management of digital botanical gardens. The workshop is to last until the day after tomorrow (June 7). It is expected to exchange experiences and discuss better ways to improve the management of digital botanical gardens nationwide, to make digital botanical gardens a real searching platform for plant information worldwide.