Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden (XTBG), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) has been attaching great importance to the academic exchange and cooperation with international science and technology communities since its establishment in 1959. It has built up nice relationships with many botanic gardens, universities, research institutions and foundations in the world on seed exchange, scientific information exchange, research project cooperation, personnel training, and assisted in establishing botanic gardens in south-east Asian countries etc.
XTBG has signed more than 20 agreements on various kinds of cooperative activities on issues of mutual interest with many different countries. XTBG also pays much attention to the development of strategic relationships with developing countries, especially with south-east Asian countries such as Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos on help with establishing botanic gardens and training of technicians. To provide a good chance for the researchers and officials from Southeast Asian countries to communicate and discuss issues of biodiversity management, XTBG has successfully organized and held several international workshops such as “International Workshop on the China-Laos Trans-boundary Biodiversity Management and Development” and “International Symposium on Biodiversity Management and Sustainable Development in the Lancang-Mekong River Basin”.
In order to achieve its mission of building one of the top-level botanic gardens in the world, XTBG has been actively developing various kinds of collaborations with universities, botanic gardens and research organizations in developed countries, such as scientific information exchange, exchange visit, joint investigation, joint laboratories, cooperative research, inviting foreign experts as advisors, and holding international workshops.
18 foreign experts and scholars have been invited as adjunct professors of XTBG, including Jerry Baskin, Noel Michele Holbrook, Peter R. Crane, W. John Kress, Spencer C. H. Barrett, Frans Bongers, Peter Wyse Jackson, Kent J. Bradford, Nicholas J. Gotelli, etc.
In recent years, XTBG has successfully organized and hosted a series of important international conferences, such as “Workshop on Seed Dispersal and Frugivory in Asia”, “International Conference on Botanic Gardens and Sustainable Development” , “Annual Meeting 2006 of ATBC”, and “the fourth directors’ meeting of the South East Asia Botanic Gardens (SEABG)”, etc.
XTBG is always glad to communicate with international colleagues and is working hard promote its work in scientific research, species conservation and landscaping to a higher level.
