On May 21-24, a 3-person delegation of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE) paid a visit to XTBG. Dr. Chen Jin, director of XTBG, gave warm welcome to the delegation and held a talk with them for seeking cooperation potentials.

The three botanists from RBGE were Prof. Stephen Blackmore, Prof. Pete Hollingsworth, and Dr. Antje Ahreads.They delivered lectures entitled “An introduction to Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE)”,  “RBGE science and conservation”, and “Climatic modeling of rubber” respectively on May 21.

Dr. Chen Jin held a discussion with RBGE scientists. The two sides talked about cooperation potentials in plant ex situ conservation, genetic diversity monitoring, plant reintroduction, digital herbarium, joint study on the impact of climate change on biodiversity, environmental education, and personnel training, etc. The two sides agree to have further and deeper cooperation in different ways.

During their stay in Xishuangbanna, the RBGE botanists visited the living collections, central laboratory, paleoecology lab, herbarium, museum, green stone forest, 20-ha forest dynamics plot, etc.

Prof. Stephen Blackmore is a British botanist, Regius Keeper of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh since 1999; previous to this he was Keeper of Botany at the Natural History Museum in London 1990-1999. He was awarded the Bicentenary Medal of the Linnean Society in 1992. In the 2011 New Year Honours list he was awarded the Commanders of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for "services to plant conservation".

 The RBGE scientists visit living collections, herbarium, 20-ha plot

Stephen Blackmore visits Zhou Zekun's lab and Fan Zexin's lab

Dr Chen Jin talking with RBGE scientists