The Hindu Editorial Analysis- 22nd April 2023 | Current Affairs & Hindu Analysis: Daily, Weekly & Monthly - UPSC PDF Download

Botanical gardens and life on earth

Why in News?

On this Earth Day (April 22), we should celebrate the recent decision of the Tamil Nadu government to establish a large botanical garden (the Chengalpattu Botanical Garden) in the State as an important and welcome piece of news. Plants form the basis of civilisation. Humanity has had a long association with gardens ever since man learned to cultivate plants more than 11,000 years ago, marking the dawn of agriculture. The tradition of home gardens — planned spaces around homes to grow edible and medicinal plants — has been noted in ancient texts and depicted in cave paintings, showing the antiquity of gardening.

A botanical garden, also known as a botanic garden, is a garden that contains a wide variety of plant species, which are usually labelled with their scientific names. A botanical garden is typically dedicated to plant research, cultivation, preservation, and display. India has a diverse range of plant species as one of the world's mega-biodiversity countries. Because of its sheer size, range of latitudes and altitudes, rainfall, and climatic and geographical conditions, India has one of the world's richest flora. There are approximately 200,000 living plants recorded in the accessions of these gardens. The Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose Botanical Garden in Kolkata was the first botanical garden in India and South Asia. 

Background

• Colonel Robert Kyd, an army officer of the East India Company, established India's first botanical garden in 1787.
• The primary goal of establishing the garden was to identify new plant species with high economic value, such as teak, and to grow them on a commercial scale for trade.
• It was then known as the Royal Botanic Garden, Calcutta. The name was later changed to Calcutta Botanical Garden and then to Indian Botanic Garden.
• On June 25, 2009, the name was finally changed to Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose Botanic Garden in honour of Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose, a Bengali botanist-physicist and early science fiction writer.
• The 109-hectare garden houses over 12,000 rare plant specimens.
• The Botanical Survey of India (BSI) manages the centre under the Ministry of Environment and Forests of India.
• The world's first university botanical garden was established in Padua in 1545.

What is a Botanical Garden?

• A botanic or botanical garden is an educational institution that aims to awaken and enlighten scientific workers as well as the general public or layperson's interest in plant life.
• Botanists, home gardeners, nurserymen, horticulturists, landscape gardeners, and foresters benefit greatly from the botanical gardens, as do millions of national and international tourists.
• A botanical garden is an institution for botanical research, particularly on the region's native flora.

Purpose

• To research plant taxonomy and growth.
• To research the introduction and acclimatization of exotic plants.
• It aids in the creation of new hybrids.
• It contributes to the conservation of rare and threatened species.
• Serve as germplasm banks or gene pools for wild relatives of economically important plants.
• Create nature centres and youth museums to draw attention to the destruction of tropical and temperate ecosystems, as well as environmental degradation.
• Keep less appealing and abandoned ornamental plants.
• Botanic gardens have a strong educational component that allows them to communicate the importance of plant conservation to a wide range of audiences while also demonstrating how this can be accomplished.
• Linking plants to human well-being, as well as assisting in the conservation of indigenous and local knowledge.
• To encourage the sustainable use of plant resources for the benefit of all, as part of sustainable development.

Criteria

• A reasonable level of permanence.
• A scientific basis for the collections.
• Proper documentation of the collections, including the wild origin.
• Plant collection monitoring.
• Plants are appropriately labelled.
• The public is welcome to attend.
• Communication of information to other gardens, institutions, and the general public.
• Exchange of seed or other materials with other botanic gardens, arboreta, or research institutions.
• Conducting scientific or technical research on plants in the collections.
• Maintenance of plant taxonomy research programmes in associated herbaria.

 Importance

• It is a protected area for a variety of endangered flora.
• It aids in taxonomic study and research.
• It informs the public about both local and exotic plant species.
• A botanical garden conserves and propagates rare species and genetic diversity.

Global Strategy for Plant Conservation

• Botanic gardens have collectively built up centuries of resources and abilities of individuals that now play a crucial component in plant upkeep and monitoring.
• Many of these accomplishments contribute to ex-situ maintenance, but botanic gardens also play an important role in sitting maintenance.
• Botanical gardens must adhere to international policies and guidelines such as the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Animals and Plants.
• These rules are required to avoid the rapid loss of biodiversity. In the botanical garden, there is research and scientific management.
• Plant diversity is maintained in botanical gardens.These strategies focus on how plant species save the world and how plant species save life on Earth.
• There is a significant variation in the size and type of botanic garden in all areas of the biosphere, with facilities set up to share proof and effectiveness.

Botanical Gardens in India

• Assam State Zoo-cum-Botanical Garden - Guwahati, Assam
• Botanical Garden Sarangpur - Chandigarh
• Sanjay Gandhi Jaivik Udyan - Patna, Bihar
• Botanical Garden Waghai - Gujarat
• Gujarat Technological University - Ahmedabad, Gujarat
• R. B. Botanical Garden and Amusement Park - Gujarat
• The Garca Branca Ayurvedic Botanical Garden - Loutolim, Goa
• National Cactus and Succulent Botanical Garden and Research Centre - Haryana
• Lalbagh - Bangalore, Karnataka
• Curzon Park - Mysore, Karnataka
• Mysore Zoo - Mysore, Karnataka
• Pilikula Arboretum, Pilikula Nisargadhama - Mangalore, Karnataka
• Regional Museum of Natural History Mysore - Mysore, Karnataka
• University of Mysore Botanic Garden - Mysore, Karnataka
• Prof. Nagaraj Botanical Garden - Kalaburgi, Karnataka
• Malabar Botanical Garden and Institute of Plant Sciences - Kozhikode, Kerala
• Malampuzha Garden - Palakkad, Kerala
• Jawaharlal Nehru Tropical Botanic Garden and Research Institute - Trivandrum, Kerala
• Vellayani Agricultural College - Trivandrum, Kerala
• Empress Garden - Pune, Maharashtra
• Odisha State Botanical Garden - Nandankanan, Bhubaneswar, Odisha
• Botanical Garden Guru Nanak Dev University - Amritsar, Punjab
• Botanical Garden Punjabi University - Patiala, Punjab
• Auroville Botanical Gardens - Auroville, Tamil Nadu
• Tamil Nadu Agricultural University - Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu
• The Institute of Forest Genetics and Tree Breeding - Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu
• Government Botanical Gardens, Ootacamund - Nilgiris, Tamil Nadu
• Semmozhi Poonga - Chennai, Tamil Nadu
• Botanical Garden, Hyderabad - Telangana
• NTR Garden - Hyderabad, Telangana
• Botanical Garden of India Republic - Noida, Uttar Pradesh
• Jhansi Botanical Garden - Jhansi, Uttar Pradesh
• Saharanpur Botanical Garden - Uttar Pradesh
• Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose Indian Botanic Garden - Shibpur, Kolkata, West Bengal
• Agri Horticultural Society of India - Alipore, Kolkata, West Bengal
• Garden of Medicinal Plant, North Bengal University - West Bengal.
• Lloyd's Botanical Garden - Darjeeling, West Bengal
• Narendra Narayan Park - Cooch Behar, West Bengal

Conclusion

Botanical gardens are used to study and conserve plant species. Along with local plant species, it also features plant species from around the world. These gardens play an important role in meeting human needs and providing well-being. Botanical gardens are frequently run by universities or other scientific research organisations, and many have associated herbaria and botanical science research programmes.