Botany 2000 is the name for a scientific program, organized under the auspices of

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. I ...

. While a similar UNESCO program, ASOMPS, focus on promotion of collaboration and co-operation between scientists in Asia, Botany 2000 is composed of activities in

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an ...

and

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

. Activities in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located enti ...

are confined to support of herbaria in countries in transition and reconstruction e.g.

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to t ...

. The Botany 2000 program was accepted by the UNESCO General Conference in 1989. Activities in Africa and Asia subsume activities in predecessor networks such as the: * Botany 2000-Asia * Botany 2000-Africa The Botany 2000-Asia program is the new name for the former ''Southeast Asian Cooperative Program on Descriptive Botany'' (SEABOP) and of the work being carried out by the majority of the other organizations involved in the ''Asian Coordinating Group for Chemistry'' (ACGC). Botany 2000-Asia is implemented by UNESCO's New Delhi Office and focuses on the

taxonomy Taxonomy is the practice and science of categorization or classification. A taxonomy (or taxonomical classification) is a scheme of classification, especially a hierarchical classification, in which things are organized into groups or types. ...

, and biological and cultural diversity of medicinal and

ornamental plants Ornamental plants or garden plants are plants that are primarily grown for their beauty but also for qualities such as scent or how they shape physical space. Many flowering plants and garden varieties tend to be specially bred cultivars that ...

, and their protection against

environmental pollution Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into the natural environment that cause adverse change. Pollution can take the form of any substance (solid, liquid, or gas) or energy (such as radioactivity, heat, sound, or light). Pollutants, the ...

, as well as ethnobiological classification and biological

systematics Biological systematics is the study of the diversification of living forms, both past and present, and the relationships among living things through time. Relationships are visualized as evolutionary trees (synonyms: cladograms, phylogenetic t ...

and the correct documentation of useful plants through collection of voucher specimens. Within the framework of the project Botany 2000-Asia,

supports also the computerization of holdings and locations in herbaria throughout Asia. Under the Botany 2000-Asia program some conferences were held: * Botany 2000-Asia: Herbarium Curation Workshop (15-20 October 1990, Point Walter, Bicton, Western Australia) * Botany 2000-Asia: Zingiberaceae Workshop (15-18 October 1991, Hat Yai, Thailand) * Botany 2000-Asia: Rutaceae Workshop (2-7 February 1992, in conjunction with ASOMPS VII, Manila, Philippines) * Botany 2000-Asia: International Botanical Congress (28 August-3 September 1993, Tokyo, Japan) * Botany 2000-Asia: International Seminar and Workshop : taxonomy and phytochemistry of the Asclepiadaceae in tropical Asia (June 1994, Malacca, Malaysia) * Second Symposium on The Family Zingiberaceae (9-12 May 1995, Guangzhou, China) Proceedings were published as: Te-Lin Wu; Qi-Gen Wu; Z.-Y. Chen (Eds.) 1996. Proceedings of the Second Symposium on the Family Zingiberaceae. Publ. by Zhongshan University Press, Guangzhou - 510 275, People's Republic of China, v, 306 pp., ill., * Botany 2000-Asia: Workshop on the Family Apocynaceae (6-8 February 1996, Chittagong, Bangladesh) Neville Marchant, Director of the

Western Australian Herbarium The Western Australian Herbarium is the State Herbarium in Perth, Western Australia. It is part of the State government's Department of Parks and Wildlife, and has responsibility for the description and documentation of the flora of Western Aust ...

Perth Perth is the list of Australian capital cities, capital and largest city of the Australian states and territories of Australia, state of Western Australia. It is the list of cities in Australia by population, fourth most populous city in Aust ...

, has been involved in the Botany 2000-Asia programme since its inception. The UNESCO Office, New Delhi also published the ''Botany 2000-Asia Newsletter'' four times a year. A typical issue contains news on workshops, training courses, databases, projects and forthcoming meetings as well as reports on unauthorized collection and export of medicinal plants from the region. The editor requests one to two page articles and reports of seminars and meetings of general relevance to

botany Botany, also called plant science (or plant sciences), plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "bot ...

and

ethnobotany Ethnobotany is the study of a region's plants and their practical uses through the traditional knowledge of a local culture and people. An ethnobotanist thus strives to document the local customs involving the practical uses of local flora for m ...

in Asia. Apart from producing the newsletter, the UNESCO Botany 2000-Asia program sponsors occasional workshops on the

and chemistry of various plant families, as well as training courses in herbarium techniques and curation. Botany 2000-Africa is implemented by UNESCO's Nairobi Office and deals with the conservation and use of the medicinal flora of Africa. Some of the activities of the Botany 2000-Africa program are published in: S. Edwards and Z. Asfaw (Editors): ''The Status of Some Plant Resources in Parts of Tropical Africa''. Botany 2000: East and Central Africa; NAPRECA Monograph Series No. 2. Published by ''Natural Products Research Network for Eastern and Central Africa'' (NAPRECA), Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, 1992. The UNESCO ''Botany 2000'' program is different from the annual meeting of the ''Botanical Society of America'' (BSA), who organised an annual scientific conference named ''Botany''. This ''Botany 2000 : New Frontiers in Botany'' conference was held in Portland, Oregon on 6-10 August 2000.

References

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External links

* UNESCO New Delhi Office: annual report, 1996

* Abstracts of some Botany 2000 seminars on Family Zingiberaceae

UNESCO International conferences Botany