Vision:

To bring global relevance to Denver Botanic Gardens through the implementation of diverse and sustainable programs, achieving global transformation by connecting people with plants.

Background:

Throughout history, botanic gardens have played a role in introducing and cultivating exotic plants. In addition to serving as a place of beauty and retreat, botanic gardens serve as educational resources about plants and horticulture, repositories of plants of conservation concern, and an historic database of plant distribution documented through herbarium collections. With a high percentage of plants currently threatened with extinction, botanic gardens are playing a huge role in their conservation through several global initiatives.   

Our current global culture offers significant potential for Denver Botanic Gardens to become relevant beyond our region through global plant exploration, conservation and collaboration with other botanic gardens throughout the world. Through the years our living collections have been enriched through participation in the Index Seminum program, which has allowed us to exchange seeds with other botanic gardens throughout the world, as well as through plant exploration in South Africa, Mongolia, Pakistan, Morocco, and more recently in the Central Asian steppes. Future exploration in the Patagonian steppes will add to the diversity of our collections. Denver Botanic Gardens will play a significant role in the development of a national botanic garden in Haiti. Denver Botanic Gardens is now poised to play a transformational role in the global arena of plants.   

2012 and 2013 Projects:

International Travel Program

• Peru (Feb. 12 – 19, 2012)
• Madagascar (Oct. 19 – Nov. 2, 2012)

• Haiti Botanic Garden Development
• South Sudan Coffee Project
• Argentina Plant Exploration (2013)
• Mongolian collaboration
• International Plant Conservation Workshop development
• Conservation project in Madagascar (Eligmocarpus cynometroides)