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News > Latin America

New Botanical Gardens a 'Dream Come True' for Cuba

  • The province of Camaguey concentrates the highest rate of endemic plants in the whole island.

    The province of Camaguey concentrates the highest rate of endemic plants in the whole island. | Photo: EFE

Published 6 September 2015
Opinion

The opening of the park coincides with the U.N.’s World Soil Year.

Cuba opened its largest botanical park Sunday with 72 hectares hosting species from the five continents. The place is located about 350 miles east of Caribbean island’s capital Havana.

The botanical park was named after the botanist Julian Acuña Gale (1900-1973), who studied and discovered various plants now exhibited in a zone called “Acuñana.”

The location in the province of Camaguey was chosen because it concentrates the highest rate of endemic plants in the whole island, and it connects with the recreation center “The Lake of Dreams,” professor Roberto Adan Perez, from the University of Camaguey, told Prensa Latina.

Its soil is also extremely fertile with significant reserves of underground water that originate at the river Kilo, which crosses the park from east to west, he added, highlighting this year had been named World Soil Day by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization.

During the inauguration, a representative for Cuba’s CITMA Ministry for science, technology and the environment, Andrea Armas, said the project – which took six months to be put together – was a dream dating back 200 years and was the result of the collective effort and the political will of regional authorities.

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