The Aburi Botanic Gardens are of immense botanical importance in West Africa as a means of preserving plant species and the ecosystems in which they occur.

The use of medicinal plant species and the accumulated knowledge of traditional medicinal practices is threatened by habitat destruction and by the unsustainable harvesting of such plants from the wild. This project seeks to set up a 50 acre model garden within the Aburi Botanic Gardens, Ghana, which will be used as a reference point to encourage local people and schools to set up their own medicinal plant and herb gardens.

By establishing propagation and cultivation procedures at this central focus point, and seeking to disseminate this knowledge across the region, the project seeks to empower local people to establish and maintain their own medicinal gardens, and to assure primary health care for their families and communities. The team will produce printed guidelines and manuals on the cultivation and growth of priority medicinal plants, and will work with 20 communities in its first phase.