After almost three years of work and research, the volume of plants in the Laboratorio Vegetal stands out and its creators already have the experience and results to have a palette and a proposal of plant species to be placed in urban public spaces. says Salvador Donghi, biologist and one of the promoters of the Plant Laboratory, who adds: . That experience and that research is what they showed this Thursday, January 27, to mayors, councilors and municipal officials from all over the country. The participants were trained in various alternatives for adapting to climate change, including the exhibition and field visit to the Las Salinas site. In Chile, the proportion of green areas per inhabitant with maintenance is measured. That is, what is spent on maintaining these spaces. This is also directly related to the contribution of the municipalities in charge of these public areas in the cities. The study and the method developed by the scientists would allow the municipalities to save a lot of resources, due to the scarce maintenance that this group of native species has needed to develop. says Salvador Donghi. says the scientist, who adds: . Cristobal Elgueta, an expert in ecosystemic landscaping, who implemented the plant laboratory, emphasizes that what the plant laboratory is betting on, the scientists explain, is not only to use native flora as such, but to provide these spaces with native flora that belongs to a vegetational floor, that is to say, to an ecosystem. And this is fundamental, because many times, in urban-landscape issues, the wrong trees are placed in the wrong places and, also, the right trees in the wrong places, say these researchers. says Salvador Donghi. Luis Álvarez, geographer and academic of the PUCV, also promoter of the Plant Laboratory, adds that Salvador Donghi, complements that, The three experts of the , not only exposed their data before the participants of the summer school of the ACHM but, in addition, they headed the visit to Las Salinas where the species of this investigation are planted, so that the assistants to the course, could know the experience in field and then apply the acquired knowledge in the public green areas of their respective communes. The President of the Water Resources Commission of the ACHM, the Mayoress of María Pinto, Jessica Mualim, said that Jaime Belmar, Executive Secretary of the ACHM, pointed out the importance of training, especially for local authorities, who in the last municipal elections were renewed by almost two thirds:
In total, the Plant Laboratory is made up of 100% native species, of which approximately 60% are endemic. In an area of 1300 mts2 there are 25 plant species that coexist among them and are part of the coastal Mediterranean sclerophyllous shrubland, one of the 17 vegetational floors known in the region of Valparaiso.
