Arboretum Durio Botanica: Botanical and Conservation Garden of Durian Gandasoli

THE Arboretum Durio Botanica is an UI action program in agro-tourism field as one of solution to complete the concept of botanical diversity in Gandasoli, Sukabumi. The program is empowering the villager of Gandasoli to build the concept of agro-tourism within the value of education and conservation by providing training and collecting seedlings of local and non-local durian. The training was established for them to independently understand about the conservation, how to maintenance of crops, harvesting and developing the durian derivative products. The Arboretum Durio Botanica program is divided into three main processes, collecting, grouping and cultivating Durian. Monitoring and evaluation of program carried out by using questionnaires, interviews, and observations. The program so far can attract the interest of villagers, add their knowledge about the durian varieties, also their mind set to conserve durian varieties as an added value to explore agro-tourism field. This program has also successfully gathered the various seedlings of durian from local and non-local.