PESHAWAR, Feb 28: Preliminary work on establishing a botanical garden aimed at conserving endangered species and providing research facilities to students of Peshawar University has started.

Official sources said that earlier a piece of land measuring 800 kanals in the Regi Lalma scheme had been selected by the university but now a team of surveyors is busy assessing the suitability of the soil for the botanical garden in Hayatabad Township and Shalman Park.

The construction will start as soon as the land was selected, the sources said. A professor in the botany department, University of Tokyo, two professors from China's Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography and an expert from the Utah State University have already offered technical assistance for the garden.

The Higher Education Commission has allocated Rs37.8 million for the development of the botanical garden whereas the provincial government has agreed to provide land. A botanical garden, two green houses and other facilities would be established for the botany students and the project would take two years to complete.

It would almost be a bio-diversity centre where research facilities would be available from the intermediate to PhD level and endangered plants would be preserved, the sources said, adding that a botanical nursery would also be established.