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Chinese Old Roses are the precious heritage of China with good qualities and rich connotation. They experienced two rises and falls in history, and many cultivars got lost in the periods of the Opium War and Cultural Revolution. Luckily, nearly 100 old cultivars survived. China is quite backward in rose breeding, with distinct regional differences, Beijing and Yunnan being the centres of rose breeding in China. Chinese old roses are not sufficiently valued in the breeding of new cultivars; basic scientific efforts are being strengthened in a wide range of crosses and diverse breeding techniques are being used. However, there are few new cultivars with proprietary property rights. The disjunction between production and breeding resulted in the serious shortage of rose breeding in China and was the important restraining factor of new cultivar introductions.
Published in the World Rose News, June 2010, pp. 41-46
