Mapping Worldwide Environmental Suitability for Artemisia annua L

Fangyu Ding, Tian Ma, Mengmeng Hao, Qian Wang, Shuai Chen, Di Wang, Luqi Huang, Xiaobo Zhang and Dong Jiang
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Fangyu Ding: State Key Laboratory of Resources and Environmental Information System, Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
Tian Ma: State Key Laboratory of Resources and Environmental Information System, Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
Mengmeng Hao: State Key Laboratory of Resources and Environmental Information System, Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
Qian Wang: State Key Laboratory of Resources and Environmental Information System, Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
Shuai Chen: State Key Laboratory of Resources and Environmental Information System, Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
Di Wang: State Key Laboratory of Resources and Environmental Information System, Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
Luqi Huang: China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences, Beijing 100700, China
Xiaobo Zhang: State Key Laboratory Breeding Base of Dao-di Herbs, National Resource Center for Chinese Materia Medical, China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences, Beijing 100700, China
Dong Jiang: State Key Laboratory of Resources and Environmental Information System, Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 4, 1-10

Abstract: Artemisinin, which is isolated from the naturally occurring plant Artemisia annua L. ( A. annua ; Qinghao in traditional Chinese medicine), is considered to be the active ingredient in the most effective treatment for malaria. Current malaria eradication plans rely on an affordable and robust supply of artemisinin, resulting in the demand to expand the area of A. annua under cultivation. However, there is no reliable assessment of the potential land resources suitable for planting A. annua at the global scale. By explicitly incorporating the assembled contemporary occurrence records of A. annua with various spatial predictor variables, a species distribution modelling procedure was adopted to produce the first global environmental suitability map for A. annua with high geographic detail (5 × 5 km 2 ). The estimated map reveals that the total amount of potential land resources suitable for planting A. annua is approximately 1496.56 million hectares, mainly distributed in Asia (516.50 million hectares), Europe (378.82 million hectares), North America (354.56 million hectares) and South America (172.01 million hectares). The relationships between the relevant variables and A. annua were explored, and these illustrated that the most noteworthy predictor variables were meteorological factors, followed by solar radiation factors, soil factors and topographical factors. The map provides a rigorous environmental niche baseline to support the reasonable expansion of the A. annua cultivation area.

Keywords: artemisinin; Artemisia annua L.; spatial predictor variables; species distribution modelling; environmental niche (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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