Zingiberaceae
Zingiber

Zingiber officinale Roscoe

First published in Trans. Linn. Soc. London 8: 348 (1807)
This species is accepted
The native range of this species is India to S. Central China. It is a perennial or rhizomatous geophyte and grows primarily in the seasonally dry tropical biome. It is used as animal food, a poison, a medicine and invertebrate food, has environmental uses and social uses and for fuel and food.

Distribution

Native to:

Assam, China South-Central, East Himalaya, India

Introduced into:

Andaman Is., Bangladesh, Borneo, Cambodia, Caroline Is., China Southeast, Comoros, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Gulf of Guinea Is., Hainan, Haiti, Honduras, Leeward Is., Lesser Sunda Is., Madagascar, Malaya, Mauritius, Mexico Southwest, Myanmar, New Guinea, Nicobar Is., Philippines, Puerto Rico, Queensland, Rodrigues, Réunion, Solomon Is., Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Thailand, Trinidad-Tobago, Vanuatu, Vietnam, Windward Is.

Synonyms

Homotypic Synonyms

Heterotypic Synonyms

Classification

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PAFTOL

Publications

POWO follows these authorities in accepting this name:

  • Acevedo-Rodríguez, P. & Strong, M.T. (2012). Catalogue of seed plants of the West Indies. Smithsonian Contributions to Botany 98: 1-1192.
  • Ahmed, Z.U. (ed.) (2008). Encyclopedia of Flora and Fauna of Bangladesh 12: 1-505. Asiatic Society of Bangladesh.
  • Baksh-Comeau, Y., Maharaj, S.S., Adams, C.D., Harris, S.A., Filer, D.L. & Hawthorne, W.D. (2016). An annotated checklist of the vascular plants of Trinidad and Tobago with analysis of vegetation types and botanical 'hotspots'. Phytotaxa 250: 1-431.
  • Balkrishna, A. (2018). Flora of Morni Hills (Research & Possibilities): 1-581. Divya Yoga Mandir Trust.
  • Chang, C.S., Kim, H. & Chang, K.S. (2014). Provisional checklist of vascular plants for the Korea peninsula flora (KPF): 1-660. DESIGNPOST.
  • Choudhary, R.K., Srivastava, R.C., Das, A.K. & Lee, J. (2012). Floristic diversity assessment and vegetation analysis of Upper Siang district of eastern Himalaya in North East India. Korean Journal of Plant Taxonomy 42: 222-246.
  • Dy Phon, P. (2000). Dictionnaire des plantes utilisées au Cambodge: 1-915. Chez l'auteur, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
  • Figueiredo, E., Paiva, J., Stévart, T., Oliveira, F. & Smith, G.F. (2011). Annotated catalogue of the flowering plants of São Tomé and Príncipe. Bothalia 41: 41-82.
  • Garcia-Mendoza, A.J. & Meave, J.A. (eds.) (2012). Diversidad florística de Oaxaca: de musgos a angiospermas (colecciones y listas de especies), ed. 2: 1-351. Instituto de Biología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México.
  • Girmansyah, D. & al. (eds.) (2013). Flora of Bali an annotated checklist: 1-158. Herbarium Bogorensis, Indonesia.
  • Govaerts, R. (2004). World Checklist of Monocotyledons Database in ACCESS: 1-54382. The Board of Trustees of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
  • Larsen, K. (1996). A prelimanary checklist of the Zingiberaceae of Thailand. Thai Forest Bulletin (Botany) 24: 35-49.
  • Nelson Sutherland, C.H. (2008). Catálogo de las plantes vasculares de Honduras. Espermatofitas: 1-1576. SERNA/Guaymuras, Tegucigalpa, Honduras.
  • Nguyen, Q.B. (2017). Thực Vật Chí Việt Nam. Flora of Vietnam 21: 1-489. Nhà xuất bản khoa học và kỹ thuật, Hà Nội.
  • Plunkett, G.M., Ranker, T.A., Sam, C. & Balick, M.J. (2022). Towards a checklist of the vascular flora of Vanuatu. Candollea 77: 105-118.
  • Tripathi, S. & Singh, K.K. (2006). Taxonomic revision of the genus Zingiber Boehm. in North-East India. Journal of Economic and Taxonomic Botany 30: 520-532.

Catálogo de Plantas y Líquenes de Colombia

  • Bernal, R., Gradstein, S.R. & Celis, M. (eds.). 2015. Catálogo de plantas y líquenes de Colombia. Instituto de Ciencias Naturales, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá. http://catalogoplantasdecolombia.unal.edu.co

Kew Species Profiles

  • Beckett, K. A. (1987). The RHS Encyclopedia of House Plants. Century Hutchison.
  • Cobley, L. S. (1976). An Introduction to the Botany of Tropical Crops. Longman.
  • Davidson, A. (2006). The Oxford Companion to Food, Second Edition. Oxford University Press, Oxford.
  • Jellin, J. M., Gregory, P. J. et al. (2008). Pharmacist's Letter/Prescriber's Letter Natural Medicines Comprehensive Database, 10th Edition. Therapeutic Research Faculty, Stockton.
  • Keesing, J. L. S. (1988). Useful plants. In: Kew Gardens Book of Indoor Plants, ed. J.B. Simmonds, pp. 186-213. George Philip.
  • Purseglove, J. S., Brown, E. G., Green, C. L., & Robbins, S. R. J. (1981). Spices, Volume 2. Longman Tropical Agriculture Series.

Kew Backbone Distributions

  • Acevedo-Rodríguez, P. & Strong, M.T. (2012). Catalogue of seed plants of the West Indies. Smithsonian Contributions to Botany 98: 1-1192.
  • Ahmed, Z.U. (ed.) (2008). Encyclopedia of Flora and Fauna of Bangladesh 12: 1-505. Asiatic Society of Bangladesh.
  • Baksh-Comeau, Y., Maharaj, S.S., Adams, C.D., Harris, S.A., Filer, D.L. & Hawthorne, W.D. (2016). An annotated checklist of the vascular plants of Trinidad and Tobago with analysis of vegetation types and botanical 'hotspots'. Phytotaxa 250: 1-431.
  • Barthelat, F. (2019). La flore illustrée de Mayotte: 1-687. Biotope éditions.
  • Choudhary, R.K., Srivastava, R.C., Das, A.K. & Lee, J. (2012). Floristic diversity assessment and vegetation analysis of Upper Siang district of eastern Himalaya in North East India. Korean Journal of Plant Taxonomy 42: 222-246.
  • Dy Phon, P. (2000). Dictionnaire des plantes utilisées au Cambodge: 1-915. Chez l'auteur, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
  • Figueiredo, E., Paiva, J., Stévart, T., Oliveira, F. & Smith, G.F. (2011). Annotated catalogue of the flowering plants of São Tomé and Príncipe. Bothalia 41: 41-82.
  • Garcia-Mendoza, A.J. & Meave, J.A. (eds.) (2012). Diversidad florística de Oaxaca: de musgos a angiospermas (colecciones y listas de especies), ed. 2: 1-351. Instituto de Biología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México.
  • Girmansyah, D. & al. (eds.) (2013). Flora of Bali an annotated checklist: 1-158. Herbarium Bogorensis, Indonesia.
  • Kitalong, A.H., DeMeo, R.A. & Holm, T. (2008). Native Trees Palau. A field guide: 1-236.
  • Nelson Sutherland, C.H. (2008). Catálogo de las plantes vasculares de Honduras. Espermatofitas: 1-1576. SERNA/Guaymuras, Tegucigalpa, Honduras.
  • Pandey, R.P. & Dilwakar, P.G. (2008). An integrated check-list flora of Andaman and Nicobar islands, India. Journal of Economic and Taxonomic Botany 32: 403-500.
  • Plunkett, G.M., Ranker, T.A., Sam, C. & Balick, M.J. (2022). Towards a checklist of the vascular flora of Vanuatu. Candollea 77: 105-118.
  • Tripathi, S. & Singh, K.K. (2006). Taxonomic revision of the genus Zingiber Boehm. in North-East India. Journal of Economic and Taxonomic Botany 30: 520-532.

Useful Plants and Fungi of Colombia

  • Bernal, R., Gradstein, S.R., & Celis, M. (eds.). (2020). Catálogo de Plantas y Líquenes de Colombia. v1.1. Universidad Nacional de Colombia. Dataset/Checklist. https://doi.org/10.15472/7avdhn
  • Burkill HM. (1995). The useful plants of west tropical Africa, Vols. 1-3. The useful plants of west tropical Africa, Vols 1-3.
  • Cámara-Leret, R., & Dennehy, Z. (2019). Information gaps in indigenous and local knowledge for science-policy assessments. Nature Sustainability 2:736-741.
  • Diazgranados et al. (2021). Catalogue of plants of Colombia. Useful Plants and Fungi of Colombia project. In prep.
  • Diazgranados, M., Allkin, B., Black N., Cámara-Leret, R., Canteiro C., Carretero J., Eastwood R., Hargreaves S., Hudson A., Milliken W., Nesbitt, M., Ondo, I., Patmore, K., Pironon, S., Turner, R., Ulian, T. (2020). World Checklist of Useful Plant Species. Produced by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Knowledge Network for Biocomplexity.
  • FPI (2021). Food Plants International. https://fms.cmsvr.com/fmi/webd/Food_Plants_World?homeurl=https://foodplantsinternational.com/plants/
  • GBIF.org (2021). GBIF species matching tool. https://www.gbif.org/tools/species-lookup
  • GRIN (2021). Germplasm Resources Information Network from the United States Department of Agriculture. https://www.ars-grin.gov/
  • IUCN (2021). The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2021-2. https://www.iucnredlist.org.
  • Instituto de Investigación de Recursos Biológicos Alexander von Humbodlt (2014). Plantas alimenticias y medicinales nativas de Colombia. 2567 registros, aportados por: Castellanos, C. (Contacto del recurso), Valderrama, N. (Creador del recurso, Autor), Bernal, Y. (Autor), García, N. (Autor). http://i2d.humboldt.org.co/ceiba/resource.do?r=ls_colombia_magnoliophyta_2014
  • Jansen, P., Lemmens, R., Oyen, L., Siemonsma, J., Stavast, F. & Van Valkenburg, J. (1991) Plant Resources of South-East Asia. Basic list of species and commodity grouping. Final version. Pudoc, Wageningen.
  • Medicinal Plant Names Services (MPNS) v.10 (2021); http://mpns.kew.org/
  • PROTA (2021). Plants Resources of Tropical Africa. https://prota4u.org/database/
  • Plants for malaria, plants for fever: Medicinal species in Latin America, a bibliographic survey: Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
  • RBG, Kew (2021). Kew Economic Botany Collection. https://ecbot.science.kew.org/
  • Ulian, T., Sacandé, M., Hudson, A., & Mattana, E. (2017). Conservation of indigenous plants to support community livelihoods: the MGU–Useful Plants Project. Journal of Environmental Planning and Management 60:668-683.
  • Willis, K.J. (ed.) (2017). State of the World’s Plants 2017. Report. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

Other Data

Other Kew resources that provide information on this taxon:

Date Reference Identified As Barcode Type Status Has image?
Japan K:SPC-66325.000 No
s.coll. [s.n.] K002429347 Yes
K:SPC-70000.501 No
Abraham, A. [3123] India K002428633 Yes
Castro, P.; Melegrito, F. [1497] Malaysia K002429004 Yes
s.coll. [Cat. no. 6564] India K001124208 Unknown Type Material Yes
Hallier, H.G. [B1983] K002429005 Yes
Westphal, E.; Westphal-Stevels, J.M.C. [9750] Cameroon K002429297 Yes
s.coll. [17417] Philippines K002429228 Yes
De Jong, W. [14] Peru K001890160 No
Prescott, T. A. K [22a] Papua New Guinea K001635583 Yes
Parham, J.W.; Parham, M.E.; Parham, D.J. [16947] Fiji K002429272 Yes
Cleghorn, H.F.C. [s.n.] India K002428629 Yes
Henry, A. [491] Taiwan K002428511 Yes
Blackwood, B. [192] Papua New Guinea K002429244 Yes
Ford, C. [s.n.] K002428505 Yes
Ford, C. [s.n.] K002428507 Yes
Bourne; [A. G. H.] [s.n.] India K002428632 Yes
Pollitt, G. [27435] Zimbabwe K002429308 Yes
Milliken, W. [2058] Brazil K001253871 Yes
Nordin, N.I. [s.n.] Malaysia K002428777 Yes
Ramos, M. [s.n.] Philippines K002429226 Yes
Conklin, H.C.; [B. Tindungan] [2554] Philippines K002429229 Yes
Sparrow, M.; Brewster, P. [VERA72A] Mexico K002429319 Yes
[W. Sadyar] [s.n.] K002429324 Yes
[L]. Bateson [138] Papua New Guinea K002429246 Yes
Louis, J.L.P. [13303] Congo, Democratic Republic of the K002429299 Yes
s.coll. [82] Papua New Guinea K002429248 Yes
Louis, J.L.P. [13303] Congo, Democratic Republic of the K002429298 Yes
Henry, A. [1575] K002428510 Yes
Deighton, F.C. [6017] Sierra Leone K002429295 Yes
Edgeworth [s.n.] K002428626 Yes
Ford, C. [s.n.] K002428506 Yes
Gamble, J.S. [25589] K002429348 Yes
J.J. [77] K002428625 Yes
Loher, A. [695] Philippines K002429227 Yes
Peekel, G. [32] Papua New Guinea K002429247 Yes
s.coll. [s.n.] Japan K002428508 Yes
Ruiz, J.; Campes, A.J. [1736] Peru K002429339 Yes
Baker, C.F. [101] Cuba K002429323 Yes
Rama Rao, M. [1550] India K002428630 Yes
Bateson, G. [66] Papua New Guinea K002429245 Yes
Powell, D.A.; Chey, H. [s.n.] K002429349 Yes
Dawe, M.T. [700] Colombia K002429338 Yes
China K:SPC-66310.000 No
s.coll. [s.n.] India K002428631 Yes
Hooker, J.D.; Thompson, T. [s.n.] India K002428627 Yes
Parham, J.W.; Parham, M.E.; Parham, D.J. [16947] Fiji K002429273 Yes
Wood, J.J. [s.n.] India K002428628 Yes
Baker, C.F. [101] Cuba K002429322 Yes
{Merrill} [1024] Philippines K002429225 Yes
Kulip, J. [SAN125903] Malaysia K002429003 Yes
Deighton, F.C. [2528] Sierra Leone K002429296 Yes
Malaysia K:SPC-66721.000 No
Conklin, H.C.; [B. Tindungan] [2554] Philippines K002429224 Yes
Broadway, W.E. [s.n.] Trinidad and Tobago K002429328 Yes
Broadway, W.E. [s.n.] Trinidad and Tobago K002429327 Yes
Broadway, W.E. [s.n.] Trinidad and Tobago K002429326 Yes
Correll, D.S. [12248] Panama K002429337 Yes
Sparrow, M.; Brewster, P.; Vera [VERA72] Mexico K002429320 Yes
Leon, C.J., Zhang,B., Lin, Y-L., Davis, A.P. & Shaw, D [TCMK 0020] China K001926719 No
[H.]; et al. [16007] K002429318 Yes
Moreau [AH8631] Tanzania K002429300 Yes
Blake, S.T. [23588] Australia K002429255 Yes
Estrada, A. [547] Costa Rica K002429321 Yes
s.coll. [s.n.] Japan K002428509 Yes
Theilade, I. [66] Malaysia Zingiber officinale var. rubrum K000255227 Isotype Yes
Jenang, K. [S58008] Malaysia Zingiber officinale var. rubrum K002429002 Yes
s.coll. [Cat. no. 6565] India Zingiber missionis K001124209 Unknown Type Material Yes

Sources

  • Angiosperm Extinction Risk Predictions v1

    • Angiosperm Threat Predictions
    • http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0

  • Catálogo de Plantas y Líquenes de Colombia

    • http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0

  • Herbarium Catalogue Specimens

    • 'The Herbarium Catalogue, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Published on the Internet http://www.kew.org/herbcat [accessed on Day Month Year]'. Please enter the date on which you consulted the system.
    • Digital Image © Board of Trustees, RBG Kew http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

  • IUCN Categories

    • IUCN Red List of Threatened Species
    • http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0

  • Kew Backbone Distributions

    • The International Plant Names Index and World Checklist of Vascular Plants 2025. Published on the Internet at http://www.ipni.org and https://powo.science.kew.org/
    • © Copyright 2023 World Checklist of Vascular Plants. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0

  • Kew Living Collection Database

    • Common Names from Plants and People Africa http://www.plantsandpeopleafrica.com/

  • Kew Names and Taxonomic Backbone

    • The International Plant Names Index and World Checklist of Vascular Plants 2025. Published on the Internet at http://www.ipni.org and https://powo.science.kew.org/
    • © Copyright 2023 International Plant Names Index and World Checklist of Vascular Plants. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0

  • Kew Science Photographs

    • Copyright applied to individual images

  • Kew Species Profiles

    • Kew Species Profiles
    • http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0

  • Universidad Nacional de Colombia

    • ColPlantA database
    • http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0

  • Useful Plants and Fungi of Colombia

    • http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0